Letter from Eleanor Roosevelt to Harry S. Truman

APARTMENT ISA " SQUARE. wery NEW vom 11, - v. May 13, 1948 Dear Mr. President: A group of people came to see me the other day about conscientious objection as related to human rights. At the same time they spoke to me about the conscientious objectors or the last war. The following is an excerpt from their state- ment to me: "The second Watter has to do with the amnesty or pardon, for conscientious objectors in the United States in World War 11. As you uncoubted- ly know, the commission headed by former Justice Roberts reported to the President in December am on December 23, 1947, the President issued pardons to the persons listed by the Robert'e Commission. "Home ver, only about 1500 of the 15,000 Selective Service violators were included in the pardon. Of the approximately 1100 recog- nized as conscientious objectors by the Department of Justice only about 150 received pardons. Or the 3,000 or more Jehovah's Witnesses only a couple of hundred were included. "An a very real sense those who were not in- cluded in the Commission' S recommendation are now worse off than they were before, since the Department or Justice is taking the position that these persons have all been considered and is therefore declining to consider applications for individual pardons. "Another extremely serious aspect of the matter is that the Roberts Commission applied a very narrow songeption of 'religious belief' in determining which conscientious objectors were