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Sidney Milkis, Katherine Rader, Haley Stiles, Military Service, A. Philip Randolph, and the Fight for Civil and Economic Freedom, Political Science Quarterly, 2025;, qqaf007, https://doi.org/10.1093/psquar/qqaf007
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Abstract
The Supreme Court's landmark 2023 decision reversing decades of affirmative action policy included a surprising exception: military academies. This contemporary debate is merely the latest event in the military's long history as an important site of civil rights activism and citizenship formation. In this article, we build on existing scholarship and emphasize that efforts led by A. Philip Randolph to desegregate the military and civil service during the 1940s and 1950s have been critical for securing more equal economic fortunes for African Americans. Relying on extensive archival and primary evidence, this article shows that mass mobilization against racial discrimination, culminating with the “civil rights revolution” of the 1960s, began with Randolph's efforts to pressure Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman to reform the public sector, underscoring the constructive but contentious alliance civil rights groups forged with the modern presidency. We connect these historical and institutional developments to the contemporary military, analyzing its ongoing efforts to achieve racial equality and the economic and social consequences of these initiatives. As the Vietnam War dramatically revealed, the American state has exacted a heavy price from African Americans who have served their country; however, we contend that the military and other forms of national service have also been a critical terrain in America's unsteady march toward a society that fulfills its promise of equality for all.
