The Office of Defense Mobilization (ODM) was an independent agency of the United States government whose function was to plan, coordinate, direct and control all wartime mobilization activities of the federal government, including manpower, economic stabilization, and transport operations.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt's pre-war mobilization efforts had been resisted by Congress, and lacked coordination.
One of the most important lessons the federal government drew from World War II was that the nation needed a permanent, rationalized mobilization apparatus.
Truman quadrupled the defense budget to $50 billion, and the NSRB placed controls on prices, wages and raw materials.
By December, public support for the war had fallen significantly, both Truman and his intelligence experts expected World War III to break out by spring, and Senator Joseph McCarthy was using the military setbacks in Korea to attack the administration and push his own political agenda.
[2][3][6][7] Confronted with the failure of the NSRB, an economy on the verge of collapse, and a mobilization effort which was faltering and unable to meet the needs of accelerated production plans, President Truman declared a national emergency on December 16, 1950.
[6] Truman named Charles E. Wilson, president of General Electric and a government mobilization chief in World War II, to head the ODM.
Defense plants, concentrated at the time near existing manufacturing centers and where electrical power was plentiful, were dispersed across the Southeast and Deep South.
Additionally, ODM invested millions of dollars in new plant and equipment to rapidly expand production capacity.
[2][3][10] Wilson's austerity program worked: By 1951, inflation had fallen back to 1.9 percent, and the economy was no longer threatened with recession.
[2][3][11] On October 25, 1951, ODM ordered a halt to the mass production of color television sets by CBS.
[12] The ban on mass production of the CBS color television set led the FCC to choose the RCA system by default in 1953.
[citation needed] In 1951 and 1952, ODM became embroiled in a steel strike which led to a landmark ruling by the United States Supreme Court.
A few hours before the strike was to begin, Truman issued Executive Order 10340, which directed Secretary of Commerce Charles W. Sawyer to take possession of and operate steel mills throughout the country.
In Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579 (1952)—a landmark case on the scope of presidential powers—the Court ruled that the president lacked the authority to seize the steel mills.
Absent a declaration of war, the President required Congressional authorization to seize the steel mills, and this the chief executive lacked.
The supply of steel shrank to almost nothing, armament deliveries dropped by 25 percent, and ammunition and airplane assembly plants shut down.
Although ODM relaxed most production, wage and price controls by the fall, many restrictions continued as the Cold War worsened.
Much of the subsequent Cold War defense procurement apparatus was created by ODM, and still exists to this day.
ODM shifted most of the nation's defense plants away from the Northeast and Midwest to the West, Southwest, and Southeast.
Meanwhile, large numbers of workers moved South and West to seek employment with defense and defense-related firms.
ODM also initiated the dispersal of defense plants to protect the nation's industrial base against enemy attack.
These economic changes had unintended consequences which helped lead to the political ascendancy of the West and South.