American Legion tries to stay relevant, small-town posts try to stay solvent amid membership decline

In Elgin, Ill., old commanders' pictures
are posted. (NYT photo by Sally Ryan)

American Legion membership nationwide is down 11 percent since 2000, to less than 2.4 million members in 2012, and "Money and members are in short supply at legion halls in many rural communities," reports Karen Ann Cullotta of The New York Times. The legion has also seen a decline in the number of operating posts, dropping from 14,700 posts in 2000 to just under 13,800 this year.

As membership continues to decline, some small-town American Legion posts fight to stay relevant and financially solvent, Cullotta reports, citing the example of Post 57 in Elgin, Ill., which has 750 members, down from 1,200 in the 1980s. Declining membership is nothing new for the American Legion, "where the enemies these days are old age, apathy and budget deficits," she writes.

“The younger veterans are so busy with work and raising their families, they don’t think they have the time to get involved with the legion,” Norman Bellows, 76, a Korean War veteran and retired truck driver, told Cullotta.

According to Joe March, a spokesman at Legion headquarters in Indianapolis, officials are confident that the membership decline can be reversed, and they have recently begun a campaign to bring the legion’s ranks back up to three million members by its 100th anniversary in 2019. (Read more)