Note (Back) — CHAPTER 21

The congressional critics had a strategy of their own. They would try to persuade McNamara to rescind or modify his directive, and, failing that, they would try to change the new defense policy by law. Senators Goldwater, J. William Fulbright of Arkansas, and Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia, along with some of their constituents, debated with McNamara while no less than the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Carl Vinson of Georgia, introduced a bill aimed at outlawing all integration activity by military officers.[21-75] Their campaign came to naught because the new policy had its own supporters in Congress,[21-76] and the great public outcry against the directive, so ardently courted by its congressional opponents, failed to materialize. Judging by the press, the public showed little interest in the Gesell Committee's report and comment on the secretary's directive was regional, with much of it coming from the southern press. Certainly the effect of the directive could not compare with the furor set off by the Truman order in 1948.