and service prescribed in subsection (b), if he is
acceptable to the land or naval forces for such training and
service.[1-25]

[Footnote 1-25: 54 _U.S. Stat._ 885(1940).]

The Wagner amendment was aimed at _volunteers_ for military service.
Congressman Hamilton Fish, also of New York, later introduced a
similar measure in the House aimed at _draftees_. The Fish (p. 012)
amendment passed the House by a margin of 121 to 99 and emerged intact
from the House-Senate conference. The law finally read that in the
selection and training of men and execution of the law "there shall be
no discrimination against any person on account of race or color."[1-26]

[Footnote 1-26: Ibid. Fish commanded black troops in
World War I. Captain of Company K, Fifteenth New
York National Guard (Colored), which subsequently
became the 369th Infantry, Fish served in the much
decorated 93d Division in the French sector of the
Western Front.]

[Illustration: HEROES OF THE 369TH INFANTRY. _Winners of the Croix de
Guerre arrive in New York Harbor, February 1919._]

The Fish amendment had little immediate impact upon the services'
racial patterns. As long as official policy permitted separate draft
calls for blacks and whites and the officially held definition of
discrimination neatly excluded segregation--and both went unchallenged
in the courts--segregation would remain entrenched in the armed
forces. Indeed, the rigidly segregated services, their ranks swollen
by the draft, were a particular frustration to the civil rights forces
because they were introducing some black citizens to racial
discrimination more pervasive than any they had ever endured in
civilian life. Moreover, as the services continued to open bases
throughout the country, they actually spread federally sponsored
segregation into areas where it had never before existed with the
force of law. In the long run, however, the 1940 draft law and
subsequent draft legislation had a strong influence on the armed
forces' racial policies. They created a climate in which progress
could be made toward integration within the services. Although not
apparent in 1940, the pressure of a draft-induced flood of black (p. 013)
conscripts was to be a principal factor in the separate decisions of
the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps to integrate their uni