Cold War Civil Rights: Week 3 Notes
Cold War Civil Rights: Week 3 Notes
Overview
Today's focus: the dawn of the Cold War and its relationship to domestic racism, especially how Black and Mexican American veterans leveraged their service for civil rights.
Readings highlighted: Carol Anderson (UN appeal by the NAACP), Adam Goodman, Barney Gates, Andrew Hoover (these last two for next class).
Central idea: domestic racial discrimination became a critical problem for US foreign policy as the country sought to counter the spread of communism; civil rights advocacy reframed as a matter of international legitimacy and soft power.
The Global Context: Containment and Soft Power
Soft power defined in today’s discussion: influence built on culture, aid, diplomacy, and legitimacy rather than military force; persuasion and trust are key.
Quote from video: soft power is persuasion, not force, relying on trust and legitimacy.
Questions raised: after significant reductions in foreign aid under the Trump administration, could China turn the aid vacuum into a soft power advantage via initiatives like the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)?
Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) (China’s global development strategy):
Beijing pledged billions to fund infrastructure and development in Africa and beyond.
Investment scale: over 2.4 imes 10^{11} dollars in the first ten years of BRI.
China’s approach emphasizes market access and technology transfer, aiming for long-term strategic influence rather than quick geopolitical wins.
Risks: large-scale debt can become unsustainable; requires better watchdog capacity to ensure wise use of funds.
China’s global standing vs. the US:
According to Gallup data cited, China’s popularity in Africa has grown, at times slightly surpassing the US.
Some Africans praise Chinese investment, but concerns persist about inferior goods, labor/right violations, and business practices.
China is not simply replacing the US as the largest bilateral donor, but it is building influence through different mechanisms (infrastructure, trade, and investment).
Relevance to US history:
The week’s theme connects soft power with civil rights: the US sought to project a democratic, free-world image abroad while facing domestic racial discrimination at home.
The Cold War Framework: Early Containment, Domestic Tensions
Core foreign policy pillars that defined containment in the late 1940s:
Truman Doctrine ( 1947 ): U.S. would support free peoples resisting subjugation by armed minorities or outside pressures, expanding involvement beyond the Western Hemisphere (e.g., Greece and Turkey).
Marshall Plan ( 1948 ): billions in financial aid to Western Europe to aid recovery and bolster markets for US trade; funding circulated back into the US economy via purchases of coal, food, machinery.
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, established 1949): alliance with US, Canada, Iceland, and nine European nations to deter Soviet influence militarily.
Together, these initiatives formed the containment strategy to curb communism using military and economic tools.
Global independence movements post-WWII:
Independence movements in Africa and Asia necessitated balancing democracy promotion with maintaining strategic ties to colonial powers (British and French examples).
Domestic balance for Truman:
Truman had to contend with nonwhite demands for democracy at home while maintaining alliance with segregationist Southern Democrats who controlled Congress.
The ideal of American equality and diversity was under international scrutiny during the Cold War.
Key personnel and attitudes shaping policy:
George Kennan (State Department): advocated containment; held biased views against Africans, Asians, women, and Blacks; believed these groups were more susceptible to communist influence.
John Foster Dulles (later Secretary of State): also espoused biased views about the Asian “oriental mind” and the inferiority of non-white populations.
These racial biases helped justify postwar foreign policy imperatives.
Civil Rights in the Postwar Era: Violence, Activism, and Legal Pressure
African American veterans returning home faced renewed racial violence and segregation despite fighting for democracy abroad.
Notable cases and phenomena:
Isaac Woodard case (Spring 1946): a Black Army sergeant returning home was brutally beaten by South Carolina police, leaving him permanently blind; federal investigation followed, but an all-white jury acquitted the police chief.
The Woodard incident helped galvanize civil rights activism; it intensified calls for federal action against mob violence.
The Longoria affair (Felix Longoria): Mexican American veteran from Three Rivers, Texas; after fighting in the Philippines, his wake in a local funeral home was refused due to racial segregation; his burial eventually occurred at Arlington National Cemetery in 1969? actually 1949.
Timeline and details:
Longoria born in April 1920 in Three Rivers, TX.
Fought in WWII; killed in the Philippines in 1945; body returned to the U.S. in 1948 and interred in Arlington in 1949 after advocacy from Dr. Hector P. Garcia (American GI Forum) and Senator Lyndon B. Johnson.
The case highlighted the systemic segregation in small-town burial practices and served as a catalyst for Mexican American civil rights organizing.
Three Rivers cemetery segregation:
Town officials divided the cemetery between “Mexican” and “White” sections; a fence separated the sections; families described hypocrisy and resistance to change in the community’s racial order.
The Longoria family’s experience demonstrated the national implications of local racism and the push to desegregate veteran memorial practices.
Civil rights advocacy and white responses:
Local resistance to desegregation and to Mexican American civic activism persisted, illustrating deep-seated racial hierarchies in many communities.
The Longoria affair shows how local arrangements reinforced systemic discrimination, while national organizers reframed the issue within a broader civil rights movement.
The Presidential Reaction and Civil Rights Policy: 1947–1948
Truman’s civil rights committee and the national response:
President Truman established a civil rights agenda in response to growing domestic unrest.
The President’s Committee on Civil Rights (PCCR) conducted a national study and produced a report, titled When Will We Be Free? Actually the official commission was the President's Committee on Civil Rights (PCCR) report: To Secure These Rights (1947).
Key findings of the PCCR report:
Documented widespread discrimination in employment, police brutality, health disparities, mob violence, and political repression.
Proposed sweeping policy recommendations across civil rights enforcement, voting rights, immigration reform, equal employment, and more.
The report argued desegregation of the armed forces and federal workforce as a core immediate reform.
Despite ambitious recommendations, congressional action was limited by strong Southern opposition.
Executive Orders on desegregation (July 1948):
Executive Order 9980 (civil service) and Executive Order 9981 (desegregation of the armed forces) signed by President Truman.
These orders desegregated the federal workforce and the military, a landmark step but controversial within the Democratic Party’s Southern wing.
Political realignment within the Democratic Party:
The 1948 Democratic National Convention featured a split between Northern/Midwestern Democrats supporting civil rights policies and Southern segregationists who walked out and formed the States’ Rights Democratic Party (Dixiecrats).
Strom Thurmond carried 39 electoral votes, winning South Carolina, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Alabama.
Despite the Dixiecrat defection, Truman won the 1948 election, but the realignment intensified.
The Dixiecrat movement highlighted the ongoing tension between federal civil rights policy and states’ rights arguments, foreshadowing later political realignments in the U.S. South.
The 1940s as a turning point:
The period marks a transition in party coalitions and a shift toward a more formidable civil rights agenda that would evolve through the 1950s and 1960s.
Civil Rights and International Law: The UN Appeals and Black Leadership
Carol Anderson’s analysis (as discussed in the lecture):
Black leaders used international forums to push for civil rights, arguing that American racial policies undermined foreign policy goals and the legitimacy of the United States on the world stage.
The NAACP and NNC appeals to the United Nations (1946–1947):
NAACP issued an appeal to the world on 10/23/1947 titled “An Appeal to the World,” to the UN, asserting violations of African American human rights and calling out violent repression, lynching, and economic subordination.
The NNC (National Negro Congress) also engaged the UN as part of a strategy to frame Jim Crow as a human rights issue.
The UN was newly empowered after its 1945 founding and the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
W. E. B. Du Bois played a principal role as editor in the NAACP’s appeal; the document linked domestic racial injustice to global human rights norms.
The U.S. delegation’s response:
The U.S. delegation to the UN did not support the NAACP’s call for investigations into U.S. civil rights abuses; the Soviet Union, however, supported the appeal and urged UN action against racial violence.
The UN’s UDHR (ratified in the context of postwar human rights norms) heightened international scrutiny of U.S. civil rights practices.
The purpose and effect of international exposure:
Civil rights groups sought to pressure the U.S. government by leveraging international legitimacy rather than to compel international enforcement.
Soft power: civil rights advocacy helped brand the U.S. as a democracy committed to universal rights, at stake in the global ideological competition with the Soviet Union.
The role of psychologists and social scientists:
Kenneth B. Clark argued that the international stage made racists defensive, as global audiences observed domestic discrimination.
Upcoming discussion: the next lecture will cover how the U.S. government’s anti-communist stance sometimes repressed civil rights activism, illustrating the darker side of Cold War policy.
Key Concepts and Terms from Today
Cold War Civil Rights: The intersection of postwar international competition against communism and domestic racial inequality in the United States.
Containment: U.S. policy to prevent the spread of communism globally through military and economic means (Truman Doctrine, Marshall Plan, NATO).
Soft power: The ability to shape the preferences of others through appeal and attraction rather than coercion, heavily influenced by U.S. civil rights image abroad.
Double victory: The demand that Black and Mexican American veterans gain full citizenship rights at home in addition to victory against fascism abroad.
UN and human rights framework: The use of international institutions to elevate domestic civil rights concerns (UN appeals by NAACP and NNC; UDHR in 1948).
Desegregation milestones: EO 9980 and 9981 (July 1948)) desegregating federal workforce and the armed forces.
The Longoria Affair: Local segregation in a cemetery, national advocacy by Mexican American veterans, and the federal reassessment of veterans’ rights.
The Woodard case: Police violence against a Black veteran and the limits of federal enforcement in the South.
-Political realignment: The 1948 Dixiecrat challenge and the broader shift in party coalitions around civil rights policy, foreshadowing later realignments.Economic aid and influence: USAID’s role in postwar development and the current global context of aid as a tool of soft power (video discussion).
Timeline of Major Events (Key Dates)
1945: End of World War II; seeds of Cold War competition.
1946: Isaac Woodard incident in South Carolina; federal investigation initiated.
1947: Truman Doctrine announced; Marshall Plan launched in the following year; PCCR report To Secure These Rights published in 1947.
10/23/1947: NAACP issues an appeal to the United Nations.
1948: Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) process culminating in ratification by the UN General Assembly; Executive Orders 9980 and 9981 desegregating federal workforce and the armed forces signed by Truman in July.
1948: Dixiecrat walkout from the Democratic Convention, Strom Thurmond carries 39 electoral votes.
1949: NATO established.
1949-1950: Felix Longoria buried in Arlington National Cemetery in 1949 after national advocacy; the Longoria affair highlights Mexican American civil rights struggles.
1961: USAID founded under President Kennedy as a central component of Cold War policy (context video discussion).
1948-1949: Ongoing civil rights activism and international advocacy influences U.S. foreign policy strategies.
Connections to Foundational Principles and Real-World Relevance
Foundational principles:
Interconnectedness of domestic and international policy: racial discrimination at home directly affected foreign policy legitimacy and soft power abroad.
Moral credibility matters in global leadership: the U.S. sought to present itself as a beacon of democracy while grappling with Jim Crow at home.
Real-world relevance:
The lectures foreground how racial justice movements informed and were instrumental to the broader anti-communist ideological competition of the Cold War era.
The ongoing discussion about soft power, aid, and international influence remains pertinent in contemporary geopolitics, including debates over foreign aid strategies and the Belt and Road Initiative.
Notable Figures and Primary Sources Mentioned
Harry S. Truman: President; pushed civil rights reforms despite political risk; issued Executive Orders 9980 and 9981 (July 1948).
George F. Kennan: State Department advisor; advocate of containment; espoused biased views about nonwhite populations.
John Foster Dulles: Early foreign policy adviser and later Secretary of State; bias against Asians cited.
W. E. B. Du Bois: Editor of the NAACP’s UN appeal; argued that internal injustice undermines national legitimacy.
Dr. Hector P. Garcia: Founder of the American GI Forum; organized Felix Longoria’s case.
Lyndon B. Johnson: Responded to Longoria case and supported veteran rights.
Felix Longoria: Mexican American WWII veteran; burial controversy sparked civil rights activism.
Isaac Woodard: Black WWII veteran whose assault catalyzed civil rights attention.
Carol Anderson: Scholar focusing on UN appeals and the global audience for U.S. civil rights.
Quick Summary of Key Takeaways
The early Cold War era forced U.S. policymakers to confront the paradox of promoting democracy abroad while tolerating racial discrimination at home.
Civil rights activism leveraged international forums (the UN) to argue that racial injustice undermined U.S. foreign policy legitimacy and soft power.
Domestic policy developments (PCCR report, To Secure These Rights; EO 9980, 9981) reflected a growing federal commitment to desegregation and civil rights, even as opposition from Southern Democrats created political tensions.
The Longoria and Woodard cases illustrate how local injustice had national and international implications, shaping the narrative around American democracy and its global image.
Contemporary discussions of aid and soft power (USAID, China’s BRI) echo the enduring relevance of soft power as a tool of national influence, especially in a multipolar world.