On March 18, 24 US Army Veterans were finally honored for their heroic actions. These veterans, known collectively as the Valor 24, fought in World War II, Vietnam and Korea. Despite many of them earning the military’s second highest honor, the Distinguished Service Cross, they were all denied what they had rightfully earned – The Medal of Honor, the United States military’s most prestigious award.

All 24 veterans were denied their medals on the basis of race or ethnicity- most were Hispanic or Jewish. Since 2001, when Congress passed the Jewish War Veterans Act, an investigative committee has been attempting to discover just how many veterans were unfairly denied their awards. They concluded that 24 had, though only three are still alive. The veterans and the families of the deceased were awarded their medals at a White House ceremony by the President.

The re-assessment of the veteran’s eligibility for the award was spurred by Mitch Libman, a childhood friend of Pfc. Leonard Kravitz who was not selected for the Medal of Honor though he was an obvious candidate. Libman petitioned members of Congress which led Congress to require the Army, Air Force and Navy to review the records of Jewish and Hispanic service members who had received the Distinguished Service Cross for their heroics in World War II, and the Korean and Vietnam Wars and evaluate whether they had been denied the Medal of Honor because of their race, religion or ethnicity.

Information from the New York Times