Others shared Truman’s trepidation of filling the shoes of so
formidable a person as FDR. Additionally, while Lincoln and Garfield had also
died in office, the country was not at war at the time. In his diary, David E.
Lilienthal, Chair of the TVA, wrote, “Complete unbelief. That at first. Then a
sick hapless feeling. Then consternation at the thought of that Throttlebottom,
Truman. ‘ The country and the world doesn’t deserve to be left this way, with
Truman at the head of the country at such a time.’”[i] Yet those who
had worked with him, and his grandmother, were sure that Truman would be a
solid, dependable President. Within his presidency Truman was faced with some
of the most important decisions in history, including the infamous dropping of
the atomic bomb, and his decisions set in place the dynamics of the cold war.
Truman’s second action as President (The first was to decide that the United
Nations conference would go on as planned on April 25, 1945) was to ask all of
the members of Roosevelt’s cabinet to stay on with the understanding that he
was the boss, “I
made it clear [to the first Cabinet session] that I would be President in my
own right," Truman said, "and that I would assume full responsibility
for such decisions as had to be made".[ii]
Three weeks into his Presidency Germany surrendered but a new threat stepped
forward to garner Truman’s attentions. It
had become clear to the President that the Soviet’s intended to create
communist regimes in Soviet occupied areas. Simultaneously, the war with Japan
was still raging and the sense of honor and allegiance to the Emperor evidenced
a commitment that would choose death over surrender. Faced with a potentially drawn out and
grueling war, Truman struggled with a resolution that would spare lives and
shorten the conflict. Little did the new
President know but a new weapon in the United States’ arsenal would offer a
solution.
Less than three months after coming into office, Truman was in Potsdam, Germany
with Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin. The conference held from July 17 to
August 2, 1945 was scheduled to cover the division of the post-war world
between the three victors and the two radically different governmental
structures. Also on the agenda was the war in the Pacific. During the Tehran
Conference in November of 1943, Stalin agreed to aid the United States in their
war against Japan and in return Britain and the United States would supply
additional troops to Europe to aid the Soviets against Germany. Two years
later, Truman now saw this brokered arrangement as another opening for the
Soviet Government to seize more land and install another communist regime.[iii]
A Japanese defeat could lead to additional territory seceded to the
Soviets. A few days into his Presidency,
Truman decided to scold Soviet Russia for violating the Yalta Accords by
inserting communist governments in newly acquired territories. He had very
little leverage. Earlier in the war, the
United States held the upper hand, able to offer much needed military aid to
the Soviets in return for their cooperation. By mid-1945, however, the Russian forces were
taking the offensive and gaining ground. In this theater, Truman’s attempt to take
the upper hand with the Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov proved politically
inert. With war still raging in the Pacific, Truman was in no position to
embark on another conflict in Europe, ultimately conceding Poland, and
recognizing the Warsaw government. At Potsdam Truman accepted the readjustment
of the Polish-German border. More importantly, however, he did not allow the
Russians to claim any reparations from the zones of Germany that had been given
to the U.S., France, or Britain, guaranteeing a divided Germany. During the
tense negotiations, Truman was interrupted by an aide who informed the
President that the first test of the atomic bomb was a success. It was the first Truman had heard of the
project. Before returning to Washington, DC Truman made the most controversial
and historic decision of his Presidency: to drop the atomic bomb on Japan. The
primary target on August 6th was the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The
“little boy” code name for the atomic bomb, was dropped at 8:15 Hiroshima time by
Paul W. Tibbets piloting the Boeing B29 Superfortress, the Enola Gay (named for
his mother). The second bomb was dropped two days later on the city of Nagasaki,
Japan. Emperor Hirohito
announced Japan’s surrender on August 15th.
Japan’s surrender marked the end of
World War II but international tensions were hardly over. The Cold War, a product of the politics of
the allies, was beginning to surface as a significant tension between the
countries. In 1947 the President issued The Truman Doctrine outlining the
containment policy that was to be applied to the Soviets. Truman highlighted
the need to aid Turkey and Greece concerned that Russian aid would create
communist governments in both countries.[iv] On the heels of The Truman Doctrine came The
Marshall Plan. In 1947 Truman appointed George Marshall as his Secretary of
State. On June 5th of the same year, Marshall introduced the
European Recovery Plan, commonly known as The Marshall Plan, in a speech delivered
at Harvard University. Marshall, in agreement with The Truman Doctrine, understood
the critical need to revitalize national economies because a stable and
capitalist-based Europe would not be drawn to the aid offered by the communists.
Sixteen nations would receive almost thirteen billion dollars total in aid from
the United States until funding was stopped in 1951.[v]
The positive relations brought about by the plan lead to the North Atlantic Alliance
or North Atlantic Treaty Organization (“NATO”) an alliance that remains in
place to this day. Truman’s final significant act before the 1948 election was
the National Security Act of 1947, which reorganized the military structure of
the government, merging the Department of the Navy and the Department of the
War into National Military Establishment, creating the U.S. Air Force as well
as the Central Intelligence Agency (“CIA”) and National Security Council, the
primary security council to the President.[vi]
With the defeat of Japan came the
inevitable shift from a wartime economy to a peacetime economy. Prior to WWII
the United States had experienced the Great Depression, and only the production
brought on by the Great War pulled America out of its decline. In September of
1945 Truman set before Congress a 21-point plan to move America into a post-war
state. It included new public works programs, guaranteed “full employment”, a
higher minimum wage, an extension of the Fair Employment Practices Committee, a
larger system of social security, and a national healthcare system, essentially
building on the New Deal. He also
insisted on Reconversion, a quick demobilization of the military in an attempt
to return soldiers to civilian life as soon as possible. The only policy that
went through was the guaranteed full employment, but it had no enforcement
mechanism, and reconversion was hindered and Truman received the blame.[vii]
However, one of the largest domestic challenges Truman had to face was the
unions. During the war there was an agreement that unions would not go on
strike for the good of the country, but with the war over unions came back with
a vengeance. Waves of strikes especially in the coal mining and railroad
businesses. Although Truman, a man with
a blue-collar base, supported workers but during the threatened train strike, the
President sided against them. May 10,
1948, Truman issued a government seizure of a number of large railroads, and
the strike eventually settled.[viii]
In 1947 the
Taft-Hartley Act, formally the Labor-Management Relations Act, was passed,
despite Truman’s veto of the bill on grounds of inhibiting freedom of speech.
The Act was a series of amendments to the Labor relations act of 1935 that was
obviously anti-labor and in direct response to the growing power of labor
following the end of the war. Evolving from a movement that intended to curb
certain unfair practices by employers, the Taft-Hartley Act went after unions
as well. It severely reduced the ability and motivation to strike and
gave the federal government the right to break a strike if it could prove a
national interest was at stake. In addition, heavy penalties were
placed on unions that supported strikes; unions could no longer force workers
to become members, and could not require members to be hired. Unions
could no longer make political contributions to federal candidates. The
bill was highly controversial, and Truman’s veto, although circumvented, galvanized
the labor movement, making them a potent ally for Truman in the 1948 election.
[i]
Robert J. Donovan, Conflict and Crisis: The Presidency of
Harry S. Truman, 1945-1948 (n.p.: W. W. Norton and Company, 1996), 14.
[ii]
Alden Whitman, "Harry S. Truman: Decisive
President," On This Day, last modified 2012, accessed December 13, 2012,
http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/bday/0508.html.
[iii]
Harry Truman and the Potsdam Conference, accessed December
13, 2012, http://www.trumanlibrary.org/teacher/potsdam.htm.
[iv]
Truman, Harry S. "Transcript of Truman Doctrine
(1947)." Our Documents.
http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=81&page=transcript.
http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=81&page=transcript.
[v]
The Marshall Plan,
http://www.marshallfoundation.org/TheMarshallPlan.htm.
[vi]
Milestones: 1945-1952,
http://history.state.gov/milestones/1945-1952/NationalSecurityAct.
[vii]
American President: A Reference Resource,
http://millercenter.org/president/truman/essays/biography/4.
[viii]
“Word Has Just "Been Received”: Truman Speaks on the
Railroad Strike.
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5137/.
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5137/.
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