Truman’s Lasting Lessons
Writing in 1924 on the similarities between the Know Nothing and Ku Klux Klan movements, historian William Starr Myers observed that American history “shows phenomena of a more or less identical type appearing at recurring intervals, and with astonishing regularity.” One such recurring type is the perennial grappling with our better and worse selves, the greatest of all American (and human) struggles. And nowhere is this struggle more visible than in the presidency, which serves as a mirror reflecting our noblest ideals as well as our bleakest tendencies.
Franklin Roosevelt remarked that the presidency is “pre-eminently a place of moral leadership.” He believed that all great presidents distinguish themselves by being “leaders of thought at times when certain historic ideas in the life of the nation had to be clarified.” Lyndon Johnson noted that the burdens of the office open the soul of its occupant, revealing their greatest traits and worst qualities in moments when they must choose—often on behalf of the entire country—between the two.
Often overlooked, Harry Truman’s presidency was a pivotal moment in this great inward struggle, providing us with timeless lessons about ourselves, as well as our nation. Ever in the shadow of his predecessor, Truman was an accidental leader whose midwestern accent and Missourian roots seemed not to match the height of the office. Yet, he rose to the pinnacle of political power with a vibrant confidence in America’s highest ideals at a time when the country faced a crisis of faith in those ideals.
Truman ascended to the presidency as American troops continued to fight the Second World War, but in another sense, he took charge of a nation at war with itself. Racial injustice and violence lurked ominously behind the curtains of patriotic fervor and democratic victory. One of the most horrific examples of this injustice was the brutal beating and blinding of Isaac Woodard, a Black veteran of the Pacific war, by South Carolina police in 1946.
Woodard’s case highlighted the systemic racism that plagued the nation. Otelia Cromwell pointed out “the glaring inconsistency” between America’s democratic ideals and its treatment of Black citizens and, like A. Philip Randolph, called for a “Double Victory” over both foreign and domestic tyranny.
Truman, more than any president since Ulysses S. Grant, recognized the urgency of confronting racial injustice. Southern Democrats initially believed Truman would maintain the status quo, but they were soon disappointed. Truman’s commitment to civil rights was clear when he wrote in 1946 that “discrimination, like a disease, must be attacked wherever it appears.” He created the President’s Committee on Civil Rights, which produced the landmark report “To Secure These Rights” in 1947, a report that condemned the “moral dry rot” eating away at the nation’s soul and called for comprehensive civil rights reforms.
Addressing the NAACP at the Lincoln Memorial on June 29, 1947, Truman called on the country to fight to fulfill its founding ideals. Truman insisted that it was the “immediate task” of the nation “to remove the last remnants of the barriers which stand between millions of our citizens and their birthright.” Truman biographer David McCullough called it “the strongest statement on civil rights heard in Washington since the time of Lincoln.”
But Truman didn’t just speak; he acted. In 1948, he signed Executive Orders 9980 and 9981, mandating equality in federal employment and the military. He also sponsored the strongest civil rights plank in the Democratic Party’s history. These actions widened regional fissures and led to the rise of the recalcitrant Dixiecrats, who nominated the white supremacist Strom Thurmond for president, pledging to defend segregation. Despite political opposition in his party, Truman held firm, declaring in his 1949 inaugural address that America rested on the truth that “all men are created equal because they are created in the image of God.”
Then there was the rise of anti-Communist hysteria. Cold War fears, exploited by figures like Joseph McCarthy, threatened to erode American values from within. Truman saw McCarthyism as a threat, not just to the nation’s politics but to its soul. Speaking in August 1951, Truman argued that by creating “fear and suspicion” through “the use of slander, unproved accusations, and just plain lies,” McCarthy was weakening the country from within; Americanism was being “undermined by [those] who are loudly proclaiming that they are its chief defenders.” McCarthy’s reckless accusations created a climate of fear that Truman believed was more damaging than any Communist plot.
Truman warned of totalitarianism at home. He explained that in dictatorships “everybody lives in fear and terror of being denounced and slandered,” and no one “dares stand up for his rights.” Such was becoming the case in McCarthyite America. Truman called on the country to “stop and think where this is leading us” and tasked citizens with spreading the word that Americanism was under siege and needed reinforcement.
Despite counterattacks, anti-Communist fear and hysteria survived Truman’s presidency and re-emerged in later years, often intertwined with opposition to civil rights. Figures like Georgia’s Governor Herman Talmadge saw civil rights activism as a Trojan Horse for Communist infiltration and subversion. This red-baiting hysteria, laced with racism, persisted through the 1950s and ‘60s, making leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr., a target of government surveillance and conservative criticism.
In the end, Truman found himself at the center of the great American struggle. Yet when most shirked, he confronted the nation’s deepest contradictions, pushing it to live up to its highest ideals. His legacy reminds us that the battle for America’s best selves is a perennial struggle that each generation must face and that the choices we make in those moments of soul-opening define who we are as a nation.
Today, as ever, we must discover who we really are, just as Truman did. In moments of choosing, are we a Truman or a Thurmond and McCarthy? Much hinges on the answer.