Surrender of Japan (1945)
Aboard the USS Missouri, this instrument of surrender was signed on September 2, 1945, by the Japanese envoys Foreign Minister Mamora Shigemitsu and Gen. Yoshijiro Umezu. On September 2, 1945, Japanese representatives signed the official Instrument of Surrender, prepared by the War Department and approved by President Harry S. Truman. It set out in eight short […]
United Nations Charter (1945)
On June 26, 1945, in San Francisco, the United Nations was established. Article 111 of its charter indicated that “The present Charter, of which the Chinese, French, Russian, English, and Spanish texts are equally authentic, shall remain deposited in the archives of the Government of the United States of America. Duly certified copies thereof shall […]
Surrender of Germany (1945)
This instrument of surrender was signed on May 7, 1945, at Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s headquarters in Rheims by Gen. Alfred Jodl, Chief of Staff of the German Army. At the same time, he signed three other surrender documents, one each for Great Britain, Russia, and France. The unconditional surrender of the German Third Reich […]
Manhattan Project Notebook (1945)
This notebook records an experiment of the Manhattan Project, the all-out, but highly secret, effort of the Federal Government to build an atomic bomb during World War II. Recorded here is the world’s first controlled, self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction, achieved on December 2, 1942. Eight months after the United States entered World War II, the […]
Servicemen’s Readjustment Act (1944)
Signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on June 22, 1944, this act, also known as the GI Bill, provided veterans of the Second World War funds for college education, unemployment insurance, and housing. While World War II was still being fought, the Department of Labor estimated that, after the war, 15 million men […]
General Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Order of the Day (1944)
This order was issued by Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower to encourage Allied soldiers taking part in the D-day invasion. Almost immediately after France fell to the Nazis in 1940, the Allies planned a cross-Channel assault on the German occupying forces. At the Quebec Conference in August 1943, Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt reaffirmed the plan, […]
Executive Order 9066: Resulting in the Relocation of Japanese (1942)
Issued by President Franklin Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, this order authorized the evacuation of all persons deemed a threat to national security from the West Coast to relocation centers further inland. Between 1861 and 1940, approximately 275,000 Japanese immigrated to Hawaii and the mainland United States, the majority arriving between 1898 and 1924, when […]
U. S. Declaration of War against Germany (1941)
December 11, 1941 The President’s Message To the Congress of the United States: On the morning of Dec. 11 the Government of Germany, pursuing its course of world conquest, declared war against the United States. The long-known and the long-expected has thus taken place. The forces endeavoring to enslave the entire world now are moving […]
Joint Address to Congress Leading to a Declaration of War Against Japan (1941)
On December 8, 1941, the day after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt delivered this “Day of Infamy Speech.” Immediately afterward, Congress declared war, and the United States entered World War II. On December 7, 1941, the U.S. naval base on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, was subject to an attack that was […]
Executive Order 8802: Prohibition of Discrimination in the Defense Industry (1941)
In June of 1941, President Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8802, banning discriminatory employment practices by Federal agencies and all unions and companies engaged in war-related work. The order also established the Fair Employment Practices Commission to enforce the new policy.In early July 1941, millions of jobs were being created, primarily in urban areas, as the […]