“He gave opportunities to an entire generation.� Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback at a press conference in January 2015 to announce a fundraising drive to erect a statue and install a memorial park to honor Harry Colmery
TO HONOR A LEGACY The American Legion Department of Kansas is deeply grateful to all who have chosen to help honor Harry W. Colmery’s place in history. The vision of a memorial park in downtown Topeka can only materialize with generous help from those who appreciate the magnitude of Colmery’s profound contribution to community, state and nation.
education. It made home ownership a reality for ordinary American families. It prevented a postwar economic catastrophe, created the middle class, and gave hope and opportunity to millions who served their country in uniform. Harry Colmery himself would not take credit for the GI Bill. “I had the good fortune and the pleasure of doing some work on that legislation,” he told his fellow Legionnaires after receiving the organization’s most prestigious award, the Distinguished Service Medal, in 1975. “It is for others to appraise that work and the results accomplished.”
This publication offers a glimpse into the unique character and capability of the man who would become known as the father of the GI Bill. It explores the perseverance Colmery and his fellow American Legion members demonstrated to build public and congressional support for the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, which revolutionized America.
The GI Bill was not, as Colmery later explained, “a one-man job.” History proves that point, but it’s equally true that the GI Bill could not have been accomplished without Colmery, whose legacy will soon be immortalized in the place he called home, at the heart of a nation he loved and helped guide to a half-century of prosperity.
The impact of the GI Bill reverberates today. Tens of millions of veterans have used it to earn college educations and enter careers that helped make the United States a global superpower in the second half of the 20th century, and beyond. It changed the face of U.S. higher
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HARRY W. COLMERY: ARCHITECT OF THE GI BILL A 1937 magazine profile of American Legion National Commander Harry W. Colmery contained a prophetic observation: “In the preparation of law cases, his associates say, he is at his best in arranging complicated masses of detail and dovetailing them to fit into a sequence that has, on occasion, flabbergasted opposing counsel by the thoroughness by which it was assembled.”
the lives of millions, for generations to come, and change the course of American history. Colmery was called upon to assemble a collection of legislative priorities into one moral imperative – a GI Bill of Rights – that would strike at the heart of a nation still awaiting the outcome of World War II, at a time when communities across the map were filling fast with men and women who had come home from military service wounded, sick, destitute and psychologically reeling from the effects of their sacrifices.
Six years after the profile appeared in The American Legion Monthly, that particular Colmery characteristic was employed in a way that would improve 2
Congress and the White House were fully aware that the U.S. government was unprepared to handle the delayed costs of war. By the end of 1943, no fewer than 640 separate bills had been introduced in Congress to address the needs and problems faced by veterans who had already come home, and of GIs soon to be discharged, at a rate of about 75,000 per month. After all they had done and were doing to free the world from Axis tyranny, little in the way of tangible opportunity awaited the veterans upon their return to civilian lives.
He had grown up in North Braddock, Pa., the son of a grocery store owner. Smart and athletic, he finished a four-year high school program in two years, excelling in math and English. He was valedictorian of his graduating class and a star athlete who went on to Oberlin College in Ohio where he started as a shortstop on the varsity baseball team. There, Colmery earned the nickname “Hans” for his play’s resemblance to one of the greatest shortstops ever, Honus “Hans” Wagner of the Pittsburgh Pirates. While home from college in the summers, Colmery worked at a variety of jobs and was accepted to law school at the University of Pittsburgh.
“Even a convict who is discharged from prison is given some money and a suit of clothes,” American Legion National Commander Warren Atherton said in 1943. “The veteran, when he is discharged from a hospital or separation center, is given neither.” The lack of readjustment services, effective health care or career opportunities for returning veterans soared to the top of the agenda of the nation’s largest veterans service organization that year. After he was selected by Commander Atherton to serve on a special American Legion committee to help solve the problem, Colmery was asked to put “all the complicated masses of detail” together into one succinct bill and help convince a nation still deep at war on opposite ends of the planet that it needed to invest in its veterans. It would be a tough, controversial and complicated proposition. Harry Colmery was perfectly suited to take it on.
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A company and squadron commander, he logged more than 500 hours in the air but was never deployed to a combat theater. His experience training pilots in less-than-safe warplanes instilled in Colmery a lifelong passion to fight for adequate peacetime defense readiness, an intractable plank in The American Legion’s platform of values. After the war and his discharge from active duty, Colmery served another decade as a reserve officer, finishing as a captain. In late 1919, Colmery moved to Topeka, Kan., where his unique mix of intelligence, patriotism, affability, legal skills and commitment to service soon made him a prominent member of the community, in particular The American Legion. He readily assumed American Legion leadership roles not only at his local post and state department, but at the national American Legion level, as well. He managed the campaign of Ralph T. O’Neil, also of Topeka, to serve as national commander of The American Legion in 1930 and 1931. As chairman of the Legion’s National Legislative Committee, Colmery pushed Congress to provide loans to World War I veterans against their long-awaited adjusted compensation – or bonuses – as the country sank deeper into the Great Depression. He also marshaled the Rogers Act of 1931, which funded hospital construction and medical services for veterans whose health-care needs were not service-connected, a proposition of more than $20 million in federal investment, less than two years after the stock market had crashed. Like the GI Bill he would later assemble and
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After finishing his law degree, Colmery joined a friend in northern Utah, where he was first admitted to the bar and began what became a long and illustrious legal career; he would ultimately argue cases before the Supreme Court and was selected to represent Robert F. Stroud, the renowned “bird man of Alcatraz,” in a 1959 motion to vacate a court judgment. Colmery’s legal career, however, was interrupted soon after it began. In late 1917, America was at war, and Colmery enlisted in the Army Air Service. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant and served as an instructor of infantry drill regulations at Kelly Field in Texas. Two months later, he was promoted to first lieutenant and trained to become a pursuit pilot. 4
promote to enactment, the loans and the hospital construction measures faced long odds at a time of near bankruptcy for America. But, due to Colmery’s determination, they passed.
American Legion’s Department of Kansas, he had similar success as commander. Along the way, he was involved in numerous civic, church, fraternal and community leadership activities.
In Topeka, Colmery was already credited for reinvigorating a financially troubled chamber of commerce when he served as its president in the late 1920s. In The
Colmery’s family – wife Mina and children Sarah, Harry and Mary – were extremely supportive of his active life of service and accepted his travel obligations
Harry W. Colmery, 1890-1979 Bachelor of Arts, Oberlin College, 1913
Bachelor of Law, University of Pittsburgh, 1916 U.S. Army, 1917-1919
Officers Reserve Corps, U.S. Air Service, 19191929 American Legion Topeka Post 1 Commander, 1928
American Legion Department of Kansas Commander, 1929 American Legion National Commander, 1936-37
French Legion of Honor, 1936 Order of Crown of Italy, 1936 Distinguished Service Medal, National Guard of Honor
Chairman, Civilian Aid Committee, U.S. Air Service, 1942
Civilian Aide to the Secretary of the Army, 1955-57
Kansas Supreme Court Nominating Committee, 1959-65 Philippines Legion of Honor, 1961 American Bar Foundation Fellow
American Legion Distinguished Service Medal, 1975
Kansas Bar Association Distinguished Service Award, 1976
Topeka Bar Association President’s Good Citizen Award, 1976
The Colmery-O’Neil VA Hospital in Topeka is named in his honor
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In addition to offices he held and awards he received, Colmery was a Topeka Chamber of Commerce president and director, Kansas Chamber of Commerce director, Boy Scouts of America board member, Salvation Army board member, YMCA board member, and American Legion Endowment Fund Corp. president. He was also active in the Presbyterian Church, Kiwanis Club, Masons, Military Order of World Wars, Scabbard & Blade, Army-Navy Club of Manila, Scottish Rite, Knights Templar, Kansas Livestock Association, Hi-Twelve Club, National Geographic Society, National Travel Club, and numerous business and law associations.
“The burden of war falls on the citizen soldier, who has gone forth, overnight, to become the armored hope of humanity.” and time away from home as sacrifices necessary for the good of the nation.
correspondent who covered the GI Bill from inception to signing, later wrote of Colmery’s conviction in assembling, writing and promoting the GI Bill: “The American Legion spoke, in a voice of cold, calculated fury that shook America.”
In 1936, he was elected national commander of The American Legion, which he saw as the conscience of a nation whose past, present and future all depend on the values of those who had served in uniform.
The voice did not come from one. It came from many, in a message unified and amplified by Colmery.
“The burden of war falls on the citizen soldier, who has gone forth, overnight, to become the armored hope of humanity,” Colmery said as he was working night and day in 1943 and 1944 to draft what would become known as the greatest social legislation passed in 20th century America.
Of all the classes he passed, baseball games he played, cases he won, years he spent in uniform, accomplishments he achieved in business and government, nothing would matter more to Colmery’s legacy than the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944.
And when critics of the GI Bill later suggested that a year of unemployment benefits would turn veterans into slackers, he simply said, “The American Legion has not lost faith in the veterans.”
“He was a verifiable legend in our time,” American Legion Past National Commander James F. O’Neil said in 1979. “His name will live forever in the history of The American Legion, the nation, and the world.”
David Camelon, a Hearst Newspapers
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A NEW TOPEKA LANDMARK: HARRY COLMERY MEMORIAL PARK All donations to the Harry Colmery Memorial Park Fund are tax-deductible. Please ask your friends and family to help us honor this important legacy to Topeka, to Kansas and to America.
Harry Colmery was deeply moved by the veterans he saw returning from World War I. “Maimed and diseased,” he observed, “some grope with blinded eyes, some hobble on canes… to all of these a grateful nation pays tribute.”
Harry Colmery Memorial Park Fund c/o The American Legion 1314 SW Topeka Blvd. Topeka, KS 66612 www.ksamlegion.org
Now, it is time for a tribute to Colmery. To honor him, The American Legion has launched a campaign to raise funds necessary to build a park and erect a statue just one block from the State Capitol Building in Topeka, Kan., which will be a permanent memorial to the man and the legacy he left for all veterans. The American Legion, along with a deeply inspired committee of volunteers, is dedicated to ensure that the memorial park has sufficient funding to be completed. 7
National Archives
“The boys I’m speaking for have been through battle. They have received wounds, just as thousands of other boys and girls will receive wounds. We’ve got to get word to the boys still over there that Congress is taking good care of their buddies who have been wounded. We must not let them think that that their buddies who have been wounded have suffered delay and neglect. That will not help their morale.” World War II veteran Buck Hendricks, a former Army tech sergeant who lost a leg when he stepped on a land mine in Tunisia, one of more than 1,500 disabled veterans whose 1943 testimonies were used to raise public awareness about the lack of government support for those returning home to drastically changed lives.
THE BATTLE FOR THE BILL The problem was widespread by the summer of 1943.
“The country was barely in the war in 1943,” former American Legion Magazine editor R.B. Pitkin wrote in a 1969 special feature commemorating the 50th anniversary of the organization. “Everyone was thinking ‘war.’ Nobody was thinking ‘veteran.’”
Bloody fighting in both theaters of World War II was sending disabled GIs back to their hometowns, farms and families with little more than the uniforms on their backs and a warning that 90 days after discharge, the uniforms could no longer be worn.
Military records had been destroyed in battle zones or sunk at sea. Hundreds of 8
“It is almost unbelievable that this nation should permit those boys to go for months without money, food or clothes, except what they can beg. You can’t explain away a situation like that. You can’t brush it off, or forget it … All of them face an immediate problem on discharge, when they feel lost and alone. And that is just the time we have been neglecting them – when their need is the greatest.” Sen. Edwin Johnson, Colorado, Senate Military Affairs Committee, 1943
disabled troops were being discharged every week. No financial support awaited them. They came home penniless, often unable to work, and their attempts to file for benefits from the Veterans Administration were met with delays of up to a year. In communities throughout the nation, these veterans turned to The American Legion for help.
“Never again do we want to see the honor and glory of our nation fade to the extent that her men of arms, with despondent heart and palsied limb, totter from door to door, bowing their souls to the frozen bosom of reluctant charity,” declared American Legion Past
At the 1943 American Legion National Convention, numerous resolutions were passed to demand employment opportunities, education, health care, discharge review, business loans and financial assistance for veterans. Newly elected American Legion National Commander Warren Atherton “groaned inwardly at ever getting so many new laws enacted while the nation was straining at the seams to win the war,” Pitkin wrote. As a collection of separate initiatives, the Legion’s portfolio of proposed legislation would be divided up, sent to committees, heard or not, likely to disappear into the various crevices of Congress and the VA. Such was the fate of similar efforts in Washington to support disabled veterans after World War I. The American Legion leadership, composed almost entirely of World War I veterans, was not going to let it happen again.
U.S. Marine Corps photo
Of the 16,353,639 U.S. men and women who served in uniform during World War II, no fewer than 407,316 were killed or listed as missing in action, and 671,846 were wounded. By the end of 1943, approximately 75,000 per month were being discharged from military service. 9
A GI Bill working group at The American Legion National Headquarters in Washington, D.C., 1943.
The Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944 – better known as the GI Bill of Rights – was introduced in the House on Jan. 10, 1944, and in the Senate the next day. One powerful supporter was newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst, who assigned three correspondents to work full time on the GI Bill story.
National Commander Harry Colmery, who would be called upon to assemble the various resolutions into one package, the omnibus GI Bill of Rights.
COLMERY’S CALLING The American Legion needed to synthesize a stack of resolutions it had passed to help veterans readjust to civilian life. Congress itself had seen a flurry of bills to address problems newly discharged veterans were facing in every community of America. They had no effect.
The media blitz to gain public support for passage of the GI Bill also included 125 two‑minute movie news reels that were shown at theaters throughout the country and at World War II duty stations from Italy to the Marshall Islands. More than 400 radio spots were distributed to stations. News releases were published in papers throughout the nation, and the Hearst publications filled their editorial pages with messages of unwavering support.
National Commander Atherton called on Colmery to turn all of the most important priorities into one cohesive statement. The Kansas attorney would join a blue-ribbon special American Legion committee including former Illinois Gov. John Stelle and a dozen other prominent Legionnaires from across the country, along with national Legislative Division Director Frank Sullivan, Rehabilitation Division Director T.O. Kraabel and Public Relations Director Jack Cejnar. Their mission, as ordered by Atherton, was to put a human face on the problem.
“All we had to do was carry the story of the GI Bill to the people,” Hearst Newspapers correspondent David Camelon wrote. “They did the rest.” Widespread public support, however, did not mean the journey was going to be a smooth one for Colmery and the bill that would change America. 10
In 2002, a bronze plaque was installed inside Room 570 of the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C., where in December 1943 Harry Colmery began writing in longhand on hotel stationery much of the language that would become the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944. Atherton sent a telegram to American Legion service officers across the country. He asked them to find disabled World War II veterans in their communities, collect whatever military records or other documentation they might have, and get their stories. In less than 24 hours, the service officers had assembled the case studies of 1,536 veterans who had waited up to 11 months for any sign of support from the government they fought to defend. Their stories were collected and rolled out, one at a time, each veteran’s troubles connected to one congressional district or another. Atherton brought the list of case studies to the House Veterans Affairs Committee on Nov. 29, 1943, along with a demand that a maximum of $500 in mustering-out pay be issued to each of those who had been discharged, in order to help them restart their lives.
The provisions for veterans contained in Colmery’s handwritten draft included: §§Educational opportunity §§Vocational training §§Readjustment compensation §§Home and business loans §§Discharge review §§Adequate hospitalization §§Prompt settlement of disability claims
As Congress debated the Legion’s recommendation – and alternately proposed $300 in maximum compensation, which Atherton deemed “inadequate” – Colmery was spending days and nights at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C., distilling the Legion’s
§§Mustering-out pay §§Veteran employment services §§Concentration of all veteran services under the Veterans Administration 11
Thousands of petitions poured into Washington in support of the GI Bill of Rights.
portfolio of legislative proposals into the original 10-point GI Bill of Rights.
him about Washington. And to permit a kaleidoscope of conflicting and confusing government bureaus to administer to his problems would only have repeated the fiasco that followed World War I. There had to be one place the veteran could go for an answer to all his problems and one bill to assure concerted, uniform provision for his needs.”
Hearst Newspapers correspondent David Camelon, who covered the issue from beginning to end, later wrote that “the idea behind the GI Bill was … to give the men who were fighting the opportunity they deserved – to restore them, as nearly as possible, to the position they might have held if they had not been called to serve America.”
Said Colmery: “The American Legion proposed this bill… because we believed it to be the duty, responsibility and desire of our grateful people.”
The bill Colmery drafted would make an indisputable moral argument that was not to be drowned in government bureaucracy. “Each veteran was a single, living being,” Camelon observed in a 1949 American Legion Magazine article titled, “I Saw the GI Bill Written.” “You couldn’t tear him up and scatter
With public opinion solidly in support, The American Legion’s GI Bill passed the Senate on March 17, 1944, by a unanimous vote. The House, meanwhile, was stalled 12
“Plainly, the object of this legislation is to cut the government bureaucratic red tape, which has already put some of our veterans into the charity line – an unpardonable shame on this nation.” New Albany, Ind., Tribune, May 1944
over the 52-20 provision – $20 per week for 52 weeks after discharge – as compensation for veterans in their first year of readjustment. The sheer cost of the compensation, and an undercurrent of racism because the benefit would apply to all veterans, black and white, were blamed for the delay. Finally, after a massive American Legion petition drive that produced over 1 million signed endorsements for the GI Bill, the House voted unanimously on May 18, 1944, in favor of the act.
The Army and the Navy both opposed the provision that would place greater scrutiny on terms of discharge. At the time, a service man or woman might be discharged simply under the term “undesirable” with no explanation. Discharge review, as passed in the GI Bill, continues today as a service of The
Those who opposed the GI Bill out of fear it would break the U.S. Treasury were dead wrong. It has been estimated that for every dollar the government spent on the GI Bill, $7 came back in the form of economic growth and a deeper tax base.
The GI Bill had detractors other than some members of Congress who disagreed with one or more of its parts.
Legislative Director Frank Sullivan digs through a mountain of petitions in the Legion’s offices.
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American Legion, which still represents veterans appealing the definitions of their separations from service. Colmery and his fellow Legionnaires were able to convince the military branches that discharge review was a vital part of the 10-point plan, and they soon withdrew their opposition.
In 1946, newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst received The American Legion’s prestigious Distinguished Service Medal for his support of the GI Bill. Editorials favoring the measure appeared in more than 30 Hearst newspapers and magazines in 1944.
Any legislation which grants entitlement to four years of college training at government expense to any able-bodied veteran who had ninety days service should be carefully examined in the light of our tremendous war debt…” Clark, a supporter of the GI Bill, was not swayed. But the perception of splintered support among various veterans groups was not helpful.
Not all veterans groups marched behind The American Legion in support of the GI Bill. Veterans of Foreign Wars, Disabled American Veterans and the Military Order of Purple Heart were among the major organizations that publicly opposed the bill at first. They sent a letter to Sen. Bennett Clark, chairman of the Veterans Subcommittee of the Senate Finance Committee, that argued “our nation’s first responsibility should be to those who have suffered physical and/or mental handicap by reason of military or naval service…
After a meeting between leaders of the nation’s two largest veterans organizations, the VFW withdrew its opposition to the bill. VFW Past National Commander in Chief Paul C. Wolman said after the agreement with The American Legion was reached: “I think that, in uniting these two great organizations, we have made history here.”
“They (veterans) would make America great, the Legion knew, if they were not engulfed in disillusion, if the brave courage, the high confidence with which they went to war, were preserved on their return.” David Camelon, Hearst Newspapers correspondent, in his 1949 essay “I Saw the GI Bill Written” 14
“These men will be a potent force for good or evil in the years to come. They can make our country or break it. They can restore our democracy or scrap it. They can promote world order or World War III. The answer lies in leadership. We look to the American Congress to step forward and give some of that leadership. This is your opportunity. And, you can count on The American Legion to add its experience and influence to assist in guiding and directing the nation along the path of peaceful progress.” Harry Colmery, in testimony before Congress, seeking passage of the GI Bill
THE SPECIAL GI BILL COMMITTEE
In time, he would be proven right. The GI Bill may have passed both houses of Congress without a vote of dissent despite unexpected opposition over the 52-20 provision, but it was not a law yet. One more drama would unfold before President Franklin D. Roosevelt would sign the historic measure.
In November 1943, American Legion National Commander Warren Atherton selected the following Legionnaires to serve on a special committee to draft a recommendation to improve veterans benefits. The committee consisted of: John Stelle, Chairman, former governor of Illinois
THE FINAL DRAMA
Harry Colmery, American Legion Past National Commander
The public wanted it. Congress unanimously approved it. President Roosevelt supported the provisions, even if doubtful the omnibus Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944 could survive various attacks from the flanks. Moreover, veterans needed it, and The American Legion was not going to budge. Still, the GI Bill came within one conference committee vote of vanishing.
Sam Rorex, former member of the Arkansas legislature W. Bea Waldrip, a Michigan banker and mortgage lender Robert M. McCurdy, assistant city manager of Pasadena, Calif., later the American Legion’s Veterans Affairs & Rehabilitation chairman
Two days after the Allied troops stormed the beaches of Normandy, a conference committee met in Washington to match up the House and Senate versions of the GI Bill. The seven senators were in full agreement on the language of the legislation. The House members, however, were deadlocked in a 3-3 tie, with one conferee, Rep. John Gibson of Georgia,
Robert Sisson, American Legion Veterans Affairs & Rehabilitation chairman Maurice Devine, American Legion Legislative chairman Larry Fenlon, American Legion Economic chairman 15
absent. The House members were divided over the 52-20 provision. Without a conference committee majority from each house of Congress, the bill would die.
and important in the history of The American Legion. They would dictate the future of the nation. Long-distance calls were delayed by five to six hours that evening in Georgia, a common wartime occurrence. Jack Cejnar, the Legion’s Public Relations director, had contacts at The Atlanta Constitution, which had supported the GI Bill in editorials. Two of the editors there were World War I veterans and could be contacted in case of an emergency. This was an emergency. Once reached and informed of the situation, Constitution rewrite editor Rolfe Edmondson quickly called Gibson’s home in Douglas, Ga., but there was no answer.
Gibson was in his home state, recovering from an illness. He had asked that his proxy vote be cast in favor of the GI Bill as written, without changes, to include the 52-20 provision, in accordance with The American Legion. Two days of discussion left the House committee members deadlocked still. It was Friday evening, just after 6, when Pat Kearney of New York – a Legionnaire and former VFW National Commander in Chief – announced that there was just one more opportunity to break the tie. The conference committee would meet again Saturday morning at 10.
He next called the switchboard operator in Douglas. The operator’s husband had landed at Normandy that week. She said she would ring Gibson’s home phone number every five minutes until he answered. The congressman was believed to be on the highway between Valdosta and Douglas. The Georgia State Police got word and started looking for Gibson on the road, stopping cars and checking identifications. Radio stations were broadcasting announcements for anyone who knows the whereabouts of Rep. Gibson to “call Operator 2 in Washington immediately.”
Kearney’s solution: “Get John Gibson up here from Georgia. He’s the only one who can save the bill.” The next 16 hours were the most frantic
Shortly after 11 p.m., the switchboard operator got an answer at the Gibson home. The congressman said he had heard the phone ringing from the yard after he pulled into his driveway. By then, all the arrangements had been made.
Rep. John Gibson of Georgia.
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“With the signing of this bill, a well-rounded program of special veterans’ benefits is nearly completed. It gives emphatic notice to the men and women in our armed forces that the American people do not intend to let them down.” President Franklin D. Roosevelt, at the signing ceremony for the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944. An Eastern Airlines flight was due to take off at 2:20 a.m. from Jacksonville, Fla., more than 150 miles away. Georgia American Legion Department Commander Clark Luke pulled up to Gibson’s house in an Army car driven by a corporal. They nearly crashed as they sped through a rainstorm, escorted by police officers on motorcycles, toward the Florida border. There, Florida police met the Gibson car and led him to the airport. The flight was purposefully delayed so that he could make it.
“Americans are dying in Normandy in the greatest invasion in all history,” he told the committee. “I’m going to hold a press conference after this meeting and castigate anyone who dares to vote against this bill.” Suddenly, there was not only a majority of House conference committee members in favor of the GI Bill as written. It was unanimous.
He landed in Washington at 6:37 a.m.
The bill, in its final form, passed the Senate on June 12, 1944, and the House on June 13.
Less than two and a half hours later, much to the shock of House conferees who thought their opposition had put an end to the GI Bill, Gibson walked into the meeting.
On June 22, 1944, surrounded by Colmery, Atherton, Stelle and other Legionnaires, President Roosevelt signed the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944 into law. 17
Students and members of Congress rally on Capitol Hill for the Post-9/11 GI Bill.
THE GI BILL THE GREATEST LEGISLATION The GI Bill’s massive effect on American society could not have been foreseen. It was meant to provide support for sick and wounded veterans coming home to an alarming lack of government services and to ease their transitions to new and changed lives.
new housing starts boomed. Over half of America’s college students soon were veterans. The World War II veterans, who critics earlier feared would cripple the economy, in fact resurrected it, building and buying homes, starting businesses, getting well-paying jobs and raising families. The ripple effect into all corners of the nation’s identity has led scholars to define the GI Bill as the most significant social legislation of the 20th century.
In addition, the GI Bill offered an untested theory, that veterans could drive the post-war and post-Depression U.S. economy forward, if given a chance.
In time, the GI Bill would be credited for creating the American middle class that propelled the nation to superpower
That theory was proven shortly into the postwar era when college enrollment and
“The GI Bill of Rights – and the enthusiastic response to it on the part of America’s veterans – signaled the shift to the knowledge society. Future historians may consider it the most important event of the 20th century.” Peter Drucker, author, educator and business philosopher 18
“The GI Bill of Rights was the law that worked, the law that paid for itself and reaped dividends because it made the American dream come true for so many.” Michael Bennett, author, “When Dreams Came True: The GI Bill and the Making of Modern America”
status. It launched the postwar baby boom, educated teachers, doctors, nurses and business owners, and it played a significant part in giving the United States the strongest military defense program on the planet, one that would ultimately be fulfilled by an allvolunteer force, recruited to serve on the promise of free higher education, low-interest home loans and effective VA health care.
unemployment compensation and the appearance of a flat $110 stipend paid directly to the veteran rather than to the school. The Veterans Readjustment Benefits Act of 1966 extended GI Bill benefits to veterans regardless of wartime service as long as their discharge conditions had been “other than dishonorable.” That GI Bill, however, paid only $100 per month, which was inadequate to cover the cost of much more than books and fees. Vietnam War veterans were not getting the same education benefits as those who had served during World War II. A number of changes soon followed, making the GI Bill more valuable, increasing the monthly stipend to $220 by 1972.
As the decades went by and new generations of American men and women served their country, the GI Bill underwent changes, starting with the Veterans Adjustment Act of 1952 to serve veterans of the Korean War. Most significant among the changes were increased state cost for GI Bill
College enrollment nationwide increased from 1.6 million to 2.1 million between 1945 and 1946. By 1947, half of all college students were U.S. military veterans using the GI Bill. But the highest percentage of veterans who went to college on the GI Bill belonged to those who served in the Vietnam War, at 72 percent. Vassar College Archives
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“Education became a necessity; mortgage lending was altered to the point that home ownership is a national goal. The Levittowns and other housing developments throughout the United States were directly attributable to the loan-guaranty section of the bill. It laid the foundation for blacks hardened by war and educated by the GI Bill, to demand equal treatment under the law.” Kenneth Cox, PhD, writing in the June 2004 American Legion Magazine
Veterans Affairs photo
By 1976, more than 6.8 million Vietnam War veterans had used GI Bill college benefits.
On his first day as a member of the U.S. Senate, Vietnam War Marine Corps veteran James Webb of Virginia introduced the Post 9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act. With a son serving with the U.S. Marine Corps in Iraq, he made an improved and more up-to-date GI Bill the centerpiece of his legislative agenda. “It is past time to enact a new veterans’ education program modeled on the World War II era GI Bill,” Webb said at the time, reviving the spirit and promise behind the measure crafted by Harry Colmery and The American Legion 64 years earlier.
As the all-volunteer force veterans grew in number among those who would use the GI Bill for college, more changes came, including the Veterans Educational Assistance Program (VEAP) where enlisted personnel contributed up to $100 a month for their college benefits, and VA would match it 2 to 1. The Montgomery GI Bill replaced VEAP in 1984 and expanded educational options to include apprenticeships, correspondence courses, flight training and a vocational rehabilitation program for veterans with service-connected disabilities.
“We keep saying this is the next greatest generation, but remember what we did for the greatest generation – we gave them the best GI Bill in history,” Webb said during The American Legion’s 2013 Washington Conference. “Let’s do that again. And we did. Now there’s 900,000 who have a chance of a first-class future because of the Post-9/11 GI Bill.”
Congress passed the Post 9/11 Veterans Educational Act of 2008 in order to better meet the needs of 21st century students, provide living allowances and cover the cost of state college tuition rates. 20
Through the decades, the Servicemen’s Readjustmen Act of 1944 and other GI Bills that followed: §§Educated more than 8 million World War II veterans and millions more under updated GI Bills to serve veterans of the Korean War, Vietnam War, Cold War, Gulf War, Iraq and Afghanistan
ownership or a college degree attainable goals §§Contributed to equality, regardless of skin color, through governmentfunded GI Bill educations §§Became such an incentive for service, the United States could move to an all‑volunteer military force, issuing its last draft orders in 1973
§§Democratized higher education in America, which had previously been available only to wealthy or elite students §§Gave birth to the modern subdivision by making low-interest home ownership affordable to the average family, thus triggering decades of construction work
§§Consolidated most federal services under one roof, the VA, which became a Cabinet-level department in 1989 §§Provided protections and routes of appeal for veterans disputing the conditions under which they were discharged, ultimately bringing an end to such terms as “undesirable” and “unfit” as conditions that would follow them throughout their lives
§§Revolutionized VA health care through the nationwide construction of modern hospital and clinical facilities for veterans §§Shifted expectations for most American families, making home
Since then, The American Legion has continued to work with Congress to improve the Post-9/11 GI Bill, expanding benefits for those who served in the National Guard and Reserves and for veterans pursuing vocational training and distance learning.
than 1 million who have served since Sept. 11, 2001. The meaning of the bill was not lost on one post-9/11 generation veteran attending the ceremony. “If I didn’t have the GI Bill, honestly I wouldn’t be where I am today,” Army veteran Keith Howard-Streicher said, as he neared completion of his bachelor’s degree at American University. “If I didn’t have that money for school, I wouldn’t have these opportunities. I thank God for the GI Bill. It really has changed my life.”
In 2014, The American Legion hosted a ceremony at the Microsoft Innovation & Policy Center in Washington, D.C., to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the original GI Bill, which has educated more than 20 million Americans, including more 21
REMEMBRANCE “A VISION AND CAPACITY’ On May 4, 1983, American Legion Past National Commander Perry Brown of Texas shared with the National Executive Committee what Harry Colmery had meant to him. Brown was 90 years old at the time.
In 1919, I was returning from a fivemonth stay in an Army hospital in France. Just a word about how I got there... I was a member of the First American Army in the A.E.F. Late in the afternoon of Sept. 12, 1918, as our unit approached its objective, I saw an enemy artillery battery about 500 yards to our immediate front, a part of the enemy rear guard.
all military hospitals were under the direction of the War Risk Insurance Department. What a place to be. The VA was started in 1930, 10 years after that. There was a Veterans Bureau organized in 1920. They told me that they were awaiting money from Congress to build hospitals. This is the situation I faced as a veteran returning from World War I. Being in Washington with what seemed the rest of the A.E.F. on the same mission, I found a band of veterans wandering... having nothing else to do, I joined them. There were about 100 veterans ... looking for answers. Whenever the band approached a park with a platform and podium, the band stopped and speakers took over the podium for short talks. These speakers, self-appointed ... some in uniform, were each saying to the crowd, “Have patience.” They said that “Congress was holding hearings and would act in the near future.”
They could see me, and I noticed a soldier moving his artillery piece into position. But I had had artillery training and knew one of the no-nos of artillery, ‘Never waste an artillery shell on a single soldier.’ He was still moving that weapon into position. I thought he must have forgotten his training. Then I remembered my training. When in a crisis, find a big hole, jump in and keep your head down. I picked my hole and was ready to jump when the enemy artilleryman pulled the lanyard. The shell exploded, and the world blew up in my face, intercepting my jump.
At the conclusion of one group of speeches, a young man took the podium. He had a pleasing voice. He must have had friends in the audience, as they applauded him when he took the podium. He was very matter of fact, telling us that it took time to get the government in motion; that it would take several years to purchase property, to prepare
I came home in May 1919. After getting my discharge, I started looking for an Army hospital. One of my wounds was still giving me trouble. I was told I should see and talk to my congressman, so with little money I thumbed a ride to Washington, D.C., only to find my congressman away. I was told that 22
plans and specifications, to construct the hospitals, to furnish and to staff them. He spoke as if he knew what was going on. I was impressed and decided to meet him if possible. As the crowd began to disperse, he drew away, and I approached him. I introduced myself. He said his name was Colmery, and for me to call him Harry. His first question was, was I hungry? After living for the past week on cornflakes and coffee, I must have looked hungry. He said to follow him across the street to a long building. It was filled with tables full of food, meats of all kinds, breads, condiments and cakes furnished by the government. After I had had my fill, he said, “There is a bed here if you need one.” What I had fallen into was food and a bed in Washington, D.C., with 2 million veterans in town and around town. After some more conversation, Harry said, “Stick around.” I was so impressed that I spent the evening with him. This was 1920.
Harry Colmery visits graves at a World War I cemetery during his year as National Commander. Kansas Historical Society
Harry had a vision and capacity. I am reminded of the words of a great president of our nation ... In the midst of the battle between the states, President Abe Lincoln said, “With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan.”
Harry commented that it would take the next 20 years to fill the needs of World War I vets. He said that it would be a gradual process. Here were 4 million veterans without any leadership. Leaders would have to come from their own ranks and that it was a great challenge to become one of their leaders. He had received his law degree, had been admitted to the Bar, and had trained himself in all matters relative to the legislative process. I was ready to vote for him.
Perhaps with heavenly dispensation, I wonder if the old gentleman didn’t come back for a few moments and guide Harry’s hand as he penned the GI Bill. 23
COLMERY THE LEGIONNAIRE Harry W. Colmery joined The American Legion in 1919, the year the organization was formed. He had just begun practicing law in Duchesne, Utah, and started establishing American Legion posts throughout the state. He was named acting chairman of Utah’s Department Resolutions Committee and served on the first Utah Department Executive Committee.
Western Sectional Tournament Committee, National Executive Committee, and was a leader of The American Legion Endowment Fund Corp. He was instrumental in helping build the original American Legion Endowment Fund, which pays for a portion of the organization’s Veterans Affairs & Rehabilitation Division work and provides cash grants to military and veteran families with children at home, through the Legion’s Temporary Financial Assistance program.
In 1920, he moved to Topeka, Kan., where he held almost every office at the post and department level of the organization, including commander of Capitol Post 1 and of the On Aug. 23, 1979, Department of Kansas. while attending the Kansas Historical Society He was an American 61st American Legion Legion National Convention delegate National Convention in Houston, Harry from Kansas each year beginning in Colmery passed away at the age of 88. 1927 and served as chairman of the In 1983, the organization dedicated Legion’s National Legislative Committee a memorial to him at the national between 1930 and 1932. He organized headquarters in Indianapolis, for his the successful campaign of fellow long and dedicated leadership of the Topekan Ralph T. O’Neil, who was elected Endowment Fund Corp. The American American Legion national commander for Legion continues to seek national 1930-31. In 1936, Colmery himself was recognition for Colmery, requesting elected national commander. as recently as 2014, in observance of Among his many roles with the the Legion’s coming centennial, that organization, Colmery served on the the architect of the GI Bill be awarded Legion’s National Defense Committee, the Congressional Gold Medal or the The American Legion Junior Baseball Presidential Medal of Freedom. 24
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Mina and Lance Steen
Scott and Jeanne Colmery Kate and Adam Firestone
Sarah and Bob Preston
Breese Tomick John Frieden
Patrick W. Michaelis Charles M. Yunker
Emery McKimmy Bob Taggart
Vince Frye
Anna Smith
Viviano Reveles
John Pinegar
David Thomas Ray Vail
Damon Christensen Don Behrens Jim Potts
Jim Buterbaugh Roy Dixon
Scott Gales
Sarah Frizell
Janet Zobel
Degginger Foundry
The American Legion National Headquarters
The Harry Colmery Memorial Fundraising Committee would like to thank the following individuals who have shared their time, talent and treasure to help make the Harry Colmery Memorial Park a reality.