In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:
  • Out of the Horrors of War: Disability Politics in World War II America by Audra Jennings
  • John M. Kinder
The War in Their Minds, German Soldiers and Their Violent Pasts in West Germany. By Audra Jennings (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016. 296. Pp. $55.00).

In May 2017, President Donald Trump's Office of Management and Budget released A New Foundation for American Greatness, a 62-page budget proposal for fiscal year 2018. Critics, including some top Republicans, declared the plan to be "dead on arrival," pointing to the budget's deep cuts to Medicaid, food stamps, and farm subsidies. Somewhat overlooked in media fallout, however, were the Trump Administration's designs to reform federal disability programs. Citing an abundance of fraud in the current system, the Trump budget promised to cut billions of dollars of Social Security disability insurance, reserving money benefits only for those who are "truly eligible." Further, it proposed a change in government priorities, away from helping people with permanent disabilities toward incentivizing "individuals with temporary work-disabilities" to rejoin the labor force.1

This line of thinking is hardly new. In her remarkably prescient book Out of the Horrors of War, historian Audra Jennings traces similar proposals back to the 1940s, when activists, medical professionals, and politicians waged fierce legislative battles to shape the federal government's response to its disabled citizens. At the center of the book is the story of the American Federation of the Physically Handicapped (AFPH), a national, cross-disability political organization built on the belief that "the federal government had a responsibility to move disabled citizens from the economic and civic margins to the center of the welfare state" (218). The group was founded in 1940 by Paul Strachan, a former government administrator whose life was transformed following an automobile crash in 1929.

Whereas previous disability groups were organized around a particular physical condition (e.g., blindness) or social category (e.g., veterans), Strachan believed in a big-tent model of disability activism, mobilizing the collective power of all disabled citizens. It was easier imagined than accomplished. The National Association of the Deaf, for example, resented being lumped in with other disabled populations, while disabled veterans—the most frequent recipients of federal benefits—were reluctant to cede their exceptional status and align with disabled civilians. To counter such resistance, Strachan and company stressed disabled Americans' "shared experiences of discrimination and disappointment with state and federal services" (117). In addition, the AFPH [End Page 999] embarked on an ambitious agenda to expand government rehabilitation programs, thwart anti-disability prejudice, and demand greater agency for disabled people—rather than medical "experts"—to shape the policies and programs that affected their lives.

At its heart, Out of the Horrors of War is a work of policy history, with most chapters outlining the internal debates behind key pieces of disability legislation from the early 1940s to the mid-1950s. In Chapter 1, Jennings describes how World War II-era AFPH activists demanded greater access to war work, more comprehensive rehabilitation services (for disabled veterans and civilians), and a new bureau to oversee all federal disability programs. Later chapters document the AFPH's legislative campaigns on behalf of the National Employ the Physically Handicapped Week, which was established in October 1945, and other federal initiatives. In the hands of a less skillful writer, one might easily drown in a sea of government acronyms and bureaucratese. However, Jennings makes sure to put a human face on even the most abstract of policy disagreements. Readers will especially appreciate her discussion of the congressional Subcommittee to Investigate Aid to the Physically Handicapped, which, in 1944, launched a two-year investigation into the scope of disability programs and prejudice in the United States. Drawing upon the resulting testimony, Jennings tells the poignant stories of men and women rejected by government rehabilitation programs, turned away by discriminatory employers, and denied equal access to taxpayer-funded education.

Given the topic, this book might have easily veered into hagiography, but Jennings is quick to point out the AFPH's limitations and failures. For all its democratic rhetoric, the group allowed racial segregation in its Southern chapters. It subscribed to...

pdf

Share