Timeline of the Harry S. Truman presidency
The presidency of Harry S. Truman began on April 12, 1945, when Harry S. Truman became the 33rd president upon the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt, and ended on January 20, 1953.
April 12 – is inaugurated as the 33rd president of the United States in a ceremony in the Cabinet Room, the oath being administered by Chief Justice of the United States Harlan F. Stone and completed exactly two hours and thirty four minutes after the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt.[1]
Harry S. Truman
April 13 – Several labor unions in official and unofficial capacities pledge support for President Truman.
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April 14 – President Truman attends FDR's funeral. The White House announces President Truman's first press conference of his tenure will be held in three days.
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April 15 – President Truman attends Roosevelt's burial services.
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April 16 – President Truman addresses a joint session of Congress, during which he outlines his intentions of his tenure, including plans to win the war, carrying on the policies of the late President Roosevelt, and punishing war criminals.
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April 17 – President Truman delivers a broadcast address to service members in the and Navy, telling them that they shall carry a tradition of not faltering as done by his immediate predecessor and recalls his own service during World War I as having made him privy to both killing on the battlefield and the fighting man's trials and tribulations.[6][7]
United States Army
April 18 – President Truman orders the Department of Commerce receive the transmission of the surplus property of the treasury procurement division. President Truman designates May 13 as Mother's Day in order to show what he calls the US's "gratitude, love, and devotion" for its mothers.[9]
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April 20 – President Truman holds the second news conference of his tenure in his White House office.
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April 23 – President Truman, Prime Minister and Marshal Joseph Stalin issue a joint statement during the evening, saying in part, "Any person guilty of maltreating or allowing any Allied prisoners of war, internees or deported citizens to be maltreated, whether in battle zone, on lines of communication, in a camp, hospital, prison or elsewhere, will be ruthlessly pursued and brought to punishment."[11]
Winston Churchill
April 26 – Press Secretary requests White House reporters give President Truman equal protection to that received by the late President Roosevelt under the voluntary censorship code.[12]
Jonathan Daniels
April 27 – President Truman issues a statement saying the armies of Anglo-Americans have met Soviet Union forces in the "heart of Nazi Germany" and that the "enemy has been cut in two." President Truman holds his third news conference during the afternoon, announcing "Edwin W. Pauley as his Personal Representative on the Reparations Commission, with the rank of Ambassador, and of Dr. Isador Lubin as an Associate, with the rank of Minister."[14]
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April 28 – President Truman holds his fourth news conference at the White House, during which he says there is "no foundation" for rumors relating to Germany surrendering, during the night hours.
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January 1 – Robert P. Patterson says the war department does not believe General Douglas MacArthur should be consulted ahead of the Japanese three occupation policies.[138]
United States Secretary of War
January 2 – President Truman returns to Washington from his vacation.
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January 3 – President Truman urges the American people to confront their representatives for the passage of legislation he says will benefit the US in a post war period during a half hour radio address.
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January 4 – The US demands the entirety of the German general staff and high command be branded as war criminals for involvement in the Nazi program by the international military tribunal.
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January 5 – General Joseph T. McNarney announces his plans for policing American occupation zones, envisioning a task force of 38,000 men with armored vehicles that would patrol during the day and night.
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January 5 – The Labor Department reports prices resumed their upward trend at the end of but adds that the average wage earner receives $4.43 less a week than needed to meet the rise in the cost of living.[143]
World War II
January 8 – During his forty-first news conference as president, conducted in his White House office during the morning, Truman states there is consideration for an increase in steel price. President Truman releases a statement on deduction of armed forces members and explains the process by which this is conducted.[145]
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March 4 – President Truman proposes that not approving the 3,750,000,000 loan to Britain could be "trade warfare between nations" following the loan being approved by the advisory board of the Office of War Mobilization and Reconversion.
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March 4 – The Senate Labor committee rejects the approval of the Case anti-strike bill developed in the House, chairman saying that members resented the enactment of legislation that they felt would penalize labor.[147]
James E. Murray
March 4 – A special Senate-House committee recommends the elimination of over half of the current congressional committees as part of an effort to reorganize the government among an increase in congressional salary and a pension plan for congressmen.
[148]
March 5 – Secretary of State Byrnes announces China has turned down efforts by Russia to collaborate on operating major industries in jointly and the intent of the United States to send a message to Moscow regarding the affair.[149]
Manchuria
March 5 – A State Department official confirms a note being sent by to confirm his intention of remaining in office despite allied pressure.[150]
Francisco Franco
March 5 – Former President is announced by Secretary of Agriculture Anderson to have accepted an invitation by President Truman to travel abroad to Europe for the purpose of surveying food needs in the continent.[151]
Herbert Hoover
March 5 – The Senate Committee on Public Lands and Surveys unanimously recommends the confirmation of Julius A. Krug as Secretary of the Interior after the nominee was called up for questioning.
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March 5 – House Republicans put forth their own substitute for the Truman administration's battered-down housing bill which if enacted would deny the government the ability to clamp price ceilings on new homes.
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June 1 – President Truman accepts an honorary degree from in Chestertown, Maryland.[154]
Washington College
June 14 – President Truman holds a news conference in which he confirms will remain his ambassador to the Vatican until world peace is secured.[155] President Truman vetoes legislation promoting navy, marine corps, and coast guard personnel who had previously been prisoners of war.[156]
Myron Charles Taylor
July 15 – Truman signs a bill authorizing a loan of $3.75 billion to Great Britain.
[157]
November 15 – President Truman announces that President of the United Mine Workers has turned down a proposal for settlement of the coal wage dispute, Truman calling for a reconsideration for what he termed a "fair and equitable" proposal by the federal government.[159]
John L. Lewis
November 30 – A check discloses Truman has support from Democrats and Republicans in discussions with United Mine Workers President Lewis without making compromises that may seem akin to a victory for Lewis.
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November 30 – Robert P. Patterson states prices needed to meet American occupation army expenses throughout the first six months of the following year.[161]
United States Secretary of War
May 22 – Truman approves a bill providing $400 million in assistance to Greece and Turkey.
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November 4 – The United States proposes withdrawing American and Soviet-occupation armies within 90 days following the formation of an elected and independent Korean government the following year in a United Nations resolution.
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November 4 – Undersecretary of the Treasury Lee M. Wiggins says he has no particular advice to give revising tax treatment of farm cooperatives while speaking to the House Ways and Means committee.
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January 3 – President Truman tasks four agencies with forming allocating programs that are voluntary and industry wide for scarcity items.
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January 6 – President Truman holds a meeting with Cabinet at the White House during the afternoon.
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January 7 – President Truman delivers the 1948 State of the Union Address.
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January 8 – George Marshall says Russia and the Communist Party will attempt a backfire on the European Recovery Program but also of his conviction that the US would be able to handle the opposition successfully.[169]
United States Secretary of State
January 12 – The announces the resignations of eleven individuals from government service during their ongoing investigation by the FBI under the federal loyalty program.[171]
Federal Bureau of Investigation
January 12 – President Truman sends Congress a peacetime budget providing billions for the funding of defense that would also be used to counter totalitarianism abroad.
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January 15 – The Interior Department states its expectation that President Truman will direct conservation of petroleum supplies by each government agencies to assist with relieving the critical fuel shortage within the following twenty-four hours.
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January 16 – In a letter to Senator , President Truman describes the Senate Armed Services Committee with having done a disservice to the United States after voting against legislation allowing Laurence S. Kuter to serve as Chairman of the Civil Aeronautics Board while receiving military pay.[174]
John Chandler Gurney
January 16 – Senate Foreign Relations committee chairman indicates opposition to the European Recovery Program would be diminished in the event the United States could follow its funding and see where it was being used.[175]
Arthur Vandenberg
January 16 – John Wesley Snyder gives an ultimatum from the Truman administration to the Congress during an appearance before the House Ways and Means Committee.[176]
United States Secretary of the Treasury
January 16 – In a statement, Julius Albert Krug endorses hydroelectric projects as a partial means of answering the national petroleum shortage problem.[177]
United States Secretary of the Interior
January 3 – President Truman attends morning services with members of Congress to pray for the successes of the at the National Presbyterian Church.[181]
81st United States Congress
January 3 – In a vote of 29 to 13, Ohio Senator is re-elected as Republican Party policy leader alongside the approval of a rule change that an individual can serve in the position for more than four years.[182]
Robert A. Taft
January 4 – During his first news conference of the 81st United States Congress, House Speaker tells reporters of his conviction that the legislative proposals of President Truman will have "considerable favor" and no priority list for legislation had been assembled.[183]
Sam Rayburn
January 5 – President Truman delivers the to a joint session of Congress, calling for the repeal of the Taft–Hartley Act, aid to farmers and implementation of civil rights laws, universal training, broader social security, education and prepaid medical insurance federal aid programs, and a million new housing units over the course of the next seven years.[184]
1949 State of the Union Address
January 7 – President Truman holds a news conference in which he announces the nomination of for Secretary of State to replace George Marshall and insists the change will not alter policy.[185]
Dean Acheson
January 8 – Five members of the Senate Labor committee endorse repealing the Taft–Hartley Act and restoring the Wagner Act prior to Congress giving consideration to any new legislation pertaining to labor.
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January 8 – The announces that it will not enlist any men for the months of either February or March as a result of increases in voluntary enlistments.[187]
United States Army
January 8 – Indiana Representative says the economic messages and plan outlined by President Truman during the latter's State of the Union address would bankrupt the US in addition to inflicting irreversible damage to the American free enterprise system.[188]
Charles A. Halleck
January 8 – Stuart Symington advocates for a seventy-member air force and the US does not have much time to prepare during his first annual report.[189]
United States Secretary of the Air Force
January 14 – During a press conference, State Department press officer states that countries unwilling to enter the collective defense pacts will receive no arms and defense supplies from the United States.[190]
Michael J. McDermott
January 14 – The Senate Foreign Relations Committee unanimously votes to approve Dean Acheson as United States Secretary of State.
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January 14 – Tom C. Clark announces that the Justice Department has filed suit for a divorce of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company and Western Electric company.[192]
United States Attorney General
January 20 –
Second inauguration of Harry S. Truman
January 31 – President Truman announces the nomination of Jesse M. Donaldson for Postmaster General, the only office in his cabinet with a fixed term.
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January 1 – It is learned that President Truman has been given a new plan to prevent from entering Communist hands and its implementation would see the United States obtain a long-term lease on either a single base or multiple bases on Formosa.[229]
Formosa
January 1 – President Truman joins the congregation of First Baptist Church in D.C. in observance of .[230]
New Year's Day
January 1 – Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee announces the upcoming meeting between the group's members will be to consider House plans to combine 1951 fiscal year appropriations into one measure.[231]
Kenneth McKellar
January 31 – After hearing from the Acheson–Johnson–Lilienthal special committee, Truman orders development of the hydrogen bomb to proceed.
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February 14 – and Joseph Stalin sign the Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance.
Mao Zedong
March 3 – The White House announces President Truman will ask Congress for authority to use his powers to seize and operate coal mines.
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March 3 – The Senate Labor Committee postpones a vote on a bill by Senator that would authorize government seizure of the strike-bound coal mines, citing a lack of a quorum.[233]
Wayne Morse
March 3 – The announces a permanent armory for the purpose of training officers and men in the Organized Reserve Corps will be established in buildings that have yet to be purchased.[234]
United States Department of the Army
March 8 – General Omar Bradley states the United States cannot be assured against a devastating blow with its present forces while giving a speech to the Women's National Press Club.
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March 8 – Wisconsin Senator charges State Department employee Dorothy Kenyon with having affiliation with at least 28 Communist organizations during an appearance before a Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee.[236]
Joseph McCarthy
March 10 – Truman orders the AEC to prepare for hydrogen bomb production.
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June 25 – begins.
Korean War
August 8 – The House postpones debate on an economic controls bill.
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August 8 – President Truman completes a message to Congress in which he calls for legislation responding to combat sabotage and Communists, White House officials stating their expectation for it to be released sometime during the afternoon and that it contains a warning to the United States against being carried away by hysteria.
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August 8 – Carroll L. Wilson resigns as General Manager of the Atomic Energy Commission and Carleton Shugg is designated by the commission to serve as acting general manager.
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August 8 – FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover warns that every Communist in the United States could potentially be a spy or saboteur and states the interest of the FBI in identifying every Communist within the country.
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November 1 –
Attempted assassination of Harry S. Truman
January 2 – President Truman signs a bill prohibiting slot machine shipments in addition to related gambling devices across the state line, the legislation providing fines and jail terms for violations.
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January 2 – The sends a civilian defense bill granting the federal government in the event of a foreign attack on the United States to the White House.[242]
81st United States Congress
January 4 – President Truman states his belief that inflation will eventually have to halted through the implementation of across-the-board price and wage controls and that he will elaborate on his position in his upcoming State of the Union address.
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January 4 – Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee says Congress will be requested to grant a six-month extension to the amount of service for draftees and calls the request one of the few parts of the proposal that he can confirm will be asked.[244]
Carl Vinson
January 6 – President Truman sends General to Europe with assurances that he is being supported by the American people.[245]
Dwight D. Eisenhower
January 6 – Nevada Senator rebukes the 30-day price freeze being considered by the Truman administration as ineffective and calls for price curbs that are both "immediate and systemic" to "stop the impending threat to the economic and industrial life of America."[246]
Pat McCarran
January 8 – President Truman delivers the 1951 State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress.
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January 9 – Wisconsin Senator publicly discloses a letter he sent to Secretary of the Army Pace asking how classified military messages became known to columnist Drew Pearson.[248]
Joseph McCarthy
January 10 – President Truman attends the award ceremonies for the Woodrow Wilson Foundation in his White House office.
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January 11 – President Truman delivers remarks at a buffet dinner at the Shoreham Hotel in Washington held in honor of Democratic members of Congress, where he cautions them to retain their principles of "honor and justice" over "fat and ease" in trying to seek world peace.
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January 11 – Informed sources familiar with American policy deny the chances of a meeting between high-level officials of the United States and Red China that would entail the countries discussing a Korean settlement.
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January 11 – California Senator proposes a six-to-one ratio arming Western Europe against Communist aggression that would ultimately see the US furnishing 10 divisions and grant the other North Atlantic nations 60.[252]
William Knowland
January 12 – Senator says the Truman administration has ended bipartisan foreign policy with President Truman's declaration that he would consult Congress in sending troops to Europe but would not be bound to do so.[253]
Robert Taft
January 12 – Assistant Secretary of Defense Anna Rosenberg testifies to Congress over President Truman's increase in American fighting forces.
[254]
January 12 – President Truman signs the into law. President Truman says the legislation is intended to protects Americans in the event of enemy assault and "affords the basic framework for preparations to minimize the effects of an attack on our civilian population, and to deal with the immediate emergency conditions which such an attack would create."[255]
Federal Civil Defense Act of 1950
January 12 – President Truman transmits the fifth annual Economic Report to Congress in a message all the while stressing the need for unity for the United States to prosper on the economic front.
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January 15 – The White House announces that James G. McDonald has resigned as and President Truman has responded by nominating Monnett B. Davis as his successor.[257]
United States Ambassador to Israel
January 15 – President Truman sends a budget message to Congress on an appropriation for flood control and river harbor projects.
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January 17 – Republican Senators and Andrew Frank Schoeppel demand that President Truman's defense housing program have a minimum of inflationary aspects and Congress must prevent the American economy from being dangerously strained by the program.[259]
Irving Ives
January 17 – Chairman of the Corporation of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Karl T. Compton calls on Congress to adopt the Truman administration-backed Universal Military Service and Training Program and advocates for an alternate service for those unable to meet the physical or mental qualifications of the service.
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January 20 – The United States demands in a resolution that China be named as the aggressor in Korea by the United Nations and that the time had come to draw the line in regard to free nations while admitting the door to a peace settlement with the UN was still possible.
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January 20 – General says the western powers are in charge of what they want to do in the war with Communist China during a visit to Eighth Army Headquarters.[262]
Douglas MacArthur
January 22 – General Omar Bradley testifies before the Senate preparedness subcommittee on his view that the American military is ready to "avert disaster" for the United States.
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January 22 – Chairman of the Senate-House Atomic Energy Committee calls for a 50 billion global peace plan and requests it be added to a Senate resolution seeking friendship for the Russians, adding that the United States was losing ground in its battle for the minds of men.[264]
Brien McMahon
January 23 – President Truman signs Executive Order 10207, forming the President's Commission on Internal Security and Individual Rights in addition to outlining its purpose and its membership of "a Chairman, a Vice Chairman, and seven other members" that are to be appointed by the president.
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January 24 – President Truman attends a dinner in honor of his banker Joshua Evans at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington.
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January 25 – President Truman holds his two hundred and fifty-third news conference in the Indian Treaty Room in the Executive Office Building. President Truman begins the conference with an address on U.S. Representative to the United Nations conveying American government views on Communist China and announces appointments to the President's Commission on Internal Security and Individual Rights.[267]
Warren R. Austin
January 25 – President Truman signs Executive Order 10208, authorizing the Secretary of State "to perform the functions and exercise the powers and authority vested in the President by the ."[268]
Yugoslav Emergency Relief Assistance Act of 1950
January 27 – President Truman issues a memorandum to executive department and agency leadership on the need for support of "the economic stabilization orders issued today" and provides three steps the agencies should work in alignment with under the law.
[269]
January 30 – President Truman attends a special ceremony in honor of serving longer as Speaker of the House of Representatives than any other individual in American history in his White House office.[270]
Sam Rayburn
January 30 – President Truman and French Prime Minister Pleven issue a joint statement on their agreements over the course of their conference as well as an outline of various issues afflicting the international community such as problems in the Far East, Europe issues, defense plans for the Atlantic, and economic dilemmas.
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January 31 – In a letter to Director of the Bureau of the Budget, citing a period of national emergency, President Truman requests the establishment of "a Federal history program for all the agencies engaged in emergency activities" and furthers that the "active direction of the program should be undertaken by the Bureau of the Budget, although the preparation of the studies themselves should be carried out by the individual agencies."
[272]
January 31 – President Truman attends a dinner for the Democratic National Congressional Committee in the Caucus Room of the Congressional Hotel in Washington.
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January 2 – President Truman announces his ordering of a reorganization of the Internal Revenue Bureau.
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January 3 – President Truman holds a news conference in the Indian Treaty Room of the Old Executive Office Building during the afternoon.
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January 10 – President Truman holds a new conference in the Indian Treaty Room of the Executive Office Building during the morning.
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January 12 – President Truman releases a statement on the current status and plans for the civil defense of the United States.
[321]
January 14 – President Truman sends a message to Congress that transmits the initial report on trade agreements having escape clauses.
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January 18 – President Truman and Prime Minister release a joint statement outlining their agreements regarding the United States Atlantic Command.[325]
Winston Churchill
March 3 – John W. Snyder tells senators that the Truman administration's plan reorganization of the Internal Revenue Service will not remove the rights of taxpayers to get local jury trials during tax cases that are disputed.[326]
United States Secretary of the Treasury
March 3 – The Supreme Court upholds the anti-Communist teacher law in New York designed to bar subversive persons from working in the New York school system by a vote of 6 to 3.
[327]
May 31 – Congressman says that President Truman's announcement that he was not running for re-election to a second full term was a ploy to dissuade interest in corruption scandals while he wages a hidden campaign for another term.[328]
Daniel A. Reed
June 27 – The House of Representatives and the Senate override Truman's veto of the .[162]
McCarran-Walter Act
September – Truman rejects the recommendation of the to delay the first test of a hydrogen bomb.[215]
State Department Panel of Consultants on Disarmament
November 4 – is elected president in the United States presidential election of 1952.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
December 4 – Chairman of the Wage Stabilization Board resigns in protest to coal miners receiving an extra wage boost beyond recommendations for top defense agency officials.[329]
Archibald Cox
December 4 – Truman administration officials confirm the administration will make no further efforts toward solving the Korean situation, leaving the incoming Eisenhower administration to make changes.
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for his predecessor
Timeline of the Franklin D. Roosevelt presidency
for his successor