ions only served to strengthen the
segregation pattern they so opposed. In the early weeks of the war a
conference of black editors, including Walter White, pressed for the
creation of an experimental integrated division of volunteers. White
argued that such a unit would lift black morale, "have a tremendous
psychological effect upon white America," and refute the enemy's
charge that "the United States talks about democracy but practices
racial discrimination and segregation."[2-28] The NAACP organized a
popular movement in support of the idea, which was endorsed by many
important individuals and organizations.[2-29] Yet this experiment was
unacceptable to the Army. Ignoring its experience with all-volunteer
paratroopers and other special units, the War Department declared that
the volunteer system was "an ineffective and dangerous" method of
raising combat units. Admitting that the integrated division might be
an encouraging gesture toward certain minorities, General Marshall
added that "the urgency of the present military situation necessitates
our using tested and proved methods of procedure, and using them with
all haste."[2-30]

[Footnote 2-28: Ltr, Walter White to Gen Marshall, 22
Dec 41, AG 291.21 (12-22-41).]

[Footnote 2-29: See C-279, 2, Volunteer Division
Folder, NAACP Collection, Manuscripts Division,
LC.]

[Footnote 2-30: Ltr, CofS to Dorothy Canfield Fisher,
16 Feb 42, OCS 20602-254.]

Even though it rejected the idea of a volunteer, integrated division,
the Army staff reviewed in the fall of 1942 a proposal for
the assignment of some black recruits to white units. The
Organization-Mobilization Group of G-3, headed by Col. Edwin W.
Chamberlain, argued that the Army General Classification Test scores
proved that black soldiers in groups were less useful to the Army than
white soldiers in groups. It was a waste of manpower, funds, and
equipment, therefore, to organize the increasingly large numbers of
black recruits into segregated units. Not only was such organization
wasteful, but segregation "aggravated if not caused in its entirety"
the racial friction that was already plaguing the Army. To avoid both
the waste and the strife, Chamberlain recommended that the Army halt
the activation of additional black units and integrate black recruits
in the low-score categories, IV