‘Six Triple Eight’ Congressional Gold Medal Act of 2020

116TH CONGRESS 2D SESSION S. 633 AN ACT To award a Congressional Gold Medal to the members of the Women’s Army Corps who were assigned to the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, known as the ‘‘Six Triple Eight’’. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa- 1 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2 2 † S 633 ES SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 1 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘ ‘Six Triple Eight’ Con- 2 gressional Gold Medal Act of 2020’’. 3 SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 4 Congress finds the following: 5 (1) On July 1, 1943, President Franklin D. 6 Roosevelt signed into law legislation that established 7 the Women’s Army Corps (referred to in this section 8 as the ‘‘WAC’’) as a component in the Army. The 9 WAC was converted from the Women’s Army Auxil- 10 iary Corps (referred to in this section as the 11 ‘‘WAAC’’), which had been created in 1942 without 12 official military status. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt 13 and Mary McLeod Bethune, the founder of the Na- 14 tional Council of Negro Women, advocated for the 15 admittance of African-American women into the 16 newly formed WAC to serve as officers and enlisted 17 personnel. 18 (2) Dubbed ‘‘10 percenters’’, the recruitment of 19 African-American women to the WAAC was limited 20 to 10 percent of the population of the WAAC to 21 match the proportion of African-Americans in the 22 national population. Despite an executive order 23 issued by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1941 24 banning racial discrimination in civilian defense in- 25 dustries, the Armed Forces remained segregated. 26 3 † S 633 ES Enlisted women served in segregated units, partici- 1 pated in segregated training, lived in separate quar- 2 ters, ate at separate tables in mess halls, and used 3 segregated recreational facilities. Officers received 4 their officer candidate training in integrated units 5 but lived under segregated conditions. Specialist and 6 technical training schools were integrated in 1943. 7 During World War II, a total of 6,520 African- 8 American women served in the WAAC and the 9 WAC. 10 (3) After several units of White women were 11 sent to serve in the European Theater of Operations 12 (referred to in this section as the ‘‘ETO’’) during 13 World War II, African-American organizations advo- 14 cated for the War Department to extend the oppor- 15 tunity to serve overseas to African-American WAC 16 units. 17 (4) In November 1944, the War Department 18 approved sending African-American women to serve 19 in Europe. A battalion of all African-American 20 women drawn from the WAC, the Army Service 21 Forces, and the Army Air Forces was created and 22 designated as the 6888th Central Postal Directory 23 Battalion (referred to in this section as the 24 4 † S 633 ES ‘‘6888th’’), which was nicknamed the ‘‘Six Triple 1 Eight’’. 2 (5) Army officials reported a shortage of quali- 3 fied postal officers within the ETO, which resulted 4 in a backlog of undelivered mail. As Allied forces 5 drove across Europe, the ever-changing locations of 6 servicemembers hampered the delivery of mail to 7 those servicemembers. Because 7,000,000 individ- 8 uals from the United States were serving in the 9 ETO, many of those individuals had identical names. 10 As an example, 7,500 such individuals were named 11 Robert Smith. One general predicted that the back- 12 log in Birmingham, England would take 6 months to 13 process and the lack of reliable mail service was 14 hurting morale. 15 (6) In March 1945, the 6888th arrived in Bir- 16 mingham. Upon their arrival, the 6888th found 17 warehouses filled with millions of pieces of mail in- 18 tended for members of the Armed Forces, United 19 States Government personnel, and Red Cross work- 20 ers serving in the ETO. 21 (7) The 6888th created effective processes and 22 filing systems to track individual servicemembers, 23 organize ‘‘undeliverable’’ mail, determine the in- 24 tended recipient for insufficiently addressed mail, 25 5 † S 633 ES and handle mail addressed to servicemembers who 1 had died. Adhering to their motto of ‘‘No mail, low 2 morale’’, the women processed an average of 65,000 3 pieces of mail per shift and cleared the 6-month 4 backlog of mail within 3 months. 5 (8) The 6888th traveled to Rouen, France in 6 May 1945 and worked through a separate backlog of 7 undelivered mail dating back as far as 3 years. 8 (9) At the completion of their mission, the en- 9 tire unit returned to the United States. The 6888th 10 was discontinued on March 9, 1946, at Camp Kil- 11 mer, New Jersey. 12 (10) The accomplishments of the 6888th in Eu- 13 rope encouraged the General Board, United States 14 Forces, European Theater of Operations to adopt 15 the following premise in their study of the WAC 16 issued in December 1945: ‘‘[T]he national security 17 program is the joint responsibility of all Americans 18 irrespective of color or sex’’ and ‘‘the continued use 19 of colored, along with white, female military per- 20 sonnel is required in such strength as is proportion- 21 ately appropriate to the relative population distribu- 22 tion between colored and white races’’. 23 (11) With the exception of smaller units of Af- 24 rican-American nurses who served in Africa, Aus- 25 6 † S 633 ES tralia, and England, the 6888th was the only Afri- 1 can-American women’s unit to serve overseas during 2 World War II. 3 (12) The members of the ‘‘Six Triple Eight’’ re- 4 ceived the European African Middle Eastern Cam- 5 paign Medal, the Women’s Army Corps Service 6 Medal, and the World War II Victory Medal for 7 their service. 8 SEC. 3. CONGRESSIONAL GOLD MEDAL. 9 (a) AWARD AUTHORIZED.—The Speaker of the 10 House of Representatives and the President pro tempore 11 of the Senate shall make appropriate arrangements for the 12 award, on behalf of Congress, of a single gold medal of 13 appropriate design in honor of the women of the 6888th 14 Central Postal Directory Battalion (commonly known as 15 the ‘‘Six Triple Eight’’) in recognition of— 16 (1) the pioneering military service of those 17 women; 18 (2) the devotion to duty of those women; and 19 (3) the contributions made by those women to 20 increase the morale of all United States personnel 21 stationed in the European Theater of Operations 22 during World War II. 23 (b) DESIGN AND STRIKING.—For the purposes of the 24 award described in subsection (a), the Secretary of the 25 7 † S 633 ES Treasury (referred to in this Act as the ‘‘Secretary’’) shall 1 strike the gold medal with suitable emblems, devices, and 2 inscriptions, to be determined by the Secretary. 3 (c) SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION.— 4 (1) IN GENERAL.—After the award of the gold 5 medal under subsection (a), the medal shall be given 6 to the Smithsonian Institution, where the medal 7 shall be available for display, as appropriate, and 8 made available for research. 9 (2) SENSE OF CONGRESS.—It is the sense of 10 Congress that the Smithsonian Institution should 11 make the gold medal received under paragraph (1) 12 available elsewhere, particularly at— 13 (A) appropriate locations associated with 14 the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion; 15 (B) the Women in Military Service for 16 America Memorial; 17 (C) the United States Army Women’s Mu- 18 seum; 19 (D) the National World War II Museum 20 and Memorial; and 21 (E) any other location determined appro- 22 priate by the Smithsonian Institution. 23 8 † S 633 ES SEC. 4. DUPLICATE MEDALS. 1 Under such regulations as the Secretary may pre- 2 scribe, the Secretary may strike and sell duplicates in 3 bronze of the gold medal struck under section 3 at a price 4 sufficient to cover the costs of the medals, including labor, 5 materials, dies, use of machinery, and overhead expenses. 6 SEC. 5. NATIONAL MEDALS. 7 (a) NATIONAL MEDALS.—Medals struck under this 8 Act are national medals for purposes of chapter 51 of title 9 31, United States Code. 10 (b) NUMISMATIC ITEMS.—For purposes of section 11 5134 of title 31, United States Code, all medals struck 12 under this Act shall be considered to be numismatic items. 13 Passed the Senate December 10, 2020. Attest: Secretary. 116TH CONGRESS 2D SESSION S. 633 AN ACT To award a Congressional Gold Medal to the mem- bers of the Women’s Army Corps who were as- signed to the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, known as the ‘‘Six Triple Eight’’.