Sold – Harry Truman: Civil Rights Should Be Secured “with all deliberate speed”

"We have begun to put into practice some of the high-sounding pronouncements of former years".

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Harry S. Truman integrated the armed forces in 1948, which dealt the first blow to institutional segregation. Yet with southerners then so prominent in the Democratic Party and Congress, he could accomplish little more to advance equality.

Some felt that Truman, a southerner himself in background, was at best lukewarm to...

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Sold – Harry Truman: Civil Rights Should Be Secured “with all deliberate speed”

"We have begun to put into practice some of the high-sounding pronouncements of former years".

Harry S. Truman integrated the armed forces in 1948, which dealt the first blow to institutional segregation. Yet with southerners then so prominent in the Democratic Party and Congress, he could accomplish little more to advance equality.

Some felt that Truman, a southerner himself in background, was at best lukewarm to civil rights. Henry Wallace ran against him from the left in 1948, and it was Hubert Humphrey that made the great civil rights plea at the 1948 Democratic Convention. Truman’s true attitude towards civil rights remained something of a mystery. This letter sets the record straight.

Harry Truman autograph on a Typed Letter Signed, 1 page 4to, Independence, Dec. 3, 1965. “I am highly pleased to extend greetings to the Civil War Round Table on the occasion of its Twenty-fifth Anniversary, and my hope that you will continue your deliberations and studies in depth of this historic turning point in the evolution of this nation. Now, that we have begun to put into practice some of the high-sounding pronouncements of former years, we should go about the business of putting our house in order with Ôall deliberate speed.’”

This is the most significant statement of Truman on civil rights that we have seen offered for sale, showing that he was very much in favor of it, and moreover believed that by 1965 the time for dawdling had long passed. He wanted quick action, and quoted approvingly Earl Warren’s historic statement in Brown vs. Board of Education to underline the point. With the original envelope.

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