Talk:Medal of Honor

Eligibility

Do you have to be a member of the US Armed forces to receive this medal? I have seen examples of awards to non-members but there is no mention in the article of how these exceptions are made.2601:647:5800:7D80:FC13:6FB4:D298:3491 (talk) 01:56, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

It states right in the infobox: Eligibility - United States Armed Forces service members - wolf 02:13, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

Short answer: Yes. You must be/have been active duty, reserve, or National Guard to recieve the Medal of Honor and it can only be awarded for heroism in combat. The Unknown Warrior was awarded the Medal of Honor on 17 October 1921, and the Victoria Cross was awarded to the Unknown Soldier in return. That is the only exception I know of; aside from such a significant symbolic gesture, the Medal of Honor is not awarded to civilians or foreigners. AC9016 (talk) 02:01, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

You might also want to review the section in the article about revoked awards. There were a handful of MoH awarded to non-military members prior to 1900. Most of those were revoked by the 1916 board, although some were reinstated later. Intothatdarkness 13:18, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

Every authorizing statute ever enacted required members to be in the service. The only case I'm aware of where there was wiggle room was the original 1861 Navy statute, which didn't expressly permit marines the MoH (from memory, I think it only said seamen, which was simply interpreted to include enlisted marines). The civilian awards were clearly unlawful--several civilian Navy pilots received them in the Civil War, and these were never revoked. The Army cases were a little different. Dr. Walker's medal was purely the product of the president seeking another form of recognition after her brevet request was denied, so he sort of jumped the shark and overrode the War Dept. Then, her medal was validly revoked per statute enacted in 1916. Somehow the BCMR convened in the 1970s lacked sound legal advice, and decided they had the authority to unilaterally override the original law, the revocation law, and the modern moh law enacted in 1918 (all of which required Walker to be a soldier). The BCMR is a delegation of the authority of SecArmy, so it's not even a cabinet level authority--it's a clear separation of powers conflict to take an action of this sort. So, they cannot override statutes, and must recommend a statutory waiver in cases like these--this has since been clarified to the Review Boards by OSD, so the BCMRs are now on notice that they cannot accomplish this on their own (which has since occurred with Garlin Conner). Walker's unlawful restoration triggered a relative of Buffalo Bill Cody to ask for the same, and the BCMR recommended restoration, but it was kicked back correctly on the grounds that the BCMR couldn't simply restore a medal without addressing the underlying defect (that Cody was a contract quartermaster guide, and not a soldier). So the BCMR created a fake enlistment for Cody and the other so-called scouts who had their medals rescinded, even though they were never enlisted. My read is that this may have been technically lawful, but was probably still incorrect, because none of those men were actually de facto soldiers, and Cody's relative petitioned primarily on the grounds that the statutes did not require Cody to be a soldier, which of course was clearly false. The whole point of the BCMR's creation back in the 1940s was to relieve Congress of the need to pass statutory waivers to correct military records (a prerequisite at that time), but of course this does not mean that the BCMR can simply act is if it has the same authority as Congress (which would not be a permissible delegation of Constitutional authority). So they can only make corrections in the cases of errors or injustices where there isn't a bar on this sort of correction. In Walker and Cody's cases, there was a clear bar, so those restorations were arguably unlawful, but nobody is going to touch them again for a variety of reasons. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 16:01, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

This whole thing is authorized by Congress, so I would suppose it could pass a special Act to award the medal, whatever the regulations say - they made the regulations, after all. I see it did for Admiral Byrd, and the Unknown Warrior in the UK. Is there any info on why they did not act for Buffalo Bill, and Dr. Walker?

Perhaps, if a member of the American contingent in the Foreign Legion of Ukraine is involved in a notable action, Congress might give it to him. Even though not fighting in the US Armed Forces. 205.220.129.225 (talk) 00:22, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

Date USAF and Space Force medal established

Noticed that the box on the upper right claims "Air and Space Forces: April 14, 1965" as the date that medal was established, while the Army and Navy versions cite the statutory authority passage dates. It looks like the USAF date is referencing the date the new medal was first awarded (which is actually 1967, not 1965--the page has a few links to the 1965 date that look wrong), but the statutory authority dates to 1956, at this citation: An Act to Revise, Codify, and Enact into Law, Title 10 of the United States Code, Entitled “Armed Forces,” and Title 32 of the United States Code, Entitled “National Guard,” Pub. L. 84-1028 (1956), 70A Stat. 540. Think it would make more sense to reference that date, even if they weren't awarding the medal until 1967. Obviously the Space Force wasn't around at that time, so I think that should have a separate date of authorization--this appears to be part of the FY2022 NDAA, with this citation: Pub L. 116–283 (2021), 134 Stat. 3811. Otherwise it makes it look like the Space Force was authorized the medal much earlier than it existed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Foxtrot5151 (talk • contribs) 19:38, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

Ok, just did more digging. See: https://www.afpc.af.mil/Fact-Sheets/Display/Article/421864/medal-of-honor/#:~:text=The%20medal%20is%20presented%20in,enemy%20of%20the%20United%20States. According to the AFPC, the USAF design was first awarded in 1967, so that's clear, so perhaps they were taking about when the design was approved but not awarded? Also, the USAF got the date of authorization wrong--they claim 1960, but that's obviously not true--I just pulled the law, and it's clearly 1956. Bonkers. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 19:52, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

Ok, I updated the Air Force and Space Force authorization dates on the page, and also wrote to the AFPC requesting that they fix the date and add the Space Force date. I'm not very hopeful, as I've repeatedly asked them to remove Billy Mitchell from their MoH page, and their NCOIC claimed she didn't know who controlled the website, and thus it wasn't within their control! Foxtrot5151 (talk) 17:23, 18 May 2023 (UTC

Can you explain why you added a separate date for the Space Force when they have the exact same medal as the Air Force? Garuda28 (talk) 18:28, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Sure, because they have a distinct statutory authorization, and the dates you were using were the dates established by Congress, not the date of design (if you were using that, they'd be the same). If you want to change it to date of design, then those are entirely different dates. The USAF medal authorization wasn't the same as the Space Force, because of course the Space Force didn't yet exist, so while that established the same medal, it wasn't authorized for Space Force personnel until 2021, per a separate act of Congress. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 19:55, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

I've now received three emails from APFC recognitions today. The first says they are not in charge of their own website, so I replied noting that it was under their own command (it's www.afpc.af.mil). They then wrote another email saying they have no control over it and to contact the webmaster, and now I've received a third email requesting to recall the earlier email. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 19:59, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Latest from the AFPC: “Please advise this is under review and will be updated in the coming weeks.” Foxtrot5151 (talk) 14:59, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

When did the USAF and the Space Force amalgamate and/or the USAF MofH renamed the Air and Space MofH? Anthony Staunton (talk) 11:44, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

I was just calling it that to distinguish it--there isn't a different formal name so far as I know (current AF regulations just call it "medal of honor," and the AFPC website hasn't been updated in years and isn't authoritative anyway--probably sourced from Wikipedia!). The higher level USAF MoH website includes Billy Mitchell, who wasn't even a MoH recipient, and also was not a major general: https://www.af.mil/Medal-of-Honor/Mitchell/. Interestingly, the USAF apparently has renamed some medals--the AF Achievement Medal is now the Air & Space Achievement Medal: https://www.afpc.af.mil/Fact-Sheets/Display/Article/421869/air-and-space-achievement-medal/, same with this one: https://www.afpc.af.mil/Fact-Sheets/Display/Article/421939/air-and-space-campaign-medal/. Apparently that's just because "Air Force" was in the original name? Interestingly, the awards manual doesn't yet reflect this renaming despite being published in late 2022, so I guess they're due for an update. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 15:02, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Going to agree with @Foxtrot5151:. There is no Army Medal of Honor or Navy Medal of Honor, it's just the Medal of Honor. The Army has a variant, the Naval Service (Navy and Marines) have a variant, and the Air and Space Forces have a variant. Garuda28 (talk) 15:08, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

There are three separate medals: the Army, Navy and Air Force Medals of Honor. The separate legislation creating the Army, Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard medals states each medal is for the service specified. Just because they are all named the Medal of Honor does not mean they are the same medal. They are all treated with the same respect and honor. I am unaware of any legislation which deems them variants of the one medal. Anthony Staunton (talk) 13:12, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

The root query was simply whether the AF MoH had been renamed, but since the service wasn't actually in the name, I think the answer is no. I've always treated the different statutes as authorizing different medals to the extent that they were materially discernible in eligibility criteria, particularly before they were mostly standardized in 1963 (with the exception of the Navy having longer statutes of limitations on recommendation and awarding, which has since been changed). Even today I think there's a difference in service culture that has a discernible impact on awards in spite of identical authorization statutes. For example, the marines being more stingy about combat decorations than the other services, which I think has been the case for decades. But to the extent that all services now fall under DoD oversight, the overall process isn't much different, other than perhaps who makes the initial recommendation (and what that is). Informal policy at the recommendation level does make a difference--the retroactive GWOT authorization that waived the statutes of limitation for many recent MoH recipients' upgrades was largely a reaction to a DoD survey that found the majority of field grades believed, incorrectly, that death was an informal prerequisite for a MoH recommendation. I think that was largely an army and marine corps problem, since that's where most of the recommendations originated. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 18:20, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for your edits on the MofH article. If you want a laugh, look at the mid-2015 talk pages when I was trying to get my head around the number of awards. There were four different totals in the article and the two main references in 2015 for statistics, the US Army Center of Military History and the Congressional Medal of Honor Society had incorrect stats. The Center of Military History still has, the last time I checked, a note not to contact them about MofH errors. The Congressional Medal of Honor Society promptly sent me a pdf with the correct stats and apologised for a +2 glitch in their stats which has now been fixed. It was when I remembered that the Senate green books from 1963 to 1979 included Billy Mitchell that the stats finally lined up.

I do not fault your explanation as to eligibility criteria for each Medal of Honor but despite many aspects including the name being the same their origins and insignia are different. It is normal just to refer to the Medal of Honor and there is no need to refer to three Medals of Honor until required.

I prefer ‘Medal of Honor’ to the sobriquet ‘Congressional Medal of Honor’ but quoting a Secretary of the Army in the 1970s seems a bit light compared to I think every President since Theodore Roosevelt referring to it at one time or another as the Congressional Medal of Honor. I agree that the Medal of Honor is correct, but it is not wrong to use a sobriquet.

There are two sections ‘Revoked’ and ‘27th Maine and other revoked awards’. In the latter it mentions that Mindil would have been the 20th double award. I was not aware of until recently that Adam McCulloch of the 27th Maine, who did volunteer to defend Washington, could have been the 21st double award. He was awarded the MofH with the USN at Mobile Bay. Anthony Staunton (talk) 13:43, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, the Mitchell issue is really inexcusable, particularly since it was clarified by the committee that it was a Cong. Gold Medal and not a MoH (but you actually have to read the text of the bill, apparently a bridge too far). For decades his medal was listed in error in the Pentagon's Hall of Heroes, but apparently was removed after OSD published the valor database in the wake of the Alvarez case. USAFA has a statue of Mitchell listing him as a MoH recipient, although I'm told the plaque will be corrected eventually. I remember that the Center of Military History had an asterisk next to Mitchell saying it was likely a Gold Medal, but that they would continue listing it anyway because it was in the Senate report. I don't think they had much interest. CMH was very much rebuked and stripped of their authority to participate in the staffing for medal recommendations, which was a product of the mishandling of resubmissions of Jewish and Hispanic recipients for potential upgrades on discrimination grounds (what President Obama eventually awarded under the title Valor 24). The CMH chief at that time, BG(Ret) John Brown, recommending denying all of the upgrades on the grounds that he believed there should be direct evidence the recommendations were downgraded due to prejudice (rather than merely an inference), and that resulted in a reprimand from GEN Casey, who was then the chief of staff. Casey determined that CMH had exceeded their authority and would limit future medal advisories to mere validation of factual submissions, meaning that Army historians don't even meaningfully participate in advising SecArmy, SA decorations board, etc. While I think CMH probably did screw up, I think that's a terrible status quo, because the bureaucracy and senior officials don't do history very well.

The history of the medal's name is interesting. The attempt to formally add "Congressional" was actually at the behest of the CMOH Society, who claimed they often had to clarify which medal of honor they had won (which seems odd--does the public really confuse it with the other lesser known names?). It resulted in a proposed bill, committee report, and committee hearing from SASC in 1972. I'm sure that's still DoD's position today--it may be true that many or most presidents get it wrong, but most modern presidents wouldn't know one way or the other, so that's more of an issue with their speech writers, who probably are recycling prior awards ceremony scripts for the sake of efficiency (and I'm sure OSD and service policy proponents cringe every time they screw up the terminology). Notable that CMoH doesn't appear in any executive publications from the services, at least on military awards. I’m relatively certain that none of the controlling statutes use CMoH. I did find two that outdated statutes referenced CMoH offhand, while also using MoH as the primary reference: they were the Act of April 23, 1904 (33 Stat. 259, 274–275) for the Army MoH, and the Act of June 3, 1916 (39 Stat. 166, 214), which authorized the review board to revoke Army Medals of Honor and used the terminology “so-called congressional medal of honor.” The CMoH terminology was mistakenly used in legislation authorizing the CMoH society (36 USC 40501) and the Stolen Valor Act (18 USC 704), but I imagine this was because of different jurisdiction from committees that did not know any better. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 15:30, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

The comments on Mitchell are sound but it is an issue for the Mitchell biography which states the National Museum of the Air Force describes it as a ‘Special Congressional Medal of Honor’. It then states that Mitchell medallion is ‘the only one of its kind in existence’ which is not special to the Mitchell medallion  but is a feature of most if not all Congressional Gold Medals.

I support your comments on the name of the Medal of Honor. It is always going to be an issue because of the generic name. It is appropriate and correct to say Medal of Honor is the official name but the public and the media will continue to use the sobriquet Congressional Medal of Honor. Anthony Staunton (talk) 14:08, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

In re: Mitchell, I actually wrote to the USAF museum a few months back and asked them to consider changing that wording, and upon checking just now, I'm happy to report that they did so (it now says Congressional Gold Medal): https://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/Visit/Museum-Exhibits/Fact-Sheets/Display/Article/198456/gen-billy-mitchells-congressional-gold-medal/. Also wrote to the US Senate historian about terminology on their websites about the MoH, and they replied saying they would consider fixing the language, but want to study the matter first: https://www.senate.gov/senators/SenatorsMedalHonor.htm and https://www.senate.gov/reference/Index/Awards_Honors_Medals.htm.

I asked a friend working at the Pentagon to check the Hall of Heroes listing of MoH recipients, and Mitchell's name has been removed (at least on the MoH section, but think it was there as recently as 2011, per earlier publications). I audited the claim by pulling Mitchell's OMPF, and there was nothing there to support it. I think the mistake was traceable to a biographical error in the early 1950s--Air University had published a bunch of biographies of senior Air Force / Air Corps leaders, and they mistakenly listed Mitchell as a MoH recipient. Of course, when it's a martyred figure like Mitchell, that's pretty clearly a thumb on the scale. Mitchell's incorrect rank and MoH claim had infected dozens of USAF publications, including the USAF standards handbook that is used for promotion board questions. It's an interesting case study of when mistakes become so ubiquitous that they override any primary sources and nobody questions them anymore. Was thinking about this phenomenon earlier in the week after reading an Atlantic article on the expression "drank the Kool-Aid," which is factually incorrect--apparently Jim Jones poisoned his followers with Flavor Aid. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 17:40, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Update on the nomenclature issue ("congressional" vs. simply MoH). I wrote to the Senate Historical Office in May asking them to remove the term "congressional" from their websites on the medal, and sent supporting documentation from DoD along with a survey of the statutory authority (only a few statutes have used the "congressional" terminology, most outside of DoD jurisdiction, such as the Stolen Valor Act or Congressional MoH Society Act, etc. Anyway, the Senate historians studied the matter along with their counterparts in the House and DoD, and they came to a consensus to remove "congressional" from their websites on the medal. They have not yet been corrected, so you'll see the original language for now: https://www.senate.gov/reference/Index/Awards_Honors_Medals.htm and https://www.senate.gov/senators/SenatorsMedalHonor.htm Foxtrot5151 (talk) 20:16, 9 August 2023 (UTC)

Active-duty Medal of Honor recipients

According to the Congressional Medal of Honor Society and the U.S. Army Center of Military History websites, there are 65 living Medal of Honor recipients as of September 2023. Of those, only 4 are listed by those sources and on Wikipedia as being still on active duty: Lieutenant Colonel William D. Swenson, Sergeant Major Thomas Payne, Sergeant Major Matthew O. Williams, and Master Sergeant Earl Plumlee. I can find sources affirming each of these four individuals are still in the active-duty U.S. Army today. I (and anyone else capable of reason) can deduce that given the extraordinary prominence and rarity of the Medal of Honor, were there another on active duty, or in a reserve component or any state's National Guard, information would be easily found on that point.

I have been running search after search and found no source explicitly, word-for-word stating only these four are on active duty, but with just 65 living recipients of the award, this is not something that would just get missed. Problem is if somebody policing this website wants to get legalistic, then strictly speaking, a source would need to explicitly state only four recipients are still serving today.

Does anyone have any source material for this? Ideas on where to find that? Short of directly contacting the CMOHS or the U.S. Army Center of Military History and asking for a memorandum affirming this, I do not know how else to verify that these 4 are the only MOH recipients on active duty. If anyone can assist or clear up how Wikipedia handles this, I will welcome any assistance. Thank you in advance to anyone who may chime in on this. AC9016 (talk) 02:08, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

I wouldn't cite the Center of Military History page--they don't update it consistently, and have indicated that they wish they'd never put up the page in the first place (it has a lot of mistakes owing to the Senate committee researchers from the 1970s not knowing what they were doing, which CMH then took ownership of by republishing). Suggest asking the Society or the National Museum, who can both verify this easily enough. DoD isn't going to publish anything that gets updated (and likely wouldn't confirm the information upon query), probably for privacy reasons. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 16:13, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

There is no better source than the Congressional Medal of Honor Society (CMOHS). In both the US and the UK, it is the recipients’ organisations, the CMOHS and the Victoria Cross and George Association who are interested accuracy rather than government departments. I am retired, but as an author who uses his name in Wikipedia and who tries to love their neighbour as himself, I do not write my first reaction to some of the helpful legalistic comments I have received. I now understand, but was unaware in 2015 why the Center of Military History was not updating their MofH information, but they were the first to have such information online and they have my thanks. All Center of Military History references should now be deleted. Back in 2015, when this article had four different totals for the number of MofH awards, the CMOHS total had a plus 2 error. When I contacted the CMOHS, I received a prompt reply that they were aware of the error but that it would be corrected when the redesigned website was implemented. It took a while, but it was worth the wait. While the Center of Military History gets credit for being online, the Senate 1963, 1973 and 1979 green books which consolidated the 1948 Army and 1949 Navy hardcover MofH books plus subsequent awards provided a reasonable priced softcover edition. Pity the 1973 and 1979 issues did not correct the Custer typo error, the inclusion of Billy Mitchell and some other issues. Anthony Staunton (talk) 01:35, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Incidentally, I recently found several mistakes on the society page, for one of the soldiers I am researching: Marvin Hillock. See https://www.cmohs.org/recipients/marvin-c-hillock. Hillock did not earn the medal at Wounded Knee nor on that date--it was actually at White Clay Creek a day later. But somehow the Army botched later circulars that confused the date and location, which apparently is why the society has the wrong information--they trusted the Army circulars. Interestingly, Hillock was later a deserter, so he was expelled dishonorably from the Army, along with two of the actual Wounded Knee recipients. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 01:28, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

I was originally quite in awe of the Senate report's detail, but then I discovered that they mostly copied their information on the medal's development (and likely the medal listings) from the Army's 1948 volume: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=umn.319510015715936&seq=11. Evidently it was just a cut and paste job other than filling in the citations awarded in the meantime. Foxtrot5151 (talk) 02:21, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

I support your comments although I am grateful for the Senate print version and the CMH online copy. It was such obvious errors as Tom Custer's awards that disappointed me. I presume you have alerted CMOHS about Marvin Hillock. It inspired me to check Mathew Hamilton who was decorated for Wounded Knee. I will inform CMOHS that his first enlistment indicated he was Australian born but subsequent enlistments show he was Scottish born. Anthony Staunton (talk) 14:46, 5 November 2023 (UTC)

No, I don't think I wrote the society, but I did fix a few Wikipedia entries. The error for Hillock meant that he was included incorrectly in Senator Warren's Remove the Stain Act (claiming 20 MoHs were awarded for conduct at Wounded Knee instead of 19, due to the Hillock error). That bill would have revoked Hillock's MoH arbitrarily if it had passed. The proponents were aware of the error but decided not to update the bill--it was then reintroduced several more times, most recently in an attempt to add it to the NDAA in 2023 (it didn't get a vote). In re: Hamilton, I pulled his file because he is the guy who chased several pack mules carrying ammunition, and also chased several stampeded horses (he did the same at WK and at White Clay Creek, so they rolled up both actions into the same recommendation). Interestingly, his MoH recommendation was kicked back by the commanding general for lack of specific information distinguishing his conduct, which caused his company commander to resubmit with a more robust recommendation. There are some interesting questions there--was this sort of conduct actually distinguishable within the meaning of the Army's regulation (it required only distinguished conduct as of 1889, and they added "bravery" via general order in 1892). There is a partial explanation of distinguished conduct from the 1917 MoH review board (who determined that enlistments, carrying dispatches, picking up shells and fuses, bringing off the colors, putting out a fire in a warehouse, and guarding Lincoln's casket were not distinguished, but they largely dodged the question by just focusing exclusively on non-combat actions (they declined to review any of the other cases--they simply had a major summarize them but passed them all over, never even looking at the files). Foxtrot5151 (talk) 17:08, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Process?

It appears this article is missing a description of the process? "Process" and "nomination" are only mentioned opaquely in the "Late" section as far as I could see. Who nominates, who recommends, does a committee (board), do several committees do it, does it go up the chain to the SecDef and then Pres, or congress, etc. (and is the pres the final decision maker, does he always go along with the nom)? Most of that belongs in the article in a clear easily findable fashion near the top. (if it has changed over time, at least put in the current process indicating current) Thanks. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:09, 16 January 2025 (UTC)