r.

Yet if it was ignored in Congress, the order was nevertheless a clear
signal to the friends of integration and brought with it a tremendous
surge of hope to the black community. Publishing the order made Harry
Truman the "darling of the Negroes," Roy Wilkins said later. Nor did
the coincidence of its publication to the election, he added, bother a
group that was becoming increasingly pragmatic about the reasons (p. 316)
for social reform.[13-1] Both the declaredly Democratic Chicago
_Defender_ and Republican-oriented Pittsburgh _Courier_ were aware of
the implications of the order. The _Defender_ ran an editorial on 7
August under the heading "Mr. Truman Makes History." The "National
Grapevine" column of Charlie Cherokee in the same issue promised its
readers a blow-by-blow description of the events surrounding the
President's action. An interview in the same issue with Col. Richard
L. Jones, black commander of the 178th Regimental Combat Team
(Illinois), emphasized the beneficial effects of the proposed
integration, and in the next issue, 14 August, the editor broadened
the discussion with an editorial entitled "What About Prejudice?"[13-2]
The _Courier_, for its part, questioned the President's sincerity
because he had not explicitly called for an end to segregation. At the
same time it contrasted the futility of civil disobedience with the
efficiency of such an order on the services, and while maintaining its
support for the candidacy of Governor Dewey the paper revealed a
strong enthusiasm for President Truman's civil rights program.[13-3]

[Footnote 13-1: Columbia University Oral Hist Interv
with Wilkins.]

[Footnote 13-2: Chicago _Defender_, August 7 and
August 14, 1948.]

[Footnote 13-3: Pittsburgh _Courier_, August 7, August
28, and September 25, 1948.]

These affirmations of support for Executive Order 9981 in the major
black newspapers fitted in neatly with the administration's political
strategy. Nor was the Democratic National Committee averse to using
the order to win black votes. For example it ran a half-page
advertisement in the _Defender_ under the heading "By His Deeds Shall
Ye Know Him."[13-4] At the same time, not wishing to antagonize the
opponents of integration further, the administration made no special
effort to publicize the order in the metropolitan press. Consequently,