Executive Order 9981 — Military Desegregation
July 26, 1948 · 20th Century
On July 26, 1948, President Harry S. Truman signed Executive Order 9981, declaring equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed forces regardless of race, color, religion, or national origin. Issued under sustained pressure from civil rights leader A. Philip Randolph, who threatened a Black draft resistance campaign, the order dismantled the racially segregated military that had fought World War II. Full implementation took until the Korean War. It was the most significant federal civil rights action since Reconstruction and set the precedent for broader desegregation.
Key Figures
Harry S. TrumanA. Philip RandolphThurgood MarshallCharles Fahy
Locations
Washington, D.C.
Topics
civil rightsWorld War IIMilitarysegregationUSAafrican american historydesegregation
Connected Events — 4 Connections
Most significant federal civil rights action since Thirteenth Amendment Ratified
Set desegregation precedent that emboldened Brown v Board of Education
Established federal desegregation authority later codified in Civil Rights Act of 1964
Truman's 1948 Executive Order 9981 desegregating the military was a direct institutional response to the wartime racial injustice exemplified by Roosevelt's EO 9066, which had interned 120,000 Japanese Americans based solely on ancestry while Black soldiers served in segregated units Executive Order 9066 — Japanese American Internment
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