Sexual Orientation and The United States Military - 1940s

1940s

The several branches of the U.S. lacked a unified policy on service by homosexuals for most of their history. Before 1949, each tended to charge personnel caught engaging in homosexual conduct with sodomy, court-martial them, and issue them a dishonorable discharge. In 1940, psychiatrists Harry Stack Sullivan and Winfred Overholser formulated guidelines for psychiatric screening for military inductees. Both believed homosexuals should not be inducted, and neither proposed excluding all homosexuals from military service. Despite their recommendations, other psychiatrists and military officials made homosexuality a key component of the screening apparatus they recommended. The United States Army Surgeon General's office issued a circular in 1941 that for the first time classified "homosexual proclivities" as disqualifying inductees from military service. The United States Navy and the Selective Service adopted similar exclusionary policies. The Women's Army Corps adopted a similar policy in 1944.

With the mass mobilization and deployment of troops for operations in World War II, it became impractical to convene court-martial boards for homosexual conduct offenses. Commanders instead issued blue discharges – a form of administrative military discharge – to gay personnel. The blue discharge, which was also issued disproportionately to African Americans, was neither honorable nor dishonorable. However, blue discharge holders faced difficulties in civilian life because the blue discharge carried with it a negative association. The Veterans Administration denied blue-discharge veterans the benefits of the G.I. Bill as a general policy. In 1944, a policy directive ordered that homosexuals were to be committed to military hospitals, examined by psychiatrists and discharged under Regulation 615-360, section 8.

Blue discharges were discontinued in May 1947 and replaced with two new headings, "general" and "undesirable". A general discharge was considered to be under honorable conditions though distinct from an "honorable discharge." An undesirable discharge was under conditions other than honorable, yet distinct from a "dishonorable discharge". The Army also changed its regulations to ensure that homosexuals would not qualify for general discharges. Under this system, a servicemember found to be homosexual but who had not committed any homosexual acts while in service received an undesirable discharge. Those found guilty of engaging in homosexual conduct were dishonorably discharged.

In 1945, four honorably discharged gay veterans formed the Veterans Benevolent Association, the first such organization. It was primarily social in nature and its membership peaked at 100. The group disbanded in 1954, and several of its members later formed the New York chapter of homophile advocacy group One, Inc..