The GI Bill and Planning for the Postwar

Top Photo: Staff Sergeant Herbert Ellison explains the GI Bill to fellow soldiers Robert T. Walton, Tonil Carter, Lawrence Keys, Sam Anderson, James Millhouse, and James West of the 15th Air Force Service Command in Italy, 1944. Courtesy of the Library of Congress.

In his oral history interview with The National WWII Museum, Lloyd Duncan, who served in the US Navy veteran in the Pacific, emphatically declared that “the GI Bill is the greatest thing that ever happened.” After returning home in 1945, Duncan graduated with a degree in education and dedicated his life to the classroom—all thanks to the benefits provided by the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, better known as the GI Bill. “Most of my friends in the service graduated from junior college,” he recalled, reflecting on the ability of veterans, many with working-class backgrounds like his, to go to school and move up into the middle class. 1

By 1947, 49 percent of students enrolled in American colleges and universities were veterans thanks to the sweeping 1944 legislation. 2 With tuition, books, and some living expenses provided for, access to higher education was greatly expanded, with over two million servicemembers graduating with degrees that qualified them for careers in the burgeoning fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. New employment opportunities along with other benefits provided by the GI Bill, including guaranteed loans, made dreams of homeownership and prosperity a reality for many veterans.

Like Duncan, Gentry Torian, a Black soldier who served with the segregated 92nd Infantry Division during the war, argued that the “the only good thing” he returned home to was the GI Bill. After finishing his service overseas, Torian was saddened to encounter the same racism that had been prevalent in Cleveland, Ohio, before he left for Europe. The opportunity to go to college and become a teacher was a bright moment for him in an otherwise dark time, and he was not the only one. “Every Black we knew used the GI Bill,” Torian’s wife explained. On average, more Black veterans took advantage of the GI Bill’s educational benefits than white veterans, swelling enrollment at historically Black colleges and universities across the nation. 3

Poster promoting educational training for veterans. Office for Emergency Management. Office of War Information. Domestic Operations Branch. Bureau of Special Services. (03/09/1943 - 09/15/1945). Courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.

But other veterans did not receive the same benefits. Across the South, where Jim Crow segregation laws prevented equal access to educational opportunities, Black veterans were unable to attend integrated colleges and fulfill their dreams. And women who served in one of the auxiliary units of the US Armed Forces often found that gender discrimination prevented them from entering the halls of academia.

In addition to educational opportunities, the same prejudices also limited access to other benefits, from housing loans to health care. While many Americans from all walks of life experienced unprecedented levels of prosperity, others found themselves constrained by the same racial, gender, and class barriers that existed before the war. Uneven application and unequal access to the GI Bill’s opportunities were almost inevitable because even such a sweeping social welfare program could not dismantle the United States’ social, political, cultural, and economic barriers. Although the bipartisan legislation did not erase structures and systems in place since America’s founding, it created momentum for those deprived of postwar promises to fight for change, justice, and a better future for all Americans.

Planning for Postwar Challenges

As the war neared an end, most Americans agreed that social and economic intervention was required to ensure that WWII veterans received timely and adequate benefits for their service. Avoiding another tragedy similar to the Bonus March of 1932, when thousands of WWI veterans convened in Washington, D.C., to demand their bonuses and were met with force by troops and police, was also a top priority for lawmakers and politicians, including President Franklin D. Roosevelt. 4

With the assistance of veterans’ rights organizations, Roosevelt pushed for an omnibus benefits package in 1943 to counter the potential challenges that GIs would face while reintegrating into society. Psychologists and doctors warned of an impending social and economic crisis if veterans returned home, shaken by their wartime experiences and without a clear way forward, and were expected to adapt without any assistance. The Department of Labor predicted a dramatic spike in unemployment: 15 million men and women veterans would be unable to find jobs. Though programs like the National Service Life Insurance Act and the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Relief Act provided some benefits for disabled veterans as well as widows and dependents of those killed in action, Roosevelt sought a more comprehensive plan that addressed broader needs. 5

In a November 1943 fireside chat, the president described the need for a comprehensive program—not just financial aid—that would align American treatment of its veterans with his goals of postwar peace. “All of us are concentrating now on the one primary objective of winning this war,” he explained. “But even as we devote our energy and resources to that purpose, we cannot neglect to plan for things to come after victory is won.” 6 As historian Meredith Hindley explains, Roosevelt believed that all veterans deserved access to benefits that would create lasting change, not just lump-sum payments. Improving the lives of veterans would improve the lives of all Americans while sustaining wartime economic gains. 7

That same month, leaders of the national American Legion drafted their own version of Roosevelt’s vision. Calling it the GI Bill of Rights, former national Legion Commander and veterans’ advocate Harry Colmery jotted down ideas for veterans’ assistance—including property loans, tuition coverage, and a more streamlined and efficient approach to all veterans’ affairs—on a napkin one evening at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C. The Legion’s Executive Office teamed up with supportive congressional representatives to introduce and advocate for legislation to support servicemembers. Despite opposition from some veterans who worried that the proposed bill would look like nothing more than a “hand out,” the Senate approved the law with bipartisan support. Roosevelt signed the historic piece of legislation on June 22, 1944, and ushered in one of the largest government spending projects in American history. 8

President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the GI Bill into law on June 22, 1944. (Courtesy of the FDR Library)

The act offered a dizzying array of benefits. Apart from receiving up to $500 a year for tuition at traditional four-year universities, junior colleges, and vocational training institutions (Harvard tuition and room and board averaged $525 dollars in 1945) and a stipend for living expenses, the GI Bill also provided job counseling; guaranteed loans for homes, property, or businesses backed by the Veterans Administration (VA); and medical care. 9 The bill provided for $20 a week in unemployment benefits for up to 52 weeks per year for returning GIs while they searched for employment, but only 20 percent of the bill’s funding accounted for this expense; most veterans found employment or enrolled in college. 10This was unsurprising: as Roosevelt confidante Anna Rosenberg traveled throughout the European theater of the war in the fall of 1944, she interviewed GIs who repeatedly stated that their top desire when they returned home was education. 11

Veterans registering for classes at Indiana University, 1947. (Courtesy of Indiana University Archives).

Cutting through the Red Tape

On paper, the requirements for accessing GI Bill benefits were straightforward: you could not have received a dishonorable discharge and had to have served 90 days between September 1940 and the end of the war. Veterans who served less than 90 days were eligible if their discharge was due to disability or injury. But many GIs looking to take advantage of the bill found myriad catches and restrictions in the legislation’s fine print. 12

“Hundreds of Tampa’s returning veterans, like others throughout the nation, have been shocked and discouraged to learn that their visions of a satisfying post-war life apparently aren’t going to materialize,” The Tampa Times reported in October 1945. Many servicemembers interviewed for the article were unsure of whether or not apprenticeships were covered under the bill for those who felt that they were “too old for books,” unqualified for the traditional classroom, or had personal and familial obligations. Disabled veterans were also presented with a dilemma that caused consternation: they were puzzled by Public Law 16, a provision attached to the bill that provided assistance for “vocational training” but appeared to require a separate application process from the tuition coverage for colleges and universities. “The result is many Tampa veterans are confused. Some of them are bitter. More are philosophical,” the article continued. “Gradually they are learning that the picture of veterans’ benefits—painted by morale-building orientation officers and enthusiastic newspaper reports—was for the most part overly-optimistic.” It wasn’t that the opportunities did not exist but rather that they were “tough to get—in many cases impossible.” 13

Tampa vets were not alone in their exasperation. Many across the nation felt abandoned to navigate the massive bureaucracy of the act on their own, particularly the often convoluted requirements for benefits. For example, in the case of tuition assistance, the requirements of 90 days of service and a favorable discharge were easy to understand on the surface. However, those veterans who wanted to work and save up money or who wanted more time to think about enrolling in college for the first time were surprised to learn that they had only two years after their discharge or the end of the war to take advantage of tuition assistance. Also, if a veteran was over 25 when they withdrew from college courses for their service, they had to file additional paperwork to prove that their education was interrupted (as the authors of the bill assumed that only men under the age of 25 upon their induction had to abandon their education). This was reflected in the government’s explanation that the bill “was not intended to provide education as such but to provide education for those whose school was interrupted because of Army service.” 14

In other cases, GIs learned that the bill was not a blank check: a veteran “could not receive two monetary programs at the same time.” This meant that a GI could take advantage of tuition assistance and a loan guaranty, but not education assistance and unemployment. And unemployment benefits were only guaranteed so long as a veteran was employed part time in a qualifying job, which did not include agricultural work or other forms of manual labor. 15

In response, the federal government issued a series of pamphlets throughout 1944 and 1945 to help veterans cut through the red tape and bureaucratic language of the bill. “The GI Bill of Rights and How It Works” broke the bill down into specific categories—unemployment, education, and property loans—and explained the benefits of each and how to apply for them. This pamphlet also provided a Q&A section, and many newspapers published special columns featuring questions submitted by readers. Another publication, simply titled “The GI Bill,” was a basic overview of requirements and qualifications for each benefit. In general, these measures successfully clarified some of the most important opportunities available in the bill. 16

Education

For those who successfully navigated the bill’s requirements, access to a college education was one of the most beneficial outcomes for thousands of men, including Medal of Honor Recipient Daniel Inouye. He enlisted in the US Army’s 442nd Regimental Combat Team in 1943, leaving his home in Hawaii to serve in France and Italy. Inouye dreamed of becoming a surgeon, but the loss of his right arm in battle prompted him to pursue other options with his GI Bill benefits. He returned to Hawaii and used his tuition assistance to graduate from the University of Hawaii at Manoa in 1950 with his bachelor’s degree; he would later attend law school at George Washington University. His political career skyrocketed after he became the first Asian American to serve in the House of Representatives in 1959, having worked with other politically active Nisei (second-generation Japanese Americans)—many of whom were also veterans—to advocate for Hawaiian statehood. Later he used his influence in Congress to push for redress for Japanese American survivors of incarceration.17

Daniel Inouye as a First Lieutenant in the Army during World War II. Courtesy of the US Army.

Civil rights icon Medgar Evers, who joined the Army when he was 17 in 1943, served in the Quartermaster Corps on the Red Ball Express in Europe and was recognized for his service when he was discharged as a Corporal. In 1946, he used his GI Bill benefits to attend Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College in Mississippi and later graduated with a business degree in 1952. But when Evers tried to enroll in law school at the University of Mississippi, he faced what Black veterans often experienced in the South: rejection because of school segregation. Even with their GI Bill benefits, Black veterans encountered Jim Crow laws in the South and de facto discrimination in other parts of the nation that created segregated colleges and universities. Black veterans could only attend approximately 100 institutions deemed “Colleges for Negroes” in the segregated South, leading to strained resources and stiff competition for coveted spots. In addition to these challenges, John Rankin, a Democratic congressman from Mississippi, joined ranks with other legislators to insert language into the bill ensuring that state-level VA agencies administered the benefits, guaranteeing that Jim Crow states could dictate that funds be redirected away from Black veterans. 18

Staff Sergeant Herbert Ellison explains the GI Bill to fellow soldiers Robert T. Walton, Tonil Carter, Lawrence Keys, Sam Anderson, James Millhouse, and James West of the 15th Air Force Service Command in Italy, 1944. Courtesy of the Library of Congress.

Black veterans were not the only ones who faced challenges in accessing their education benefits under the GI Bill. Roosevelt stated that the bill gave “servicemen and women the opportunity of resuming their education,” and nearly 332,000 women were eligible for GI Bill benefits. [19] Not all, however, were informed that they were eligible when they were discharged. Of those who were, nearly 65,000 went to college with their benefits, but for others, gaining access to an education proved difficult as many universities catered to and admitted male veterans first. Women veterans who did graduate with a bachelor's degree or higher went on to enter into traditionally male and highly skilled jobs, but others still faced discrimination in the larger workforce regardless of their education. 19

WACs parade in front of a viewing stand as President Harry S. Truman looks on, 1948. Courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.

Homeownership

For some veterans, achieving homeownership with GI Bill benefits proved challenging. Veterans from all walks of life frequently found it difficult to access home loan assistance. Not only did lengthy forms and lack of guidance make the process difficult, but legislators designed the bill to prevent veterans from taking out loans on property they might not be able to afford in the long term. The bill designated the VA as the agency to officially sign off on the loans, not the banks that issued them. In The Charlotte Observer, Major Thomas Nial noted while interviewing veterans that “the VA has been forced to throw out many GI loans because the law says loans can’t be made on properties and businesses whose values are not ‘reasonable and normal.’” 20 But in the immediate postwar years, property values rose, making it difficult to find a house or farm that the VA deemed affordable for many first-time homeowners. “Thus the dreams of a by-gone foxhold day about that farm or business or home, drift away,” Nial continued. “Though we may realize that the loan restrictions and qualifications supposedly were created for our protection, we still don’t get the loans we wanted.” Eventually, Congress amended the bill so that the VA still guaranteed the loan, but the bank would be the final approving institution. 21

Poster promoting guaranteed loans to veterans for buying farms, homes, or businesses. Office for Emergency Management. Office of War Information. Domestic Operations Branch. Bureau of Special Services, c. 1945. Courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.

These changes, however, did little to address the larger systems working against minority veterans. Black GIs faced similar difficulties purchasing homes and getting loans through VA distribution as they did with education. Discriminatory measures, including restrictive housing covenants that the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional in 1948 but continued to operate unofficially for decades, prohibited racial or ethnic groups from buying homes in certain neighborhoods. Banks also purposely devalued property where Black residents owned homes (called redlining) and limited opportunities for advancement. As Erin Blakemore notes, the result of these injustices was that of the 3,200 government-backed loans in 13 Mississippi cities, Black veterans received only two. 22 Other groups, including Mexican American veterans, faced similar struggles. 23

Native American veterans also encountered hurdles in using their GI Bill benefits to purchase homes. Technically, the VA guaranteed loans for Native American veterans as they did for others, but these benefits did not apply to property on reservations. Because the Bureau of Indian Affairs refused to waive the title to reservation land (as property of the federal government), there could be no individual sales, disqualifying Native Americans from the loan assistance. 24

Total Disqualification

While many groups faced challenges in accessing benefits, there were veterans who were completely denied all assistance from the GI Bill. During the war, the Army issued “blue discharges” for service members accused of “undesirable” behavior, a broad category that applied to nearly 50,000 soldiers improperly diagnosed with mental illness and “attempting to perpetrate an act of sexuality” deemed inappropriate, most commonly sodomy. There was often little proof of these charges and, as a result, LGBTQ+ servicemembers received blue discharges that disqualified them for GI Bill benefits. 25

Though they saw some of the highest casualty rights of any service, members of the Merchant Marine were unable to take advantage of GI Bill benefits. The federal government did not recognize mariners as veterans until 1988 after a lengthy legal battle for recognition of their dedication, training, and sacrifice. Merchant Marine veterans from World War II waited until 2007 to receive consideration for payments under the Belated Thank You to the Merchant Mariners of World War II Act, but Congress never passed the proposed legislation. 26

Over 20 years later, President Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, which included a provision to grant lump-sum payments of $15,000 to another group shut out from GI Bill benefits: surviving Filipino WWII veterans who served alongside Allied troops in the Pacific. Filipinos signed up for service while the Philippines was still a commonwealth of the United States, but when President Harry S. Truman signed the Rescission Act in 1946 and granted the Philippines its independence, Filipino veterans were denied GI Bill benefits as they were not American citizens.27

General Douglas MacArthur, left, congratulates Captain Jesús Villamor of the Philippine Air Force after awarding him the Distinguished Service Cross, December 22, 1941. Courtesy of the Library of Congress.

Legacy

While the original GI Bill of 1944 expired in 1956, Congress has renewed the act several times over its long history. Today, GI Bill benefits continue to offer veterans and their families access to an education and homeownership, but these opportunities would not exist without the WWII veterans—Medgar Evers, Daniel Inouye, Mexican American veterans who formed the GI Forum to ensure equal access to medical care through the VA system, and others—who used their opportunities to fight against racism and prejudice. 28

The opinions expressed here do not reflect those of Air University, Maxwell Air Force Base, the United States Air Force, and the Department of Defense.