GI Bill's 60th year a testament to vision
By JOHN BRIEDEN
KNIGHT RIDDER TRIBUNE
The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, the original GI Bill, changed America. I can think of two ideal ways to mark the 60th anniversary of its signing on June 22: Reinstitute its provisions for the nation's newest veterans, and award the Medal of Freedom posthumously to past American Legion National Commander Harry Colmery of Topeka, Kan., the man universally recognized as its author.
The Kansas lawyer's penciled outline of the GI Bill -- its pages now tanned with age -- are contained in a glass display case at American Legion National Headquarters at Indianapolis. Since June 17, 2002, a plaque dedicated to Colmery's work has marked the suite, Room 570 of the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, where the World War I veteran on Dec. 15, 1943, penned his remarkable vision.
Thanks to House Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Chris Smith of New Jersey and other members of Congress, the buying power of the GI Bill educational benefit has risen meteorically the last couple of years. The Medal of Freedom, however, remains a long-overdue tribute to my predecessor, a man of foresight and character whose contribution to veterans and to U.S. domestic policy has reverberated through generations and enhanced the lives of millions.
Is anyone more worthy of the Medal of Freedom than the veteran whose vision radiated the American dream? By providing home loans, business loans and enough money to cover the full cost of higher education, that is precisely what the original GI Bill did.
In 1939, according to Education Department estimates, nearly 1.5 million Americans were enrolled in the nation's institutions of higher learning. By the fall of 1947, as the late Michael J. Bennett wrote in "When Dreams Came True," total enrollment had swelled to more than 2.3 million, with veterans accounting for 1.1 million, nearly half of the nation's post-secondary enrollment.
Educational assistance
Prior to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's signing of the GI Bill, elite private institutions were the province of the nation's economic and social elite. Thanks to the GI Bill, even the Ivy League's "hallowed halls" were opened to World War II veterans; Harvard's enrollment almost doubled from 2,750 in February 1947 to 5,000 in September 1947, Bennett reports. Most of the veterans might not have attended college without the educational assistance, which covered books, fees and tuition.
Educational opportunity was not the only commodity in short supply before the GI Bill's remedy kicked in. Legions of World War II veterans came home to a nation short on housing. Milton Greenberg's "The GI Bill: The Law That Changed America" noted that a million and half veterans in 1946 were "doubled up with family or friends." And that was during the infancy, if you will, of the Baby Boom, during which the U.S. birthrate skyrocketed. Thanks to the landmark legislation, Greenberg wrote, more than 2 million GI Bill home loans were approved by the '50s, and 5 million by the '60s.
The suburb was born. The shopping center followed. Roads had to be built to connect communities. The engine of economic growth churned. Dreams came true. Men and women of a variety of backgrounds, who served their nation honorably in the U.S. armed forces, made something of themselves. Their accomplishments raised expectations for their children and for future generations.
Michael Bennett used to deliver inspirational talks about the egalitarian consequences of the original GI Bill: the spawning of a middle class; the social and economic diversifying of college student bodies; and the unlocking of passageways to homeownership and entrepreneurship.
Economic stimulus
Bennett used to save for last a discussion of the original GI Bill as a cost-effective means of economic stimulus. One would see the proverbial light bulbs popping on above the heads of his audiences. He would point out that veterans repaid the GI Bill's $13.5 billion price by 1960. They repaid the hefty sum with higher taxes that they paid on their increased incomes.
Former President George Bush, Harry Belafonte, Art Buchwald, Tony Curtis, Sen. Bob Dole, Dr. Henry Kissinger, Walter Matthau, Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Rod Steiger attended college on the GI Bill. So did Baruch S. Blumberg, who earned the Nobel Prize in 1976 for the discovery of the hepatitis-B virus; economist Dr. Andrew Brimmer, who was a member of the Federal Reserve Board; and acclaimed civil rights attorney Dovey Roundtree, the first GI Bill graduate to become both a lawyer and an ordained minister. A generation of veterans came home and took the same path of upward mobility that they took.
Colmery's World War I generation came home to a nation that was unprepared to address its unique readjustment needs. The GI Bill ensured that America's veterans would never again face the lack of educational and employment opportunities that his comrades endured.
The vision of Past National Commander Colmery, as he is known within The American Legion, changed America. He deserves the Medal of Freedom. What better way to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the GI Bill than to correct this long-overdue oversight?
X John Brieden is national commander of the American Legion, the nation's largest veterans organization, with offices in Indianapolis, Ind. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services