The Air Force's Black DEI Myths

Integration of the Armed Services Fixed Everything

"Let me set the stage by saying… the military services continue to be one of the most meritocratic organizations in the United States, thanks to the principles established by President Truman in Executive Order 9981: That there shall be equal treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin.' These principles enabled me, a working-class kid from Indiana, to be the first in my family to go to college and join the Navy."
Congressman Tim Banks of Indiana

      In the previous chapter, Congressman Banks said two things that need to be re-examined. One of the things he said was not true, and the other is an enduring aspect of DEI mythology. The first thing that he said was that President Truman's executive order "enabled" him as "a working-class kid from Indiana, to be the first in my family to go to college and join the Navy." With all due respect to the Congressman's working-class roots, it was already possible for white working-class men to go to college and join the Navy in the 1940s. President Truman's order desegregated the Armed Forces. As far as the Navy is concerned, it was the slowest to integrate its officer corps, even after President Truman issued his order to desegregate the Armed Forces.

"In addition, said the Civil Rights Commission, the armed forces should eliminate the last traces of segregation from within the services. The Navy might require special attention, for it seemed to have "shown little or no improvement" since World War II."

"By the end of 1973, there were twelve black generals in the Army, three in the Air Force, and one flag officer in the Navy."

"Of all the services the Navy, with just one black admiral, reacted the most vigorously to the racial problems that surfaced during the Vietnam conflict. Although described by Rowan as "always a bit backward, racially speaking,"19 the naval service had changed since he earned his commission in 1944 and now moved quickly forward. Samuel L. Gravely, Jr., who in 1971 became the first black to attain flag rank, lacked the seniority to alter naval policy. The leader in the campaign against racism was a white officer, Admiral Elmo R. Zumwalt, sworn in as Chief of Naval Operations in June 1970. The new Chief of Naval Operations fired a broadside of directives, called Z-grams, designed to banish "Mickey Mouse"-a term that embraced every form of petty harassment and excessive regulation that made life in the Navy unattractive. Included in the category were prohibitions against growing beards and senseless restrictions on the kind of clothing that could be worn off duty by sailors or members of their families. Zumwalt realized, however, that racial discrimination had an impact far more devastating than the annoyance caused by pointless rules. The admiral had become aware of this while assigned to the Bureau of Personnel; there he discovered that black officers, of whom there were very few, routinely received assignments that afforded little or no opportunity for promotion."

     Congressman Banks said, "Thanks to the principles established by President Truman in Executive Order 9981: That there shall be equal treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin…the military services continue to be one of the most meritocratic organizations in the United States." The notion that proclaiming from the rooftops, even from the Oval Office, "that there shall be equal treatment for all" does not make it so. It is one of the enduring myths of DEI in the military. If you don't agree, let's take a look at a similar proclamation that you may also be familiar with:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it…"

On July 4th, 1776, the Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence, which proclaimed that "all men were created equal." Slavery in America started in 1619 but wasn't outlawed until 1863 in the Emancipation Proclamation, of which news didn't reach parts of Texas until Jun 19th, 1865:

"Juneteenth (short for "June Nineteenth") marks the day when federal troops arrived in Galveston, Texas in 1865 to take control of the state and ensure that all enslaved people be freed. The troops' arrival came a full two and a half years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation. Juneteenth honors the end to slavery in the United States and is considered the longest-running African American holiday."

Proclaiming all men were equal in America by God-given rights did not result in the manifestation of equal rights for black men brought to or born in America. The Declaration of Independence says, "to secure these rights Governments are instituted" and "that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the "Right of the People" to alter or abolish it. We see "abolish it" in action with the work of abolitionists and the Union Army to secure freedom for enslaved blacks. To "secure these rights" the government had to take action even after two of the greatest proclamations in American history.

       We see something similar with Truman using the force of the Oval Office and the federal government to "abolish" segregation in the military. Segregation meant separate units for blacks and whites, separate housing, and separate schools for their children. Even the segregation of schools for military children didn't happen until the Supreme Court decision "Brown vs. Board of Education in 1954.

"For a brief time early in the Eisenhower administration, the Department of Defense had taken tentative first steps toward integrating the races in schools operated on military bases to educate the children of servicemen. A single court decision and its subsequent enforcement by federal authorities eclipsed the effort of the armed forces to integrate schools for military dependents."

A proclamation with the force of law to desegregate the Armed Forces did not, as Congressman Banks suggests, automatically create a meritocracy. President Eisenhower was still taking "tentative first steps" to integrating military schools long after Truman's desegregation order. A Supreme Court decision accelerated these first steps. Why were the steps tentative? What forces had the power to resist an executive order from the Oval Office? Racism in society, racism in a society of people who vote people into the Oval Office, held the power to prevent establishing a true meritocracy in the military even after Executive Order 9981.
One of the most fascinating things I discovered in my research was that every administration, from Truman through Kennedy, knew that racism was still present in the Armed Forces and that progress to achieving "equal treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin" was something that had to be achieved bit by bit in carefully calculated political fashion as measured against majority society's racial tolerances.

"As supreme commander in Europe, Dwight D. Eisenhower had approved Court House Lee's plan to introduce black riflemen into white infantry units, though he phrased his endorsement in cautious terms. During his campaign for the Presidency in 1952, he had ignored the issue of racial discrimination. Upon being elected, Eisenhower carried out the existing policy of bringing racial integration to military and naval bases. He also followed the practice, by this time almost a custom, of appointing a few qualified blacks to subcabinet positions. Personally, the new President abhorred the injustices inflicted upon blacks and believed the federal government should intervene on their behalf in certain circumstances. However, he lacked the sense of outrage and moral passion displayed by his predecessor, Mr. Truman, and was reluctant to make frontal assaults on the status quo."

"Then in 1957, the Eisenhower administration succeeded where Truman had hung back, obtaining the passage of the first civil rights legislation since Reconstruction. With the assistance of Democrats like Senators Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas and Albert Gore and Estes Kefauver of Tennessee, a Republican administration had persuaded Congress to approve a law that set up a bipartisan Civil Rights Commission to conduct a two-year study of discriminatory practices, empowered the Attorney General to file suit on behalf of anyone denied the right to vote-which President Eisenhower considered the critical element in any program of civil rights-and established within the Justice Department a Civil Rights Division headed by an assistant attorney general. Despite the adoption of this first civil rights legislation since1875, the President could be seen as lacking interest in the cause of civil rights. He had, for example, done nothing early in 1956 when pressure from White Citizen's Councils and from segregationists in the student body prevented Autherine Lucy from exercising her right, affirmed by Brown v. Board of Education, to enter the University of Alabama…At the heart of this contradiction were his respect for some white southerners who believed in segregation, his conviction that the Brown decision was a mistake because it sought to do too much too soon, and possibly an interpretation of the harassment of Autherine Lucy as an act against an individual rather than defiance of the Constitution."

"Too much too soon" was a sentiment held by white southern segregationists. This sentiment, whether it was shared by Eisenhower or not, certainly influenced his actions and therefore delayed progress to eliminating not only segregation in the military but also racism. The task of ending all forms of segregation and racism in the military then fell to President Kennedy.

"During the campaign, Kennedy declared that he could end segregation in federally subsidized housing with a stroke of the pen; when he failed to do, thousands of blacks sent pens to the White House. Although Secretary McNamara's advisers in the defense establishment urged him to move boldly against discrimination in the sale or rental of housing to servicemen and their families, he declined to do so. He had other tasks that enjoyed a higher priority, such as restructuring the budget process for the armed forces, but he also may have realized how intractable the problem was. As late as 1966, a poll revealed that 46 percent of white Americans objected to having a black family live next door. He came to regret it later, but he narrowed the scope of his action, finally banning discriminatory practices only in the housing units leased by the armed forces-not in those bought or rented by individual servicemen. He also decreed that base commanders should become the cutting edge (blunt though it was) in this limited offensive against segregation, culling from housing referral lists any owners who invoked racial restrictions in leasing or selling property. Not until 1967 did Secretary McNamara take more vigorous action in this area.17 The administration, moreover, found it difficult to prevent base commanders from endorsing, inadvertently or otherwise, the practice of segregation in nearby communities. Secretary McNamara issued orders prohibiting elements of the Department of Defense from sponsoring any organizations practicing racial discrimination. A commander at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, logically enough interpreted the directive as a denial of federal facilities to all groups, whether boys' club baseball teams or service clubs in the city of Montgomery, that barred blacks from membership. Upon learning how the directive was being applied, Senator Lister Hill, a Democrat from Alabama, protested, and the Department of Defense backed down. A veteran senator could not easily be defied by an administration that might need his help.18 Across the state at Mobile, another Air Force commander barred the local minor-league baseball team from selling discount tickets through a recreation council operated by civilian employees of the Brookley Air Force Base. He issued the ban because the team's management restricted blacks to a specific section of the grandstand. In this instance, when there was no senatorial reaction, the department followed Yarmolinksy's advice and supported the officer. Faced with a loss of ticket sales, the team agreed to set aside a racially integrated section for Brookley employees and in return received permission to renew its arrangement with the recreation council. In matters affecting relations between servicemen and citizens of communities located near bases, the Department of Defense tried to uphold the rights of the man in uniform without arousing hostility among the townspeople. This usually resulted in offering empty assurances to the soldier or sailor while bowing to the wishes of the local government. Responsibility for negotiating with community leaders again fell to the base commander, who, since he rarely could look to the Pentagon for support, had little in the way of bargaining strength. Far from imposing sanctions, such as declaring establishments off limits, the Department of Defense reflected the current attitude of the Kennedy administration, which was to avoid rocking the boat."

We can see that the fight for black servicemen to live in a desegregated community could not be won, even by the President and the Secretary of Defense. President Kennedy "wanted to avoid rocking the boat" politically, and the Secretary of Defense was limited in his ability to affect the desires of elected politicians or the local community. But what about things within the clear purview of the military, like promotion systems and the administration of judicial actions? Was meritocracy established in these areas simply by proclamation and a desegregation order?

"The Department of Defense was trying to ensure equal opportunity and fair treatment without challenging the southern senators and representatives who might carry out reprisals against President Kennedy's legislative initiatives. Yet something controversial might have to be done in view of the kaleidoscopic changes in race relations throughout the nation and the volume of complaints from within the armed forces. President Kennedy found himself facing racial problems in the armed forces and mounting pressure for civil rights legislation in political circumstances not unlike those that Mr. Truman had faced some fifteen years earlier. During the Truman administration, racial prejudice in the services had been widespread and blatant; now it tended to be hidden, ingrained in such matters as promotion, and therefore difficult to root out and destroy. The Congress had grown more tolerant of racial integration since Truman's day, but Kennedy believed that in the spring of 1962 the southern Democrats could still prevent the passage of a strong, far-reaching civil rights law. Because the political climate was so similar, Adam Yarmolinsky proposed that the new President try what the old one had done: avoid making an issue of the civil rights law, concentrate on the armed forces, and revive the Fahy Committee, though with some basic changes. Once again the investigating group would be nominally independent but certain to reach conclusions that the President could accept. Moreover, Kennedy, like Truman before him, would be able to disassociate himself from the give-and-take of the committee's deliberations, which would produce nonpolitical reforms not attributable to the administration or even the Democratic Party. The armed forces remained subject to the authority of the Commander in Chief, so that the committee's recommendations, like those of the Fahy group, could be carried out by executive rather than legislative action. Despite the similarities between the Truman and Kennedy era that inspired the resurrection of the Fahy Committee, times had changed. President Truman and his committee had taken the bold but obvious first steps; they had addressed the basic injustices. The remaining manifestations of racial discrimination would be hard to isolate and harder to eliminate. The surviving examples of racism touched upon the basic fabric of military life such as the power of the commander to promote and assign his men or affected the traditional racial practices in communities near military bases.

"The Defense Department's machinery for ensuring equal treatment and opportunity became complete when James C. Evans, a black who had formerly served as a special assistant to Secretary McNamara on racial matters, in the summer of 1963 joined the new office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Civil Rights. By the end of the year, however, the mechanism for policy enforcement ground to a temporary halt, not because of a departmental decision, but because the administration had grown fearful that vigorous action might imperil the passage of what became the Civil Rights Act of 1964."

Even in 1962, there was an awareness that the military still had "remaining manifestations of racial discrimination" in promotions and assignments. The Kennedy administration knew that these manifestations were "hidden" and "therefore difficult to root out and destroy." The Kennedy administration received many complaints from black servicemen about these remaining aspects of racism. Still, Kennedy was afraid that pushing too far to fix these remaining issues might jeopardize progress toward the passage of civil rights legislation by Southern Democrats.

"For example, Charles C. Diggs, a member of the House of Representatives from Michigan, had amassed a catalogue of complaints sent him by servicemen. 'Major complaints,' he reported, 'include: Double standards for promotion as between white and Negro servicemen, lack of communication between commanders and personnel, discrimination and segregation of on and off base recreational facilities and off base housing, participation of ... [officer] personnel in local community discriminatory practices, inequality of treatment of de- pendent[s]..., use of symbols of racial intolerance on bases, intimidation of complainants concerning racial discrimination, and severe comparative penalties for offenses committed by Negro service personnel.' Since 1960, his own tours of bases in the United States and overseas and the letters he had received from black servicemen revealed hundreds of instances of racial discrimination."

"President Kennedy envisioned himself as a mediator, appealing to rational men both black and white to join together for the common good. He resisted being swept along on the tide of civil rights activism, but he could not muster any sympathy for the southern racists, whom he detested. He realized that the civil rights movement was a just cause and deserved to prevail, but he felt that his administration needed the help of representatives and senators from the South in carrying out its domestic and foreign policies. To avoid alienating either the pro-civil rights forces or the segregationists until he had created a personal following and felt more confident of reelection, he appointed the carefully picked committee to improve the lot of blacks in the armed services and left its management to Secretary McNamara, who had a nonpolitical image and a Republican past."

"Secretary McNamara set up within his department a hierarchy of bureaucratic institutions designed to eliminate the last vestiges of racism from the armed forces. At the apex of this hierarchy was the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Manpower), who was to serve as the representative of the Secretary in all 'civil rights matters,' directing the programs designed to bring about equality of treatment and opportunity, establishing general policy, and charting progress."

"President Kennedy seemed confident that he could obtain passage of the civil rights bill and nevertheless prevent the southern wing of the Democratic Party from deserting him as it had Harry Truman. Still, obtaining approval of so ambitious a piece of legislation would prove difficult indeed. As one sign of this, some southern Democrats on Capitol Hill had denounced even the modest reforms adopted by the services upon the recommendation of the Gesell Committee, although these applied to men in uniform, their dependents, and the residents of comparatively few communities. One member of the opposition, Senator John Stennis of Mississippi, decried the 'new and unheard of mission... designed to shape our military force as an instrument for social reform' and predicted that involvement of the armed services 'in the misguided... so called civil rights drive' could only be 'detrimental to military tradition, discipline, and morale.' 31 The drive for equal rights aimed at the reform of American society, of which the armed forces formed a minor part. Despite the efforts of Representative Diggs and the continuing work of the Gesell Committee, equal treatment and opportunity for blacks in uniform remained a secondary consideration."

Pursuing the "equal treatment and opportunity for blacks in uniform remained a secondary consideration" to passing civil rights legislation in America, and in hindsight, was likely the right thing to do. President Kennedy and the Department of Defense knew that the manifestation of hidden racism remained rooted in things like promotions and assignments. Kennedy felt he could pursue these issues, which he and Secretary McNamara considered the "civil rights" of black service members, once he felt "more confident of re-election.” President Kennedy's assassination pushed remedy of these remaining elements of systemic racism into the lap of the new president, Lyndon B. Johnson.

"THE NEW PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, Lyndon B. Johnson, was determined not to be propelled by the civil rights movement into taking the kind of political risks that his predecessor had in dispatching troops and federal marshals to protect those challenging Jim Crow, but he had a broad vision of an America free of racism. Although the new Chief Executive had inherited the Gesell Committeе, he did not feel that he needed it as a symbol of his commitment to equality for blacks. Instead, he was determined to bring to fruition the civil rights legislation introduced by John F. Kennedy. Of his three most recent predecessors, President Johnson most resembled Harry Truman in the emotional depth of his commitment to equal rights. Unlike Eisenhower, drawn deeper into the struggle against racism by a challenge to the Constitution, or Kennedy, whose dedication to the cause of civil rights seemed coolly rational, Johnson felt a genuine sympathy toward the black victims of racism. Robert C. Weaver, a one-time member of Eleanor Roosevelt's 'black cabinet' and Johnson's Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, thus compared Kennedy with his successor: 'I think Kennedy had an intellectual commitment for civil rights and a broad view of social legislation. Johnson had a gut commitment for 'changing the entire social fabric of this country.' The kind of person that Weaver described in his sketch of President Johnson could not be satisfied with a symbolic and carefully controlled gesture like the Gesell Committee. The integration of the armed forces, after all, formed but a small element in his grand design for the Great Society. Confident of his political skills, Mr. Johnson was certain he could bring about passage of the Kennedy civil rights legislation and incorporate it into his Great Society. Should President Johnson's vision become reality, it would affect almost every aspect of American life, including the armed services."

This promising description of President Johnson's vision for a "Great Society," which included the military, was greatly impacted by the Vietnam War. Not only did President Johnson's support for the war become his central focus, but it also created a division between him and civil rights leaders like Dr. King.

"Meanwhile, the war in Southeast Asia was beginning to affect the civil rights movement. The transition from adviser to principal combatant brought long lists of casualties and aroused protest in the nation, alienating many of the very individuals, inside the government or out, who had supported the President's efforts to gain the passage of the civil rights and voting rights legislation. Among those who broke with President Johnson was Martin Luther King, Jr. As the American involvement in Vietnam deepened, the Nobel laureate came to question the wisdom and morality of the war….Before the year 1965 ended, Dr. King publicly endorsed a negotiated settlement of a conflict that he considered a tragedy in terms of domestic policy as well as international relations. He had become convinced that the resources needed to improve the lot of the poor in the United States were being diverted to Vietnam, where American forces were the allies of a repressive government. The Chief Executive took note of King's opposition and excluded the organizer of the Selma victory from a meeting of civil rights leaders, a session designed to demonstrate that blacks did not oppose the war but considered housing, jobs, and health care more important issues than the peace movement.11 Dr. King persevered in his opposition to the war. On the other hand, some persons long active in advancing the cause of civil rights, such as Carl Rowan, Whitney Young, and Roy Wilkins, became concerned that what they interpreted as an attempt to merge the campaign against racism with a burgeoning antiwar movement would endanger further progress toward equal rights. Opposition to the war, spearheaded at the time by white, middle-class youths, might well swallow up the civil rights movement. Moreover, as Dr. King's exile from the President's inner circle of advisers demonstrated, no one could challenge Mr. Johnson on the war and hope to exert influence on any other subject. For the President, the war had become the test that separated friend from enemy; no one could publicly oppose his conduct of the war without being seen as a traitor to the administration, if not to the nation."

Rooting out the last vestiges of racism that had been pursued since at least the early 1960s became a casualty of the Vietnam War. Efforts to eliminate racism in promotion, assignment, and judicial punishment systems lost steam.

"Civil rights laws, backed by the authority of federal enforcement agencies, protected blacks in the services from acts of discrimination beyond the gates of military reservations and naval bases. If anything, the Department of Defense relied too heavily on the laws passed in 1964 and after. In cases of discrimination, commanding officers and departmental authorities preferred to seek voluntary compliance; if rebuffed, however, they avoided exerting pressure of their own and considered the matter a subject for action by the aggrieved party under the appropriate law. The armed forces thus avoided alienating community leaders, although at the cost of delayed enforcement of the announced policy of the Department of Defense… What these authorities tended to overlook was persisting, often subtle discrimination in assignment, promotion, and the administration of justice-aspects of military life that President Johnson's civil rights laws left untouched. Progress, in short, bred a certain smugness that concealed less visible but insidious forms of discrimination.24 Because of this smugness, military leaders ignored nagging questions, such as the comparison of court-martial rates and casualty rates among black and white soldiers."

After the Vietnam War, the racial demographic of the military began to become a concern. Terms like "tipping point" and overrepresentation started appearing as the percentage of blacks in the military services began to increase..

"A topic that received disproportionate study was 'the tipping point.' Some students of human behavior, examining the question of racial integration in housing, had concluded that when the proportion of blacks in a development or neighborhood reached a certain percentage, the remaining whites would flee."

"While the defense establishment had fretted about the tipping point, circumstances had presented the military with an enlisted force stable in comparison to the draftees of the Vietnam War era, largely unaffected by notions of black power or white power, and possessing the aptitude for complex and highly technical jobs. Then, instead of making that force even better by finally addressing the surviving inequities in the administration of justice or in selection for promotion, the defense analysts went chasing after yet another phantom. This one, first noticed by 1980, was called "overrepresentation." According to its discoverers, most of them whites, the overrepresentation of blacks in the armed forces seemed likely to have damaging effects upon black recruits."

"Shirley Chisholm, at the time a member of Congress from New York City, voiced her suspicion that crocodile tears over unequal sacrifice on the part of blacks were being shed by those who preferred an Army that was comfortably white."

Focusing on tipping points and overrepresentation issues shifted attention away from the fact that "racial discrimination still affected to varying degrees the administration of justice, promotions, and assignments." The progress that had been made also led to complacency.

"The Air Force in particular moved rapidly to educate its men and women in the importance of racial amity to the successful accomplishment of its assigned mission to fly and fight. Within fewer than forty months since the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., great changes had taken place in the military. When he died in April 1968, the armed forces were confident that the bureaucratic machinery established as a result of the Gesell Committee, reinforced by the recent civil rights legislation, was automatically ensuring that all servicemen, regardless of race, enjoyed equal treatment and opportunity. Events rapidly revealed the meaninglessness of the carefully drawn diagrams with individual boxes and lines of responsibility running upward to the Office of the Secretary of Defense. The civil rights bureaucracy within the department had turned inward upon itself, engaging in self-congratulation while ignoring the men and women in uniform whose rights it was supposed to safeguard…Nor did the authorities see any need to modify the review process for discharges or the procedures for nonjudicial punishment.22 Racial discrimination persisted, although in a diminished form. The efforts of Martin Luther King, Jr., President Johnson, and others had not exorcised the demon from civil life, nor had President Truman, Judges Fahy and Gesell, or Admiral Zumwalt imposed a thorough going racial integration on the armed forces. The solutions tried by the Department of Defense had worked to a great extent, but racial discrimination still affected to varying degrees the administration of justice, promotions, and assignments. The military had reacted to a succession of crises, usually by creating some bureaucratic mechanism to monitor progress or to change attitudes through directives and education. Unfortunately, the programs generated more self-satisfaction than enduring change; certainly mood of overconfidence contributed to the tendency to place the civil rights function at progressively lower levels within the Office of the Secretary of Defense."

When I considered all the research that I reviewed, from Truman's executive order to the policies and actions of President Nixon, I wondered how all this evidence of racism got lost. My mind drew a connection between all this history and ancient scrolls in mythology.

"II. Historical Context of Sacred Scrolls
The use of scrolls can be traced back to early civilizations, where they played a crucial role in the preservation and dissemination of knowledge. These scrolls were typically made from papyrus, parchment, or other materials, and were inscribed with texts that documented everything from administrative records to religious scriptures.

A. Early civilizations and their use of scrolls
Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and China are among the earliest cultures known to have utilized scrolls. In Egypt, for instance, the famous Book of the Dead was written on papyrus scrolls, guiding the deceased through the afterlife.

B. The role of scrolls in preserving knowledge
Scrolls served as a crucial medium for preserving knowledge across generations. They were often stored in temples or libraries, such as the Library of Alexandria, which housed thousands of scrolls containing a wealth of information on various subjects, from philosophy to science.

C. Transition from oral traditions to written texts
Before the advent of written texts, oral traditions were the primary means of knowledge transmission. The development of scrolls marked a significant transition, allowing for more accurate and permanent records of cultural narratives, laws, and religious beliefs.

III. Mythological Origins of Sacred Scrolls
The creation of sacred scrolls is often steeped in mythology, with various cultures attributing their origins to divine beings or legendary figures associated with wisdom.

Scrolls were used for the "preservation and dissemination of knowledge” "as a crucial medium for preserving knowledge across generations." Scrolls were a medium to transport the "wisdom" of "legendary figures." When I review the words and actions of American legends like Presidents Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy , and Johnson I can see that some of their wisdom has been lost.
In the scrolls of American history, these legendary figures all acknowledged that racism persisted in the military's assignment, promotion, and judicial systems. While they all celebrated the initial desegregation order, the gradual integration of units, housing, and schools, the demographic gains made by minorities, and greater racial harmony in the military, they knew there was work left to be done.

"The armed forces could not turn the clock back to the 1940s, nor did they want to, for they had learned that racial integration improved morale and administrative efficiency. They were, however, content with what they had done, satisfied with the progress made since 1948, and reluctant to undertake the difficult job of pushing racial integration to its logical conclusion, overhauling promotion policies, eliminating race as a consideration in the administration of justice, and extending the racial policies that prevailed on military bases into nearby communities."

Today, what our legendary figures called racism, we call "disparities." Presidents Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson attributed the different outcomes in promotions, assignments, and judicial outcomes to racism. The Air Force's Racial Disparity Report (RDR) says that the source of these disparate outcomes for minorities in areas such as promotions and judicial actions cannot be known without further study and certainly can't be linked to or be inferred to be caused by bias, conscious or unconscious.

      With the preserved knowledge of those who had gone before, we can see that the disparities for blacks outlined in the Air Force's RDR existed long before the 23 diversity studies that preceded it, long before 1974. We know the racial disparities against blacks in the Air Force are remnants of unaddressed systemic inequities that date back to Truman's executive order, which came after the Air Force's establishment as a separate military service in 1947.

      The writers of the Air Force's RDR claimed they lacked the expertise to know whether the disparities were caused by bias and even racism. History shows, however, that from President Truman to President Kennedy, racism is the true cause of the lasting disparities against blacks in the military's promotion, assignment, and judicial systems.

      We cannot allow the wisdom of our legendary American figures to be lost to the current political sentiments of our time. We must arm ourselves with the knowledge preserved from their time and transmitted to us and press on to complete the work they started. We can have a military, an Air Force with a true meritocracy, a "Great Society," if you will, free from the remaining bias and racial disparities in our assignment, promotion, and judicial systems.
How will these results be achieved?

The same way they have always been achieved. By the efforts of legendary political figures.