[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 209 (Thursday, December 10, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7430-S7431]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        `SIX TRIPLE EIGHT' CONGRESSIONAL GOLD MEDAL ACT OF 2019

  Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs be discharged from 
further consideration of S. 633 and the Senate proceed to its immediate 
consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the bill by title.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 633) 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''.

  There being no objection, the committee was discharged, and the 
Senate proceeded to consider the bill.
  Ms. MURKOWSKI. I ask unanimous consent that the Moran substitute 
amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as 
amended, be considered read a third time and passed; and that the 
motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment (No. 2702) was agreed to, as follows

                (Purpose: In the nature of a substitute)

        Strike all after the enacting clause and insert the 
     following:

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the `` `Six Triple Eight' 
     Congressional Gold Medal Act of 2020''.

     SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

       Congress finds the following:
       (1) On July 1, 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed 
     into law legislation that established the Women's Army Corps 
     (referred to in this section as the ``WAC'') as a component 
     in the Army. The WAC was converted from the Women's Army 
     Auxiliary Corps (referred to in this section as the 
     ``WAAC''), which had been created in 1942 without official 
     military status. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and Mary McLeod 
     Bethune, the founder of the National Council of Negro Women, 
     advocated for the admittance of African-American women into 
     the newly formed WAC to serve as officers and enlisted 
     personnel.
       (2) Dubbed ``10 percenters'', the recruitment of African-
     American women to the WAAC was limited to 10 percent of the 
     population of the WAAC to match the proportion of African-
     Americans in the national population. Despite an executive 
     order issued by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1941 
     banning racial discrimination in civilian defense industries, 
     the Armed Forces remained segregated. Enlisted women served 
     in segregated units, participated in segregated training, 
     lived in separate quarters, ate at separate tables in mess 
     halls, and used segregated recreational facilities. Officers 
     received their officer candidate training in integrated units 
     but lived under segregated conditions. Specialist and 
     technical training schools were integrated in 1943. During 
     World War II, a total of 6,520 African-American women served 
     in the WAAC and the WAC.
       (3) After several units of White women were sent to serve 
     in the European Theater of Operations (referred to in this 
     section as the ``ETO'') during World War II, African-American 
     organizations advocated for the War Department to extend the 
     opportunity to serve overseas to African-American WAC units.
       (4) In November 1944, the War Department approved sending 
     African-American women to serve in Europe. A battalion of all 
     African-American women drawn from the WAC, the Army Service 
     Forces, and the Army Air Forces was created and designated as 
     the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion (referred to in 
     this section as the ``6888th''), which was nicknamed the 
     ``Six Triple Eight''.
       (5) Army officials reported a shortage of qualified postal 
     officers within the ETO, which resulted in a backlog of 
     undelivered mail. As Allied forces drove across Europe, the 
     ever-changing locations of servicemembers hampered the 
     delivery of mail to those servicemembers. Because 7,000,000 
     individuals from the United States were serving in the ETO, 
     many of those individuals had identical names. As an example, 
     7,500 such individuals were named Robert Smith. One general 
     predicted that the backlog in Birmingham, England would take 
     6 months to process and the lack of reliable mail service was 
     hurting morale.
       (6) In March 1945, the 6888th arrived in Birmingham. Upon 
     their arrival, the 6888th found warehouses filled with 
     millions of pieces of mail intended for members of the Armed 
     Forces, United States Government personnel, and Red Cross 
     workers serving in the ETO.
       (7) The 6888th created effective processes and filing 
     systems to track individual servicemembers, organize 
     ``undeliverable'' mail, determine the intended recipient for 
     insufficiently addressed mail, and handle mail addressed to 
     servicemembers who had died. Adhering to their motto of ``No 
     mail, low morale'', the women processed an average of 65,000 
     pieces of mail per shift and cleared the 6-month backlog of 
     mail within 3 months.
       (8) The 6888th traveled to Rouen, France in May 1945 and 
     worked through a separate backlog of undelivered mail dating 
     back as far as 3 years.
       (9) At the completion of their mission, the entire unit 
     returned to the United States. The 6888th was discontinued on 
     March 9, 1946, at Camp Kilmer, New Jersey.
       (10) The accomplishments of the 6888th in Europe encouraged 
     the General Board, United States Forces, European Theater of 
     Operations to adopt the following premise in their study of 
     the WAC issued in December 1945: ``[T]he national security 
     program is the joint responsibility of all Americans 
     irrespective of color or sex'' and ``the continued use of 
     colored, along with white, female military personnel is 
     required in such strength as is proportionately appropriate 
     to the relative population distribution between colored and 
     white races''.
       (11) With the exception of smaller units of African-
     American nurses who served in Africa, Australia, and England, 
     the 6888th was the only African-American women's unit to 
     serve overseas during World War II.
       (12) The members of the ``Six Triple Eight'' received the 
     European African Middle Eastern Campaign Medal, the Women's 
     Army Corps Service Medal, and the World War II Victory Medal 
     for their service.

     SEC. 3. CONGRESSIONAL GOLD MEDAL.

       (a) Award Authorized.--The Speaker of the House of 
     Representatives and the President pro tempore of the Senate 
     shall make appropriate arrangements for the award, on behalf 
     of Congress, of a single gold medal of appropriate design in 
     honor of the women of the 6888th Central Postal Directory 
     Battalion (commonly known as the ``Six Triple Eight'') in 
     recognition of--
       (1) the pioneering military service of those women;
       (2) the devotion to duty of those women; and
       (3) the contributions made by those women to increase the 
     morale of all United States personnel stationed in the 
     European Theater of Operations during World War II.
       (b) Design and Striking.--For the purposes of the award 
     described in subsection (a), the Secretary of the Treasury 
     (referred to in this Act as the ``Secretary'') shall strike 
     the gold medal with suitable emblems, devices, and 
     inscriptions, to be determined by the Secretary.
       (c) Smithsonian Institution.--
       (1) In general.--After the award of the gold medal under 
     subsection (a), the medal shall be given to the Smithsonian 
     Institution, where the medal shall be available for display, 
     as appropriate, and made available for research.
       (2) Sense of congress.--It is the sense of Congress that 
     the Smithsonian Institution should make the gold medal 
     received under paragraph (1) available elsewhere, 
     particularly at--
       (A) appropriate locations associated with the 6888th 
     Central Postal Directory Battalion;
       (B) the Women in Military Service for America Memorial;
       (C) the United States Army Women's Museum;
       (D) the National World War II Museum and Memorial; and
       (E) any other location determined appropriate by the 
     Smithsonian Institution.

     SEC. 4. DUPLICATE MEDALS.

       Under such regulations as the Secretary may prescribe, the 
     Secretary may strike and sell duplicates in bronze of the 
     gold medal struck under section 3 at a price sufficient to 
     cover the costs of the medals, including labor, materials, 
     dies, use of machinery, and overhead expenses.

[[Page S7431]]

  


     SEC. 5. NATIONAL MEDALS.

       (a) National Medals.--Medals struck under this Act are 
     national medals for purposes of chapter 51 of title 31, 
     United States Code.
       (b) Numismatic Items.--For purposes of section 5134 of 
     title 31, United States Code, all medals struck under this 
     Act shall be considered to be numismatic items.
  The bill (S. 633), as amended, was ordered to be engrossed for a 
third reading, was read the third time, and passed.

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