Secretary of Defense Robert Gates will be on Capitol Hill today, discussing the Obama administrations broad plan to repeal the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy on homosexuals. Gates faces an uphill battle against increasingly raucous conservatives and increasingly timid democrats, all who are anxious to put their name on anything controversial in an election year.

Despite this, Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-Pa) and his 187 co-sponsors have publicly thrown their support behind allowing openly gay service members to serve their country. Still, the fodder from the opposition is strong: General George Casey, the Army's Chief of Staff, has voiced that he believed the ban shouldn't be lifted until the US completes its withdrawal from Iraq (though homosexuality in Iraq is less taboo than in America). A second member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is also in opposition to the repeal: Marine Corps Commandant General James Conway, stating the repeal would affect military readiness.

This battle has been fought before. In 1948, despite the opposition of members of his Joint Chiefs, President Harry S. Truman bypassed Congress by signing Executive Order 9811, effectively desegregating the military.

Southern Republicans and some democrats would have assured a Congressional bill would not have passed (at least not in 1948), and when the Executive Order was signed, many tried to create laws which would have rendered the Order moot, namely Richard B. Russell, a Democratic Senator from Georgia.

Despite segregation laws during World War II, units low on white soldiers were often forcibly desegregated by adding black soldiers. When the segregated Eighth Army went to the Korean front in 1950 and suffered staggering losses, black soldiers soon joined the fight and helped push back the communists to the 38th parallel. It seems racial supremacy was an issue until death and defeat were on the line. By 1951, the Army formally desegregated its units.

The military preceded the rest of America in desegregation by over a decade. It was a moral choice: when Truman signed the Order we were not a nation at war. The Man from Missouri knew it was the right thing to do.

Now in the midst of two wars where gays and straights have served side-by-side, we're faced with a similar dilemma. Cries from the right will say openly-serving gays will affect military readiness. I say we are fortunate they are serving in our ranks today, despite our rejection of their lifestyles.

Richard B. Russell, the democrat from Georgia, had tried to pass a bill allowing white soldiers to choose whether they wanted to serve in a segregated military unit or not. The bill was defeated twice in Congress, and defeated again in Korea, and again in Vietnam, and again in Panama, and again in Iraq and again in Afghanistan. Soldiers in the Army want someone beside them they can trust. Beyond that, it doesn't matter who they are or how they live. Our laws should reflect that.

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