Before the matter implied in my title, I had three gripes against The American Legion.
- In an associated file, "Fear of Veterans Coverup?", I note the hatred that we soldiers experienced from the townies of San Antonio, TX, in 1941, "before Peal Harbor". We were ordered to go to town in civies, because merely a uniform could provoke provocation. (We were also ordered to wear "G.I. or khaki rocks" for close identification.) But many recognized that we weren't townies and harassed us, even in civies.
There were "wholesale riots"" in the streets, beatings, even knifings. The MPs were our friends. An MP would pull up the pantleg of a scuffler. If he didn't have GI socks, he got a club or at least a shove. If he had GI socks, he was dragged to a jeep to make a getaway.
But what provoked so many of us soldiers was that, later, we often saw a fighter-townie wearing an American Legion cap! These veterans of WWI apparently didn't identify with soldiers who might go into WWII!
- An American Legionaire made it impossible for me to return to my home in Springfield, MO, after WWII. Briefly, in 1942, I signed Family Allotment papers for my mother and my brother, Bobby. But the Allotment Agency in New Jersey didn't send them any money. So, along with a monthly deduction, I sent money home to them. In February, 1943, having made Staff Sergeant, I was no longer eligible for a Family Allotment, so I signed papers to discontinue it, but complained that no money had ever been paid out, despite a year's deduction from my pay. Guess what? Now the payments began. When the payments equaled what they should have paid out, I tried again to stop the payments. But by this time, the Allotment Agency had ordered my mother to pay back all the money she's received, saying that I was never eligible for a Family Allotment! For the next two years, I tried to straighten this out, with the help of Chaplains at my variously assigned posts. My discharge, in December, 1945, was held up two weeks in an attempt to get some response from the Allotment Agency. Then my discharging officer, "We did our best. You can't be discharged owing the Government money. So I'm declaring this debt void and discharging you.
However, my mother, in 1944, had taken the matter to a Legionaire in Springfield. He wrote me many scurrilous letters, blaming me -- to the Agency -- for the problem. I passed through Springfield after my discharge -- on my way to my wartime wife in Kansas, who immediately demanded a divorce, now that the War was over. While waiting for a bus, this Legionaire accosted me, denounced me loudly to a small crowd, and said he'd see that I never got a job in that town! And this was one reason why I wound up in NYC and lived homeless on the streets.
- In NYC after WWII, as noted elsewhere, veterans were living under crowded conditions, due to lack of housing, and trying to live on a considerably lower pay that we heard was paid out during the War. I bankrolled a "Veterans' Census" of the Chelsea section, hoping the recorded needs might persuade political action. I went to the local American Legion Post for help. They did nothing -- except some of them tried to bully me into giving up my lists, which they apparently wanted forrecruiting purposes.
And, beginning with the "bastard war" of Korea, I have observed 54 years of silence about this treatment of Service Personnel and Veterans!