Dates: Jun 25, 1950 – Jul 27, 1953

Dates: Jun 25, 1950 – Jul 27, 1953
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A convoy of U.S. Army trucks cross the 38th parallelduring the Korean War. The parallel marks the dividing linebetween North and South Korea.NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND RECORDSADMINISTRATION

The Korean War was a conflict fought on theKorean Peninsula from June 1950 to July1953. Initially the war was between SouthKorea (Republic of Korea) and North Korea(Democratic People's Republic of Korea), but itsoon developed into an international warinvolving the United States and 19 othernations. The United States sent troops toSouth Korea as part of a United Nations"police action," which sought to repel theCommunist aggression of North Korea. Beforethe war ended in a stalemate, the People'sRepublic of China had intervened militarily onthe side of North Korea, and the Soviet Unionhad supplied military equipment to the North

The Korean War affected U.S. domestic policy. In April 1952, President Truman sparked aconstitutional crisis when he seized the U.S. steel industry. With a labor strike by the steelworkers'union imminent, Truman was concerned that the loss of steel production would hurt the Korean Wareffort. He ordered Secretary of Commerce Charles Sawyer to seize the steel mills and maintain fullproduction. The steel industry challenged the order, bringing it before the Supreme Court. Inyoungstown sheet and tube co. v. sawyer, 343 U.S. 579, 72 S. Ct. 863, 96 L. Ed. 1153 (1952), theCourt refused to allow the government to seize and operate the steel mills. The majority rejectedTruman's claim of inherent executive power in the Constitution to protect the public interest in timesof crisis.