would not also be successful. At Harvard Medical School there have been notable increases in admissions of women medical students yet several departments openly practice discrimination in hiring and/or reward to the few women faculty. Specific details on these matters will be supplied in camera to protect the women involved from harassment and retaliation. An example of an open sexist advertisement (men only apply) from another unit of Harvard has been pointed out in the testimony of Dr. Julia Lear. Thus we see that Harvard has given removal of sexist practices a very low priority and our government agencies mandated to protect the civil rights of individuals to ensure FAIR treatment also have not made surveillance of Harvard a matter worthy of high priority action. The situation at Princeton University, a relatively small but highly-prestigious institution, deserves some attention because one of its faculty members Dr. Richard A. Lester recently published a report under the auspices of the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education which appears to be in conflict with my own experience as well as the experience of other colleagues. Since I am particularly concerned with entrance of our distinguished women scientists into the higher ranking university positions, I am giving as background some examples of the percentage women doctorates awarded between 1960-69 (data from DHEW). If one adds doctorates awarded before that time and in addition remembers that criteria for admission to graduate school and award of doctorates to women during that period were higher for women than for their male peers, one then understands that a disproportionately large number of women (but not men) were better than average and, if fair play ruled then a number in excess of the percent doctorates to women would be represented in the number of women in university leadership positions. Unfortunately, the number of women in these important and leadership positions is small and has shown little increase. The total number of women on faculties of some large universities (for example my own university) has actually decreased in the last year. The Office of the Chancellor, University of Wisconsin, has prepared an even more impressive set of statistics. That is a list of total number of women doctorates in various fields from top degree granting universities for the years 196769. Those percentages show that there are even more young women doctorates available and they have degrees from the more prestigious institutions. Only a few examples are given here to make the point: Dr. Lester claims that (a) there has been a reduction in quality of university faculty; and (b) that this has been due to affirmative action pressure which has forced universities to hire a disproportionate number of unqualified women. The facts tell quite a different story. 1. The proportion of women faculty membersparticularly in high positions is still disproportionately low and, as I indicated even declining in some institutions so that any decrease in quality must be due to the overwhelming influence of the most numerous faculty component-the white males. 2. Affirmative action never has demanded or even suggested that incompetents be hired and we women are on the one hand proud of the large number of above average and distinguished women available in diverse professional areas but we are saddened when we see less competent white males pressed ahead via the old boy muddy system and in direct opposition to the idea that the best quality should receive the highest award. Now let us look at the roster of women faculty in the natural and social sciences and engineering for Dr. Lester's institution-Princeton, for the academic year 1973–74. It is important for committee members to understand that only the ranks assistant professor, associate professor and professor are considered in the direct line of faculty assent. Other positions are to be considered transient. Thus we see that of the 19 women considered faculty by Princeton for the 1973-74 academic year only 6 are in the direct line of faculty assent. The availability of competent and even distinguished women, in many areas of academe, who are not actively sought after for jobs for which males who are peers or less than peers-are sought display the casualness with which antidiscrimination regulations are regarded by many institutions and also laxity of enforcement by governmental agencies. For example the Nobel Prize Winner Marie Geoppert Meyer was not offered a proper academic position until just about the time of her award. Fortunately her contribution was not lost to humanity but I would not like to guess how many contributions emanating from female brains have been lost and in those instances all society suffers. For an institution, the responsibility for ethical behavior really rests in the hands of the chief executive officer. It is unfortunate that we are at a stage of national development in which implementation of such behavior appears to depend upon threats of financial reprisal against the very institutions which purport to train our next generation to operate by standards that they themselves are reluctant to observe. When a chief administrator makes it clear to middle and lower echelon administrators that sex discrimination will not be tolerated, then quite rapidly this form of discrimination ceases. Why is it good for the individual, the institution and the country to practice a sex-blind policy with respect to hiring, promotion, etc., of all people based upon identical quality criteria? One obvious answer is that one can not predict whether important contributions will first emanate from a male or female mind. The practice of open policies with respect to hiring not only benefits women and minorities, it also benefits white males who for one reason or another have not been included in the inner circle of the buddy system. Announcement of professional jobs in national professional journals and similar places is in the best spirit of American competition. Evaluation of candidates and credentials by a committee rather than by one individual not only helps ensure good choices, but helps to train junior committee members for future administrative responsibilities. Some institutions do evaluate and hire in an open and forthright maner and are models for the rest. Other institutions are more cynical and practice er post facto advertising in order to be able to check off on an affirmative atcion statement that they have done so. I am giving you here an example of such a practice that I have documented and which involves the Biology Department, University of New Mexico. A few weeks after I received a letter informing me that the position of department head was filled, an ad for that same position appeared in the journal Bioscience. Clearly ads should indicate filing date and/or application deadline date. It is well worth noting that the Women's Equity Action League (WEAL) has filed a complaint with DHEW charging that the University of New Mexico exhibits a consistent pattern of discrimination against women, particularly in administrative positions. From my vantage point I see persistence of discrimination practices by universities and failure to utilize properly one of our most precious natural resources the intellect of women. Until such a time when institutional management realizes that it is in the best interests of us all to judge all people by the same merit standards the whole country loses and so we depend upon our federal legislators to ensure that one set of standards apply to all. PURDUE UNIVERSITY, West Lafayette, Ind., September 23, 1974. Representative JAMES G. O'HARA, DEAR REPRESENTATIVE O'HARA: Thank you for your invitation to submit written testimony for your subcommittee's hearings on compliance with civil rights laws and institutional eligibility for federal funds. I have always been a vigorous opponent for discrimination of any kind against any individual on the grounds of sex or membership in a minority racial, religious, or ethnic group. I first became concerned about the problem of "reverse discrimination" when a student of mine who was searching for an academic job received a letter from the Sociology Department of the University of Colorado indicating that, as a white male, he could not be considered. He was told that "recruiting throughout the university was almost completely limited to certain categories of persons whose employment would enable the university to meet certain equal opportunity requirements." I learned, from colleagues and reading at about this time, that my own student's experience was far from unique. Universities all around the country felt pressured by HEW to hire minorities and women preferentially in order, paradoxically, not to be penalized for not meeting equal opportunity requirements. Although the problem cuts across many academic fields, I will address myself especially to the situation in my own field of Sociology. In the August 1973 issue of The American Sociologist, Barbara R. Lorch has published an article titled "Reverse Discrimination in Hiring in Sociology Departments: A Preliminary Report". On the basis of a questionnaire sent to 200 chairpersons of Sociology Departments in a random sample of all four years colleges and universities in the U.S., Professor Lorch concludes that widespread reverse discrimination is being practiecd. Her comments at the close of her article are, I think, worth quoting: "The fact that 32 percent of the sociology department chairmen who indicated that they had positions to fill in the past two years felt coerced to practice reverse discrimination, and 16 percent reported that they actually did, is reason for grave concern. Surely no one can deny the importance of improving the opportunities for employment of women and minorities in academic institutions and in doing everything possible to remove whatever discrimination that is presently occurring in the hiring of women and minorities. But discrimination is removed by non-discrimination, not by added illegal discrimination. Under the Supreme Court's consistent interpretation of the equal protection and due process clauses of the U.S. Constitution, and in light of the plain language of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, hiring should be based solely on qualifications disregarding sex, race, color, religion and national origin. The Affirmative Action Programs, as administered at the time of this research, involve a collision of rights and principles, and in a number of cases are a major factor in coercing department chairmen in academic institutions not only to lower their employment standards and to engage in discrimination, but also to break the law. "If the goal is to reduce discrimination, then we should be as concerned about discrimination against Anglo males, for example, as against women and minority members. Surely ways can be found to increase the employment opportunities for women and minorities without promoting reverse discrimination.” The matter of reverse discrimination is not limited to hiring of faculty members. It also applies to the awarding of fellowships to students. When I was a student in the 1950s, the goal of many of us was to stop universities from administering scholarships and fellowships which discriminated against minorities. In the main, this was successfully accomplished. Now we find a variety of programs which discriminate against anyone but certain minorities. For example, the American Sociological Association recently announced graduate fellowships for minority students, 1974-75. Eligibility is limited to Blacks, Spanish-speaking and Asian-American (announcement attached). At many universities, including my own, there are other followships open only to Black students and/or other minority students. I believe that it is important to provide financial assistance to those people who are in need of help to continue their educations. This need is especially great among minority students. But there are many whites as well who are in the same boat. One of these is a man named David M. Gray, of the Philadelphia Health Department, who wrote a letter printed in a recent issue of the Newsletter of the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues. He wrote, in part: "As a member of the white proletariat whose efforts to complete his formal education have been repeatedly thwarted, I am infuriated with the Equal Opportunity Committee and its incredibly naive assumption that ethnic minorities are the only victims of discrimination in higher education . . . "My father, who is a New Jersey truck-driver, encouraged me to complete my education and helped all he could. However, on his limited income he was also supporting my brother, who has since earned an M.S. in bio-chemistry. . . "In a recent study (Gray, 1970), I found that the overwhelming majority of graduate departments in all fields make graduate education, especially at the doctoral level, financialy inaccessible to large numbers of qualified students. . ." On the basis of the factual material available, it is beyond doubt that a substantial amount of reverse discrimination in the universities has been practiced in recent years. In a recent letter to the American Sociologist I stated my reasons for opposing this practice in my own field. I would like to draw on this letter to express these reasons to your committee: "Reverse discrimination is, first, simply unfair. There are those who argue that since whites and males have received the benefit of discrimination for many years, it must be fair to turn things around for a while. This argument ignores the fact that a completely different set of individuals was involved in past situations. In order to believe that discrimination in favor of A over B today will redress the discrimination in favor of C over D yesterday, one must regard the people involved not as individuals but as abstract and interchangeable representatives of categories. We owe more human treatment to any persons, but in particular to our students and colleagues. "Besides being unfair, a policy of reverse discrimination opens a Pandora's Box from which may flow untold evil and turmoil. If we must select new faculty (or students, or those to be promoted) on the basis of race or sex, why not on religion or ethnic group? Surely Catholics are underrepresented in Sociology. And how about Poles? Those with Spanish surnames? Italians? Are there not too may Jews? How much weight should various ascribed characteristics be given? For what rewards? The list of such questions is almost endless and they are not trivial. This way lies a morass from which we will not extricate ourselves easily. Award of positions within the profession and university will be determined by a never-ending social and political battle in which those groups with greatest power and the strongest allies will win the greatest share. And who can believe that, once begun, the policy of awarding positions on an ascribed basis can be suddenly stopped? When will there be general agreement that the time to stop has come? "There are likely to be other serious costs stemming from such a policy. Clearly any school which does not draw impartially upon the widest possible pool of applicants will, either in the short or long run, suffer in academic excellence. Moreover, there is bound to be hostility and division within the profession, the universities, and the larger society, among the various groups which are treated differentially. "Finally, we should remember that job discrimination is illegal, under the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Inronically, reverse discrimination is now being carried out under the guise of conforming to this Act. Thus, the man who wrote to my student said "We have now learned that recruiting throughout the University is almost completely limited to certain categories of persons whose employment would enable the University to meet certain equal opportunity requirements." According to this reasoning, this student could not be considered in order that the university might provide equal opportunity to all! "Discrimination against blacks, against women, or against any other group, must be fought vigorously. More than this, we should encourage and facilitate the entrance into the profession of more people from those social groups which have been disadvantaged. But there are other ways for us to work toward these goals. We can, for example, provide more financial aid to needy students, who come disproportionately from among blacks and among certain other social groups. With respect to job discrimination, we can require that, from an equally qualified set of applicants during a specified time period, there not be a consistent underselection of those in a given social category. There are other things we can do to advance social justice. We need not embark on a policy which is unfair to many individuals and which, by abandoning the merit principle, is destructive of the very foundation of the profession." I appreciate the chance to have expresed my views to your committee. Sincerely yours, MARTIN PATCHEN, Professor of Sociology. COMBATING DISCRIMINATION IN EMPLOYMENT (By Stanley H. Masters and Collette H. Moser) In recent years, this country has become increasingly concerned with the issue of racial and sexual inequality.' While this problem has many dimensions, economic inequality has received increasing attention. Statistically, relative income differentials are probably the most important measure of economic inequality. For example, the median income of black males was 60.5 percent of white males in 1970, compared with 52.5 percent in 1960. Although this represents some improvement, we are still far from achieving complete racial equality. In contrast, among full-time full-year workers, the median income of females declined from 60.8 percent of the median male income in 1960 to 59.5 percent in 1970. Although differences in amount and kind of education and in labor force continuity account for part of these income differentials, the most important factor appears to be labor market discrimination. In this paper we discuss efforts to combat such discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and under federal executive orders requiring affirmative action programs of government contractors. As we shall see, labor market discrimination need not be deliberate, but may often occur despite the conscious intentions of employers. As a result, combatting discriminatiion requires considerable sophisIn discussing legal efforts to combat discriminatory employment activities, we shall look briefly at the issue of enforcement procedures and then turn to substantive issues regarding the legislation. With regard to procedures, the first question is the scale of federal enforcement effort. As of fiscal year 1972, total appropriations for "private sector equal employment opportunities" were only forty-seven million dollars, with administration requests up to eighty-one million for 1974. Although the projected increase is encouraging, this figure Throughout this paper victims of racial and sexual discrimination will be referred to as "minorities," although it is understood that women are not a numeric minority. 2 Calculated from data in U.S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Report, Series P-60, Nos. 36 and 80. 3 Labor market discrimination is defined as the lower earnings occurring to some group after standardizing for differences in productivity that are not caused by such discrimination. Although it is not easy to estimate how much of the lower educational attainment of blacks or the discontinuons labor force participation of many women is due to labor market discriminating, such discrimination is significant even if one standardizes for the entire differential in education or labor force continuity. For blacks, see Stanley H. Masters. "The Effect of Educational Differences and Labor Market Discrimination on the Relative Earnings of Black Males," Journal of Human Resources, Vol. 9, No. 2 (Spring, 1974). For women, our conclusion is more speculative. Special Analysis of the United States Government, Fiscal Year 1973 (a part of The Budget of the United States Government, 1974), p. 180. |