It was the use to which these definitions were put more than their number that had concerned civil rights leaders since the 1950's. Under pressure from civil rights organizations, some congressmen, and the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the services began to abandon some of the least justifiable uses of racial designations, principally those used on certain inductees' travel orders, reassignment orders, and reserve rosters.[22-58] But change was not widespread, and as late as 1963 the services still distinguished by race in their basic personnel records, casualty reports, statistical and command strength reports, personnel control files, and over twenty-five other departmental forms.[22-59] They continued to defend the use of racial designations on the grounds that measurement of equal opportunity programs and detection of discrimination patterns depended on accurate racial data.[22-60] Few could argue with these motives, although critics continued to question the need for race designations on records that were used in assignment and promotion processes. When public opposition developed to the use of racial entries on federal forms in general, the President's Committee on Equal Opportunity appointed a subcommittee in 1963 under Civil Service Chairman John W. Macy, Jr., to investigate. After much deliberation this group conducted a statistical experiment within the Department of Agriculture to discover whether employees could be identified by racial groups in a confidential manner separate from other personnel data.[22-61]
Supplying the Seventh Fleet.
USS Procyon crewmen rig netload of supplies for a warship.
The civil rights staff of the Defense Department was also interested in further limiting the use of race in departmental forms. In April 1963 Assistant Secretary Paul ordered a review of military personnel records and reporting forms to determine where racial entries were included unnecessarily.[22-62] His review uncovered twenty-five forms used in common by the services and the Office of the Secretary of Defense that contained racial designations. On 3 March 1964 Paul discreetly ordered the removal of race designations on all but nine of these forms, those concerning biostatistical, criminal, and casualty figures.[22-63] His order did not, however, extend to another group of forms used by individual services for their own purposes, and later in the year Fitt drafted an order that would have eliminated all racial designations in the services except an entry for data processing systems and one for biostatistical information. The directive also would have allowed racial designations on forms that did not identify individuals, arranged for the disposition of remains and casualty reporting, described fugitives and other "wanted" types, and permitted other exceptions granted at the level of the Assistant Secretary of Defense or that of the service secretary. Finally it would have set up a system for purging existing records and removing photographs from promotion board selection folders.[22-64] The services strongly objected to a purge of existing records on the grounds of costliness, and they were particularly opposed to the removal of photographs. Photographs were traditional and remained desirable, Deputy Under Secretary of the Army Roy K. Davenport explained, because they were useful in portraying individual physical characteristics unrelated to race.[22-65] Davenport added, however, that photographs could be eliminated from promotion board materials.
These proposals marked a high point in the effort to simplify and reduce the use of racial designations by the Department of Defense. Although several versions of Fitt's 1964 draft order were discussed in later years, none was ever published.[22-66] Nor did the Bureau of the Budget, to which the matter was referred for the development of a government-wide policy, publish any instructions. In fact, by the mid-1960's an obvious trend had begun in the Department of Defense toward broader use of racial indicators but narrower definition of race.
Several changes in American society were responsible for the changes. The need for more exact racial documentation overcame the argument for removing racial designations, for the civil rights experts both within and outside the department demanded more detailed racial statistics to protect and enlarge the equal opportunity gains of the sixties. The demand was also supported by representatives of the smaller racial minorities who, joining in the civil rights revolution, developed a self-awareness that made detailed racial and ethnic statistics mandatory. The shift was made possible to a great extent by the change in public opinion toward racial minorities. As one civil rights official later noted, the change in attitude had caused black servicemen to reconsider their belief that detrimental treatment necessarily followed racial identification.[22-67] Ironically, just a decade after the McNamara directive on equal opportunity, a departmental civil rights official, himself a Negro, was defending the use of photographs in the selection process on the grounds that such procedures were necessary in any large organization where individuals were relatively unknown to their superiors.[22-68] So strong had the services' need for black officers become, it could be argued, that a promotion board's knowledge of a candidate's race redounded to the advantage of the black applicants. For whatever reason, the pressure to eliminate racial indicators from personnel forms had largely disappeared at the end of the 1960's.
The Gesell Committee's investigations also forced the Department of Defense to consider the possibility of discrimination in the rarefied area of embassy and special mission assignments and the certainty of discrimination against black servicemen in local communities near some overseas bases. Concerning the former, the staff of the civil rights deputy concluded that such assignments were voluntary and based on special selection procedures. Race was not a factor except for three countries where assignments were "based on politically ethnic considerations."[22-69] Nevertheless, Fitt began to discuss with the services ways to attract more qualified black volunteers for assignments to attaché, mission, and military assistance groups.
The department was less responsive to the Gesell Committee's recommendations on racial restrictions encountered off base overseas. The services, traditionally, had shunned consideration of this matter, citing their role as guests. When the Department of Defense outlined the commander's responsibility regarding off-base discrimination overseas, it expressly authorized commanders to impose sanctions in foreign communities, yet just five weeks later the services clarified the order for the press, explaining that sanctions would be limited to the United States.[22-70] A spokesman for the U.S. Army in Germany admitted that discrimination continued in restaurants and bars, adding that such discrimination was illegal in Germany and was limited to the lowest class establishments.[22-71] Supporting these conclusions was a spate of newspaper reports of segregated establishments in certain areas of Okinawa and the neighborhood around an Army barracks near Frankfurt, Germany.[22-72]
Despite these continuing press reports, the services declared in mid-1965 that the "overwhelming majority" of overseas installations were free of segregation problems in housing or public accommodations. One important exception to this overwhelming majority was reported by General Paul Freeman, the commander of U.S. Army Forces in Europe. He not only admitted that the problem existed in his command but also concluded that it had been imported from the United States. The general had met with Gerhard Gesell and subsequently launched a special troop indoctrination program in Europe on discrimination in public accommodations. He also introduced a voluntary compliance program to procure open housing.[22-73]