Performance Assessment

Determine the Core Meaning of Primary Sources:

Civil Rights During WWII

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The purpose of this assignment:• Determine and express the central ideas and details of primary sources.

• Using primary sources and secondary background below, closely read and analyze documents from 1940-41 on the African American struggle for equal rights.

• You will write summaries, showing the relationship among key details and ideas in the documents. You may include relevant and important information to help make your point.

Part 1: Read background passage & timeline

Background• Even before the U.S. entered World War II, President Franklin Roosevelt

condemned Nazi racism and began to build American military might. Meanwhile, he worried that news stories about America’s own racist Jim Crow laws would give evidence to Nazi and Imperial Japanese propaganda writers to undermine support for America around the globe. Yet FDR also knew that if he pushed to end Jim Crow, he would lose the support of many white voters and leaders in his own Democratic Party (especially in the South) for many other policies.

• A. Philip Randolph, African American civil rights and labor union leader, headed the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters. These were good jobs held mostly by African Americans.

• Walter White was an African American civil rights leader and head of the NAACP in 1941.

Civil Rights & WWII Selected Timeline

1939 • WWII begins when German invades Poland

1940 - Sept. 27 • A. Phillip Randolph meets with FDR > little response

1941 - June 18 • Randolph meets with FDR about upcoming March on

Washington

- June 25 • FDR’s Exec Order 8802 - Fair Employment Practices

Committee

- July 1 • Date of scheduled (but cancelled) March on Washington

- Dec. 7 • Japan bombs Pearl Harbor > U.S. enters WWII

1945 • Allied victory over Japan and Germany ends WWII

1948 • President Truman orders desegregation of U.S.

Armed Services

1950

1954 • Brown v. Board of Education orders schools to be

desegregated

1956 • Montgomery bus boycott expands Civil Rights

Movement

1960

Roosevelt, Randolph, and White

Franklink Delano Roosevelthttp://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/hec.4

7547/

Walter Whitehttp://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/93503550/

A. Phillip Randolphhttp://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/cph.3c26

849/

Part 2-a: Analyze a Primary Source

Answer the following questions about the letter from A. Phillip Randolph to Walter White (Exhibit A):

A. What is happening in the letter?

B. What do you think Randolph means by the phrase, “the Negro and national defense”?

C. Why does Randolph write this letter to White? What does he want White to do?

Exhibit A

Part 2-b: Interpret a Primary Source

Now write a short paragraph to answer this question: What is the central message of the letter from Randolph to White?

Include significant details from the document (at least 2-3) and explain how they support Randolph’s central message.

Part 3: Compare Primary Sources

Carefully read and analyze the four documents below.• Exhibit B is from the transcript of an audio-taped 1940

White House meeting between President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Civil Rights leaders, including A. Philip Randolph and Walter White.

• Exhibit C is a flyer from a 1941 NAACP conference• Exhibit D is from notes of a 1941 White House meeting

between Roosevelt, Randolph, and White.• Exhibit E is from Presidential Order 8802 of 1941.

Then answer the questions that follow the exhibits.

Exhibit B: Part of taped White House conversation between President

Franklin D. Roosevelt and A. Phillip Randolph on September 27, 19402

A. Philip Randolph: Mr. President, it would mean a great deal to the morale of the Negro people if you could make some announcement on the role the Negroes will play in the armed forces of the nation... They feel that they're not wanted in the various armed forces of the country and they feel they have earned the right to participate….Roosevelt: ...The main point to get across is in building up this draft army… that we are not, as we did before so much in the World War, confining the Negro into the non-combat services–so putting them right in, proportionately, into the combat…Randolph: Well, we feel that's a start…Roosevelt: Which is something… Hell, you and I know it's a step ahead. Randolph: We feel–

Roosevelt: …Suppose… that you have one...battery, with Negro troops and officers… They go into… a whole division of 12,000. And you may have a Negro regiment… here, and right over here on my right in line would be a white regiment in the same division... Now what happens? After a while, in the case of war those people get shifted from one to the other. The thing we sort of back into…

(continue on next slide)

2You can download recordings and transcripts from the 1940 Roosevelt White House: http://millercenter.org/scripps/archive/presidentialrecordings/roosevelt.

Exhibit B – continued.Randolph: Mmm. Roosevelt: You would have one battery out of a regiment of artillery that would be a Negro battery with a white battery here and another Negro battery, and gradually working in the field together. You may back into what you're talking about...Roosevelt: Another thing... We are training a certain number of musicians on board ship, the ship's band. Now there's no reason why we shouldn't have a colored band on some of these ships, because they're darn good at it. And that's something that we should look into... You know, at worst it will increase the opportunity. That's what we're after.

VOCABULARY: Regiment & Division = Army unitsBattery = A small group of large guns

Exhibit C: The Negro in National

Defense –NAACP Conference,

Houston, Texas (June 24-29, 1941)

Exhibit D: Notes from a second White House conversation between President

Franklin D. Roosevelt, A. Philip Randolph, and Walter White on June 18, 1941 about a proposed March on Washington.4

A. Philip Randolph: We want something concrete, something tangible, positive and affirmative…Roosevelt: How many people do you plan to bring?Randolph: One hundred thousand, Mr. President.Roosevelt: Walter, how many people will really march?Walter White: One hundred thousand, Mr. President.

4Quotations recreated based on information from the website: http://www.whha.org/whha_classroom/classroom_9-12-pressure-defense.html.

See that site for bibliographic references.

Exhibit E: “Why should we march” flyer, 1941

VOCABULARY: Redress = remedy or make right

Part 3-a: Analyze and compare primary sources

3) Circle any dates for each of the sources.

Think about the order and timing of the sources.

4) Identify the most important one or two sentences in each of the four Exhibits B, D, & E.

Part 3-b: Interpret the SourcesA) Based on the sources and background information above, explain what the Civil Rights leaders wanted from Roosevelt. Write two or three sentences. B) Based on the sources and background information, identify the most important things Roosevelt said and did in response to the demands of the Civil Rights leaders. Explain why Roosevelt responded the way he did. Write one or two paragraphs. You may include information you already knew about these events, but you do not have to.C) Support your explanations in Questions A and B with evidence from the four exhibits above. Give at least 5 to 7 significant pieces of evidence. Write several sentences that clearly explain how the evidence supports your position. (Complete the sentence stems below.) Your explanation should be more than just a list. It should make logical sense. Each idea should lead to the next. “The evidence to support my position in Question A is that…”“The evidence to support my position in Question B is that…”

Part 4: What does it take to make change?

After students have completed writing about the primary sources, have them read and discuss the following document in Appendix. • What does Executive Order 8802 appear to declare? • Review the timeline. When did the U.S. Armed Services become

desegregated? Who ordered it? • What does it take to make change?

AppendixExecutive Order 8802: June 25, 1941, General Records of the United States; Record Group 11; National Archives

“…NOW, THEREFORE, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution of the statues, as the prerequisite to the successful conduct of our national defense production effort, I do hereby reaffirm the policy of the United Stated that there shall be no discrimination in the employment of workers in defense industries or government because of race, creed, color, or national origin and I do hereby declare that it is the duty of employers and of labor organizations, in furtherance of saying and of this order, to provide for the full and equitable participations of all workers in defense industries, without discrimination because of race, creed, color, or national origin.”

ResourcesRandolph, A. Philip. A. Philip Randolph, letter to Walter White, March 18, 1941. Letter. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/primarysourcesets/naacp/pdf/randolph.pdf

African American soldiers on patrol near bombed buildings, somewhere in Europe. 1944. Photograph. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2003689099/

FDR, A. Philip Randolph and the Desegregation of the Defense Industries. Classroom- 9-12 Lessons. Ca. 1999. The White House Historical Association. http://www.whha.org/whha_classroom/classroom_9-12-pressure-defense.html

Flyer for the March on Washington Movement, 1941. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/mss/mssmisc/ody/ody0808/0808002v.jpg.

Jefferson, Louise E, artist. The Negro in national defense NAACP conference, Houston, Texas, June 24-29. 1941. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2010648421/.

Randolph, A. Philip, Roosevelt, Franklin D., & White, Walter. Audio Recording. Office Conversation with A. Philip Randolph—ca. September 27, 1940. Miller Center University of Virginia: Presidential Recording.http://millercenter.org/scripps/archive/presidentialrecordings/roosevelt

Roosevelt, Franklin D. Executive Order 8802. 1941.United States of America. The White House. Washington D.C.: National Archives.http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc_large_image.php?doc=72.

This assessment was developed by the

Emerging America Program of the Collaborative for Educational Services

with funding from the U.S. Department of Education Teaching American History Program.

Teachers may use it freely as long as full credit is given.