Blue discharge
Encyclopedia
A blue discharge was a form of administrative military discharge
formerly issued by the United States beginning in 1916. It was neither honorable nor dishonorable. The blue ticket became the discharge of choice for commanders seeking to remove homosexual
service members from the ranks. They were also issued disproportionately to African Americans
.
Service members holding a blue discharge were subjected to discrimination in civilian life. They were denied the benefits of the G.I. Bill by the Veterans Administration
and had difficulty finding work because employers were aware of the negative connotations of a blue discharge. Following intense criticism in the press – especially the black press, because of the high percentage of African Americans who received blue discharges – and in Congress
, the blue discharge was discontinued in 1947, replaced by two new classifications: general and undesirable.
while underage, but this practice was abolished by law and all such discharges were upgraded to honorable.
for sodomy, imprisoned and dishonorably discharged. However, with the mobilization of troops following the United States' entry into World War II
, it became impractical to convene court-martial boards of commissioned officers and some commanders began issuing administrative discharges instead. Several waves of reform addressing the handling of homosexuals in the military
resulted in a 1944 policy directive that called for homosexuals to be committed to military hospitals, examined by psychiatrists, and discharged under Regulation 615-360, section 8
. It is unknown exactly how many gay and lesbian service members were given blue discharges under this regulation, but in 1946 the Army estimated that it had issued between 49,000 and 68,000 blue discharges, with approximately 5,000 of them issued to homosexuals, while the Navy's estimates of blue-discharge homosexuals was around 4,000. The period of time covered by these estimates is unclear.
The psychiatrists responsible for creating and implementing screening procedures to exclude homosexuals from military service, initially supported giving gay service members blue discharges. However, when they learned of the difficulties that blue-ticket holders faced in civilian life, they urged the military to discontinue the practice. William C. Menninger
, who served as the Director of the Psychiatry Consultants Division for the Surgeon General of the United States Army from 1944 to 1946, tried to persuade the military to issue honorable discharges to gay service members who had not committed any crimes during their military service.
(VA), charged with implementing the provisions of the G.I. Bill, denied benefits to blue-discharge veterans, despite the Bill's explicit language that only a dishonorable discharge was grounds for denying benefits to a veteran. In 1945, the VA issued a directive that all blue-discharges for homosexuality would be denied benefits. On December 22, 1955, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
denied an appeal from Raymond W. Longernecker, who had been denied his G.I. Bill benefits by the VA because of his blue discharge. The Court found that the VA had discretion in awarding benefits and that Congress had specifically foreclosed the courts from overruling it. Nevertheless, the Court noted that the denial of benefits should only have occurred if Longernecker had been dishonorably discharged and that the VA Administrator was acting without authority in treating a blue discharge as if it were dishonorable.
Most employers required that job applicants who had served in the military present their discharge papers as part of the application process. Blue-discharge veterans experienced difficulty in securing employment because many employers were aware that the blue discharge meant that the holder was considered undesirable. Those employers who did not know had access to a list of the Separation Program Numbers or "spin" numbers that the military used to classify discharges. At least four such spin numbers indicated a gay-related discharge.
Congress had expressed concern about possible misuse of the blue discharge when it began work on the G.I. Bill in 1944. In discussions about the legislation's details, the American Legion
insisted on a specific provision to provide benefits to veterans discharged under any circumstance other than dishonorable. The Legion believed a large number of veterans had been given blue and other less-than-honorable discharges for reasons that it considered unreasonable or trivial. In testimony before the United States Senate
, Rear Admiral Randall Jacobs strongly opposed this provision on the grounds that it would undermine morale and remove any incentive to maintain a good service record. Senator Bennett Champ Clark
, a sponsor of the bill, dismissed his concerns, calling them "some of the most stupid, short-sighted objections which could be raised". Clark went on to say:
The G.I. Bill also provided for discharge review boards to review an appeal of any discharge other than dishonorable. From 1945 until early 1947, these boards routinely upgraded the discharges of homosexual service members who had not committed any known sex acts during their military service to honorable. About one-third of all blue discharges reviewed were upgraded to honorable.
In addition to the Courier, other groups and institutions that decried the punitive use of the blue discharge included the American Legion, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
, the Congress of Industrial Organizations
, and the Veterans Benevolent Association
.
convened a special committee to review the disparate treatment of blue discharge holders. The committee issued its report, "Blue Discharges", on January 30, 1946. The committee expressed its amazement that anyone with a blue discharge would risk further stigmatization by speaking out against the discrimination:
In examining case histories of blue-discharge veterans, the committee found that "the procedure lends itself to dismissals based on prejudice and antagonism". Further, the committee found that the effects of a blue discharge "differ little from those of a dishonorable discharge...the discharged man finds it difficult to get or keep a job. The suspicion of society is aroused against him, all the worse in some ways for carrying an atmosphere of mystery." The committee said that "nothing could more clearly prove the anomalous and illogical and disingenuous nature of the blue discharge than this policy of the Veterans Administration". The committee called the system for dealing with blue-ticket veterans "a squeeze play between the war department and the veterans' administration" and took the agency to task for "passing moral verdicts on the history of any soldier".
To reform the discharge system the committee recommended:
The committee also recommended changing the discharge system to four classifications: honorable and dishonorable, with no change in their definitions; "under honorable conditions" to replace the blue discharge; and general, to cover separation for misconduct.
".
It has been suggested that the large gay populations in port cities like San Francisco, Chicago
and New York City
are in part the result of the blue discharge. The theory asserts that many gay blue-ticket veterans from smaller urban or rural areas felt they were unable to return home because of the shame associated with their discharges. Instead, they relocated to larger areas with established gay subcultures or simply stayed in the city through which they were returned to the United States.
Military discharge
A military discharge is given when a member of the armed forces is released from their obligation to serve.-United States:Discharge or separation should not be confused with retirement; career U.S...
formerly issued by the United States beginning in 1916. It was neither honorable nor dishonorable. The blue ticket became the discharge of choice for commanders seeking to remove homosexual
Sexual orientation and military service
The military forces of the world have differing approaches to the enlistment of homosexual and bisexual individuals. The armed forces of most developed countries have now removed policies excluding non-heterosexual individuals...
service members from the ranks. They were also issued disproportionately to African Americans
Military history of African Americans
The military history of African Americans spans from the arrival of the first black slaves during the colonial history of the United States to the present day...
.
Service members holding a blue discharge were subjected to discrimination in civilian life. They were denied the benefits of the G.I. Bill by the Veterans Administration
United States Department of Veterans Affairs
The United States Department of Veterans Affairs is a government-run military veteran benefit system with Cabinet-level status. It is the United States government’s second largest department, after the United States Department of Defense...
and had difficulty finding work because employers were aware of the negative connotations of a blue discharge. Following intense criticism in the press – especially the black press, because of the high percentage of African Americans who received blue discharges – and in Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
, the blue discharge was discontinued in 1947, replaced by two new classifications: general and undesirable.
History
The blue discharge was created in 1916 to replace two previous discharge classifications, the administrative discharge without honor and the "unclassified" discharge. The discharges were printed on blue paper, hence the name. They were also sometimes called "blue tickets". One early use of the blue discharge was for service members who had enlisted to fight in World War IWorld War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
while underage, but this practice was abolished by law and all such discharges were upgraded to honorable.
Association with homosexuality
The United States military had a long-standing policy that service members found to be homosexual or to have engaged in homosexual conduct were to be court-martialedCourt-martial
A court-martial is a military court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of members of the armed forces subject to military law, and, if the defendant is found guilty, to decide upon punishment.Most militaries maintain a court-martial system to try cases in which a breach of...
for sodomy, imprisoned and dishonorably discharged. However, with the mobilization of troops following the United States' entry into World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, it became impractical to convene court-martial boards of commissioned officers and some commanders began issuing administrative discharges instead. Several waves of reform addressing the handling of homosexuals in the military
Sexual orientation and military service
The military forces of the world have differing approaches to the enlistment of homosexual and bisexual individuals. The armed forces of most developed countries have now removed policies excluding non-heterosexual individuals...
resulted in a 1944 policy directive that called for homosexuals to be committed to military hospitals, examined by psychiatrists, and discharged under Regulation 615-360, section 8
Section 8 (military)
The term Section 8 refers to a category of discharge from the United States military for reason of being mentally unfit for service. It also came to mean any serviceperson given such a discharge or behaving as if deserving such a discharge...
. It is unknown exactly how many gay and lesbian service members were given blue discharges under this regulation, but in 1946 the Army estimated that it had issued between 49,000 and 68,000 blue discharges, with approximately 5,000 of them issued to homosexuals, while the Navy's estimates of blue-discharge homosexuals was around 4,000. The period of time covered by these estimates is unclear.
The psychiatrists responsible for creating and implementing screening procedures to exclude homosexuals from military service, initially supported giving gay service members blue discharges. However, when they learned of the difficulties that blue-ticket holders faced in civilian life, they urged the military to discontinue the practice. William C. Menninger
William C. Menninger
William Claire Menninger was a co-founder with his brother Karl and his father of The Menninger Foundation in Topeka, Kansas, which is an internationally known center for treatment of behavioral disorders.-Boy Scouts:...
, who served as the Director of the Psychiatry Consultants Division for the Surgeon General of the United States Army from 1944 to 1946, tried to persuade the military to issue honorable discharges to gay service members who had not committed any crimes during their military service.
Discrimination
The Veterans AdministrationUnited States Department of Veterans Affairs
The United States Department of Veterans Affairs is a government-run military veteran benefit system with Cabinet-level status. It is the United States government’s second largest department, after the United States Department of Defense...
(VA), charged with implementing the provisions of the G.I. Bill, denied benefits to blue-discharge veterans, despite the Bill's explicit language that only a dishonorable discharge was grounds for denying benefits to a veteran. In 1945, the VA issued a directive that all blue-discharges for homosexuality would be denied benefits. On December 22, 1955, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit known informally as the D.C. Circuit, is the federal appellate court for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Appeals from the D.C. Circuit, as with all the U.S. Courts of Appeals, are heard on a...
denied an appeal from Raymond W. Longernecker, who had been denied his G.I. Bill benefits by the VA because of his blue discharge. The Court found that the VA had discretion in awarding benefits and that Congress had specifically foreclosed the courts from overruling it. Nevertheless, the Court noted that the denial of benefits should only have occurred if Longernecker had been dishonorably discharged and that the VA Administrator was acting without authority in treating a blue discharge as if it were dishonorable.
Most employers required that job applicants who had served in the military present their discharge papers as part of the application process. Blue-discharge veterans experienced difficulty in securing employment because many employers were aware that the blue discharge meant that the holder was considered undesirable. Those employers who did not know had access to a list of the Separation Program Numbers or "spin" numbers that the military used to classify discharges. At least four such spin numbers indicated a gay-related discharge.
Congress had expressed concern about possible misuse of the blue discharge when it began work on the G.I. Bill in 1944. In discussions about the legislation's details, the American Legion
American Legion
The American Legion is a mutual-aid organization of veterans of the United States armed forces chartered by the United States Congress. It was founded to benefit those veterans who served during a wartime period as defined by Congress...
insisted on a specific provision to provide benefits to veterans discharged under any circumstance other than dishonorable. The Legion believed a large number of veterans had been given blue and other less-than-honorable discharges for reasons that it considered unreasonable or trivial. In testimony before the United States Senate
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
, Rear Admiral Randall Jacobs strongly opposed this provision on the grounds that it would undermine morale and remove any incentive to maintain a good service record. Senator Bennett Champ Clark
Bennett Champ Clark
Joel Bennett Clark , better known as Bennett Champ Clark, was a Democratic United States Senator from Missouri from 1933 until 1945, and was later a United States federal judge.-Biography:...
, a sponsor of the bill, dismissed his concerns, calling them "some of the most stupid, short-sighted objections which could be raised". Clark went on to say:
"The Army is giving blue discharges, namely discharges without honor, to those who have had no fault other than they have not shown sufficient aptitudeAptitudeAn aptitude is an innate component of a competency to do a certain kind of work at a certain level. Aptitudes may be physical or mental...
for military service. I say that when the government drafts a man from civil life and puts him in the military service ... and, thereafter, because the man does not show sufficient aptitude gives him a blue discharge, or a discharge without honor, that fact should not be permitted to prevent the man from receiving the benefits to which soldiers are generally entitled."
The G.I. Bill also provided for discharge review boards to review an appeal of any discharge other than dishonorable. From 1945 until early 1947, these boards routinely upgraded the discharges of homosexual service members who had not committed any known sex acts during their military service to honorable. About one-third of all blue discharges reviewed were upgraded to honorable.
Black press crusade
Another minority group disproportionately issued blue discharges was African Americans. Of 48,603 blue discharges issued by the Army between December 1, 1941, and June 30, 1945, 10,806 were issued to African Americans. This accounted for 22.2% of all blue discharges at a time when African Americans constituted 6.5% of the Army. In October 1945, Black-interest newspaper The Pittsburgh Courier launched a crusade against the discharge and its abuses. Calling the discharge "a vicious instrument that should not be perpetrated against the American Soldier", the Courier rebuked the Army for "allowing prejudiced officers to use it as a means of punishing Negro soldiers who do not like specifically unbearable conditions". The Courier specifically noted the discrimination faced by homosexual blue-tickets, calling them "'unfortunates' of the Nation...being preyed upon by the blue discharge" and demanded to know "why the Army chooses to penalize these 'unfortunates' who seem most in need of Army benefits and the opportunity to become better citizens under the educational benefits of the GI Bill of Rights". The Courier printed instructions on how to appeal a blue discharge and warned its readers against accepting a blue blue ticket out of the service because of the negative effect it would likely have on their lives.In addition to the Courier, other groups and institutions that decried the punitive use of the blue discharge included the American Legion, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, usually abbreviated as NAACP, is an African-American civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909. Its mission is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to...
, the Congress of Industrial Organizations
AFL-CIO
The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, commonly AFL–CIO, is a national trade union center, the largest federation of unions in the United States, made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 11 million workers...
, and the Veterans Benevolent Association
Veterans Benevolent Association
The Veterans Benevolent Association was an organization for LGBT veterans of the United States armed forces. The VBA was founded in New York City in 1945 by four honorably discharged gay veterans....
.
Congressional investigation
With so much attention focused on the disparity to which blue-ticket veterans were subjected, the House Committee on Military AffairsUnited States House Committee on Armed Services
thumb|United States House Committee on Armed Services emblemThe U.S. House Committee on Armed Services, commonly known as the House Armed Services Committee, is a standing committee of the United States House of Representatives...
convened a special committee to review the disparate treatment of blue discharge holders. The committee issued its report, "Blue Discharges", on January 30, 1946. The committee expressed its amazement that anyone with a blue discharge would risk further stigmatization by speaking out against the discrimination:
It should be borne in mind that even a moderate amount of complaint in a matter of this sort is significant. For a person to make such a complaint in his own case implies that he feels a sense of injustice so great that he is willing to risk publicizing the stigma of having been discharged from the Army under circumstances which savor of disgrace. For each complainant there are many more who feel the same sense of injustice but prefer to bury their hurt in as much oblivion as possible."
In examining case histories of blue-discharge veterans, the committee found that "the procedure lends itself to dismissals based on prejudice and antagonism". Further, the committee found that the effects of a blue discharge "differ little from those of a dishonorable discharge...the discharged man finds it difficult to get or keep a job. The suspicion of society is aroused against him, all the worse in some ways for carrying an atmosphere of mystery." The committee said that "nothing could more clearly prove the anomalous and illogical and disingenuous nature of the blue discharge than this policy of the Veterans Administration". The committee called the system for dealing with blue-ticket veterans "a squeeze play between the war department and the veterans' administration" and took the agency to task for "passing moral verdicts on the history of any soldier".
To reform the discharge system the committee recommended:
- Automatic review for all blue discharges
- That the Army be required to demonstrate that it made multiple attempts to rehabilitate the service member before issuing a blue discharge
- The right to counsel for service members being given a blue discharge, either provided by the military or private counsel
- Copies of procedural regulations regarding the blue discharge process be provided upon request
- That any discharge that did not specify the quality of service state plainly that it is not dishonorable
The committee also recommended changing the discharge system to four classifications: honorable and dishonorable, with no change in their definitions; "under honorable conditions" to replace the blue discharge; and general, to cover separation for misconduct.
Aftermath
Despite the Committee's report, the VA continued to discriminate against homosexual blue-tickets, renewing its 1945 directive in 1946 and again in 1949. Blue discharges were discontinued as of July 1, 1947, with two new headings, general and undesirable, taking their place. A general discharge was considered to be under honorable conditions – distinct from an "honorable discharge" – and an undesirable discharge was under conditions other than honorable – distinct from a "dishonorable discharge". At the same time, however, the Army changed its regulations to ensure that gay and lesbian service members would not qualify for general discharges. Under this system, a service member found to be homosexual but not to have committed any homosexual acts received an undesirable discharge. Those who were found guilty of engaging in homosexual conduct were dishonorably discharged. By the 1970s, a service member who had not committed any homosexual acts would tend to receive a general discharge, while those found to have engaged in homosexual conduct would in theory tend to receive undesirable discharges. However, the reality remained that gay service members received a disproportionate percentage of undesirable discharges issued. This was the status quo until replaced in 1993 by the law commonly known as "don't ask, don't tellDon't ask, don't tell
"Don't ask, don't tell" was the official United States policy on homosexuals serving in the military from December 21, 1993 to September 20, 2011. The policy prohibited military personnel from discriminating against or harassing closeted homosexual or bisexual service members or applicants, while...
".
It has been suggested that the large gay populations in port cities like San Francisco, Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
and New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
are in part the result of the blue discharge. The theory asserts that many gay blue-ticket veterans from smaller urban or rural areas felt they were unable to return home because of the shame associated with their discharges. Instead, they relocated to larger areas with established gay subcultures or simply stayed in the city through which they were returned to the United States.