Fahy made his prediction before Secretary of Defense Johnson took a course of action that, in effect, rendered the committee's position untenable. On 30 September Johnson received from Gray a new program for the employment of black troops. Without reference to the Fahy Committee, Johnson approved the proposal and announced it to the press. Gray's program opened all military occupational specialties to all qualified men, abolished racial quotas for the Army's schools, and abolished racially separate promotion systems and standards. But it also specifically called for retention of the racial quota on enlistments and conspicuously failed to provide for the assignment of black specialists beyond those jobs already provided by the old Gillem Board policy.[14-86] Secretary Gray had asked for Fahy's personal approval before forwarding the plan discussed by the two men at such length, but Fahy refused; he wanted the plan submitted to his full committee. When Johnson received the plan he did not consult the committee at all, although he briefly referred it to the acting chairman of the Personnel Policy Board, who interposed no objection.[14-87]
It is not difficult to understand Johnson's reasons for ignoring the President's committee. He had been forced to endure public criticism over the protracted negotiations between the Army and the committee. Among liberal elements on Capitol Hill, his position—that his directive and the service replies made legislation to prohibit segregation in the services unnecessary—was obviously being compromised by the lack of an acceptable Army response.[14-88] In a word, the argument over civil rights in the armed forces had become a political liability for Louis Johnson, and he wanted it out of the way. Glossing over the Army's truculence, Johnson blamed the committee and its recommendations for his problem, and when his frontal assault on the committee failed—Kenworthy reported that the secretary tried to have the committee disbanded—he had to devise another approach.[14-89] The Army's new proposal, a more reasonable-sounding document than its predecessor, provided him with a convenient opportunity. Why not quickly approve the program, thereby presenting the committee with a fait accompli and leaving the President with little excuse for prolonging the civil rights negotiations?
Unfortunately for Johnson the gambit failed. While Fahy admitted that the Army's newest proposal was an improvement, for several reasons he could not accept it. The assignment of black specialists to white units was a key part of the committee's program, and despite Gray's private assurances that specialists would be integrated, Fahy was not prepared to accept the Army's "equivocal" language on this subject. There was also the issue of the quota, still very much alive between the committee and the Army. The committee was bound, furthermore, to resent being ignored in the approval process. Fahy and his associates had been charged by the President with advising the services on equality of treatment and opportunity, and they were determined to be heard.[14-90] Fahy informed the White House that the committee would review the Army's proposal in an extraordinary meeting. He asked that the President meanwhile refrain from comment.[14-91]
The committee's stand received support from the black press and numerous national civil rights organizations, all of which excoriated the Army's position.[14-92] David K. Niles, the White House adviser on racial matters, warned President Truman about the rising controversy and predicted that the committee would again reject the Army's proposal. He advised the President to tell the press that Johnson's news release was merely a "progress report," that it was not final, and that the committee was continuing its investigation.[14-93] The President did just that, adding: "Eventually we will reach, I hope, what we contemplated in the beginning. You can't do it all at once. The progress report was a good report, and it isn't finished yet."[14-94] And lest his purpose remain unclear, the President declared that his aim was the racial integration of the Army.
The President's statement signaled a victory for the committee; its extent became apparent only when the Army tried to issue a new circular, revising its Gillem Board policy along the lines of the outline plan approved by Johnson on 30 September. During the weeks of protracted negotiations that followed, the committee clearly remained in control, its power derived basically from its willingness to have the differences between the committee and the Army publicized and the reluctance of the White House to have it so. The attitudes toward publicity were already noticeable when, on 11 October, Fahy suggested to Truman some possible solutions to the impasse between the committee and the Army. The Secretary of Defense could issue a supplementary statement on the Army's assignment policy, the committee could release its recommendations to the press, or the Army and the committee could resume discussions.[14-95]
President Truman ordered his military aide to read the committee's 11 October suggestion and "then take [it] up with Johnson."[14-96] As a result the Secretary of Defense retired from the controversy. Reminding Gray through intermediaries that he had approved the Army's plan in outline form, Johnson declared that it was "inappropriate" for him to approve the plan's publication as an Army circular as the Army had requested.[14-97] About the same time, Niles informed the Army that any revision of Circular 124 would have to be submitted to the White House before publication, and he candidly admitted that presidential approval would depend on the views of the Fahy Committee.[14-98] Meanwhile, his assistant, Philleo Nash, predicting that the committee would win both the assignment and quota arguments, persuaded Fahy to postpone any public statement until after the Army's revised circular had been reviewed by the committee.[14-99]
Chairman Fahy was fully aware of the leverage these actions gave his committee, although he and his associates now had few illusions about the speedy end to the contest. "I know from the best authority within P&A," Kenworthy warned the committee, that the obstructionists in Army Personnel hoped to see the committee submit final recommendations—"what its recommendations are they don't much care"—and then disband. Until the committee disbanded, its opponents would try to block any real change in Army policy.[14-100] Kenworthy offered in evidence the current controversy over the Army's instructions to its field commanders. These instructions, a copy of the outline plan approved by Secretary Johnson, had been sent to the commanders by The Adjutant General on 1 October as "additional policies" pending a revision of Circular 124.[14-101] Included in the message, of course, was Gray's order to open all military occupational specialties to Negroes; but when some commanders, on the basis of their interpretation of the message, began integrating black specialists in white units, officials in the Personnel and Administration and the Organization and Training Divisions dispatched a second message on 27 October specifically forbidding such action "except on Department of Army orders."[14-102] Negroes would continue to be authorized for assignment to black units, the message explained, and to "Negro spaces in T/D [overhead] units." In effect, the Army staff was ordering commanders to interpret the secretary's plan in its narrowest sense, blocking any possibility of broadening the range of black assignments.
Kenworthy was able to turn this incident to the committee's advantage. He made a practice of never locking his Pentagon office door nor his desk drawer. He knew that Negroes, both civilian and military, worked in the message centers, and he suspected that if any hanky-panky was afoot they would discover it and he would be anonymously apprised of it. A few days after the dispatch of the second message, Kenworthy opened his desk drawer to find a copy. For the first and only time, he later explained, he broke his self-imposed rule of relying on negotiations between the military and the committee and its staff in camera. He laid both messages before a long-time friend of his, the editor of the Washington Post's editorial page.[14-103] Thus delivered to the press, the second message brought on another round of accusations, corrections, and headlines to the effect that "The Brass Gives Gray the Run-Around." Kenworthy was able to denounce the incident as a "step backward" that even violated the Gillem Board policy by allocating "Negro spaces" in overhead units. The Army staff's second message nullified the committee's recommendations since they depended ultimately on the unlimited assignment of black specialists. The message demonstrated very well, Kenworthy told the committee, that careful supervision of the Army's racial policy would be necessary.[14-104] Some newspapers were less charitable. The Pittsburgh Courier charged that the colonel blamed for the release of the second message had been made the "goat" in a case that involved far more senior officials, and the Washington Post claimed that the message "vitiates" even the limited improvements outlined in the Army's plan as approved by Secretary Johnson. The paper called on Secretary Gray to assert himself in the case.[14-105]
A furious secretary, learning of the second message from the press stories, did enter the case. Branding the document a violation of his announced policy, he had it rescinded and, publicizing a promise made earlier to the committee, announced that qualified black specialists would be assigned to some white units.[14-106] At the same time Gray was not prepared to admit that the incident demonstrated how open his plan was to evasion, just as he refused to admit that his rescinding of the errant message represented a change in policy. He would continue, in effect, the plan approved by the Secretary of Defense on 30 September, he told Fahy.[14-107]
The Army staff's draft revision of the Gillem Board circular, sent to the committee on 25 November, reflected Gray's 30 September plan.[14-108] In short, when it emerged from its journey through the various Army staff agencies, the proposed revision still contained none of the committee's key recommendations. It continued the severe restrictions on the assignment of Negroes who had specialty training; it specifically retained the numerical quota; and, with several specific exceptions, it carefully preserved the segregation of Army life.[14-109] Actually, the proposed revision amounted to little more than a repetition of the Gillem Board policy with minor modifications designed to make it easier to carry out. Fahy quickly warned the Deputy Director of Personnel and Administration that there was no chance of its winning the committee's approval.[14-110]