hites. Since the majority of marines served in the
ground units of the Fleet Marine Force, organized like the Army in
regiments, battalions, and squadrons with tables of organization and
equipment, the formation of racially separate units presented no great
problem.

Although the Marine Corps was similar to the Army in organization, it
was very different in size and tradition. With a postwar force of
little more than 100,000 men, the corps was hardly able to guarantee
its segregated Negroes equal treatment and opportunity in terms of
specialized training and variety of assignment. Again in contrast to
the Army and Navy with their long tradition of Negroes in service, the
Marine Corps, with a few unauthorized exceptions, had been an
exclusively white organization since 1798. This habit of racial
exclusion was strengthened by those feelings of intimacy and
fraternity natural to any small bureaucracy. In effect the marines
formed a small club in which practically everybody knew everybody else
and was reluctant to admit strangers.[6-48] Racial exclusion often
warred with the corps' clear duty to provide the fair and equal
service for all Americans authorized by the Secretary of the Navy. At
one point the commandant, General Alexander Vandegrift, even had (p. 171)
to remind his local commanders that black marines would in fact be
included in the postwar corps.[6-49]

[Footnote 6-48: See USMC Oral History Interviews, Lt
Gen James L. Underhill, 25 Mar 68, and Lt Gen Ray
A. Robinson, 18 Mar 68, both in Hist Div, HQMC.]

[Footnote 6-49: Memo, CO, 26th Marine Depot Co.,
Fifth Service Depot, Second FMF, Pacific, for CMC,
2 Nov 45, with Inds, sub: Information Concerning
Peacetime Colored Marine Corps, Request for; Memos,
CMC for CG, FMF (Pacific), et al., 11 Dec 45, sub:
Voluntary Enlistments, Negro Marines, in Regular
Marine Corps, Assignment of Quotas; idem for Cmdr,
MCAB, Cherry Point, N.C., et al., 14 Dec 45. Unless
otherwise noted, all documents cited in this
section are located in Hist Div, HQMC.]

One other factor influenced the policy deliberations of the Marine
Corps: its experiences with black marines during World War II.
Overshadowing the praise commanders gave the black d