President Biden’s appearance and remarks at the Truman Civil Rights Symposium may not have received headline treatment by the mainstream press, but it was one of his most important speeches on the accomplishments of minorities in the military.
Since the event last Thursday was hosted by the Truman Library Institute in D.C., he praised Truman for passing Executive Order 9981, which prohibited discrimination in the military based on race, color, religion, or national origin. He also used the occasion to chastise Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama and the GOP for not allowing numerous military promotions to pass as retribution for the Defense Department allowing paid leave for abortions.
Biden made special mention of the heroic deeds of the Harlem Hellfighters during World War I, “an all-Black regiment that spent 191 days on the front, longer than any unit of its size in history.” They, he said, were a link “in a distinguished line of ancestors and descendants, enslaved and free, risking their lives in every war since our founding for ideals they hadn’t fully known on American soil: equality.”
He cited the combat bravery and success of the Tuskegee Airmen, who flew “more than 15,000 sorties into battle.” Among the long line of African Americans who have been outstanding in their service to the nation, he invoked Lloyd Austin, a decorated four-star general and “the first-ever Black Secretary of Defense. He wanted to be here tonight, but he’s traveling to the Indo-Pacific to strengthen our security ties in the region.”
In concluding his salute to Black soldiers, Biden said, “Let me close with this: In June 1865, a major general from the Union Army arrived in Galveston, Texas, to enforce the Emancipation Proclamation and free the last enslaved Americans from bondage.” He reflected on what is now the Juneteenth holiday, the first “federal holiday since Dr. Martin Luther King Day, nearly 40 years ago…To think enslaved people remained shackled two years after the Emancipation. To think how many long nights they looked at the light of the North Star to keep the faith that despite America’s original sin of slavery, this nation could be saved.”
He said it was time for us “to reflect and to repair”—and that process, Mr. President, begins with you.