Extensions of Remarks

11450 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS April 27, 1976 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS DOWN THE HATCH TO TROUBLE Humphrey, and Birch Bayh, paid attention firmative action programs to employ more to what the civil servants are really saying. women and more blacks and other minori they might not have voted to un-Hatch them. ties. Public opinion surveys taken by members of La.r~ corporations have instituted afllrma HON. EDWARD J. DERWINS'KI Congress from Virginia, with the nation's tive action programs and some of the most OF n..t.INOIS heaviest concentration of federal employes, rigid unions are showing some fieXibillty, but IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES found early on that a majority opposed Hatch while some universities have given in. others Act changes. a.re stlll screaming about the terrible things Tuesday, April 27, 1976 Then why all the heavy oratory to change that will happen to them if they have to hire Mr. DERWINSKI. Mr. Speaker, across to the 37-year-old Hatch Act? The reason was more blacks and more women. the heavy pressure from the AFL-CIO and From the way some of them carry on. one the country editorials and articles by dis particularly from the hierarchy of the public would think that Washington has placed tinguished columnists have been appear employes• union. Lifting the restraint of an FBI man in every college administra ing praising the President's veto of the political activity by civil servants, said sen. tor's omce to force him to hire minorities. Hatch Act and calling on the Congress Hiram L. Fong [Rep .• Hawa.11], would give Actually though. the proportion of blacks to uphold the veto. I would like to call these unions the manpower and the political and women faculty has barely changed over the attention of the Members to a column donations "that could be targeted more ef the last five years-it's still less than three fectively on Senate and House candidates percent for blacks and 20 percent for women. by Jerald terHorst which appeared in the willlng to do their bidding." Chicago Tribune on Friday, April 16, on A major segment of the college community That kind of thing ls what we had sought recently spent a lot of time and effort to this issue which will be before the House to eliminate more than half a century ago try to get the government to ease affirmative on Thursday. when we abolished the spoils system and in action standards as they relate to higher edu The article follows: stituted civil service. The idea was to get cation. They fa.Hect, but their statements of DoWN THE HATCH TO TROUBLE politics out of the bureaucracy so that tax good intentions would be more believable (By Jerald terHorst) payers could get their money's worth out o:f if that same time and energy were spent try the bureaucrats. ing to recruit minorities for academic and WASHINGTON.-Shortly before World War Federal workers are very well paid. They administrative jobs on campus. II, when the expanding list of New Deal agen enjoy pension benefits and job security rights Colleges and universities are not exempt cies began to read like a recipe for alphabet that are virtually unmatched. They attained from legal requirements for fair hiring ap soup, a Democratic senator from New Mexico this high status, under the Hatch Act and plical)te to other major government contrac named Carl Hatch began fretting about the Ford was right to veto the move to un-Hatch political potential of the thousands of work tors. They get billions in federal grants and them. contracts and there's just no excuse for the ers who were rapidly swelllng the federal pay What the civil service does need, however, roll. failure to show progress in minority employ is a full-scale reform. The merit system has ment after all these yea.rs. Hatch reasoned, quite logically as it turns been badly warped. Exceptional workers go out, that federal employes could constitute Universities often argue that there aren't unrewarded, and mediocre employes are pro enough "qua.lifled" blacks and that affirma an army of campaign workers for any nation tected. It's almost impossible to get rid of al candidate making the right promises. tive action programs mean weakening the the deadwood. so-called merit system. So Hatch, a man with a pioneer streak of If Congress wants to help the morale o:f puritanism, decided to do something about One would expect stronger arguments from the federal service and--dare we suggest 1t? intellectuals. As Stephen Horn, President of the problems he :foresaw. He persuaded the the morale of the taxpayers. it should cease Senate and the House to pass a law in 1939 California State University has recently trying to manipulate the civil service and stated, "Universities cannot simply plead prohibiting active participation in national start a reform movement. I predict Ford politics by federal employes. would not veto that. that the supply of quallfled minorities and The law has been amended from time to women is not available when they have a time but not the basic ban on partisan po major responsib1Uty to provide that supply." liticking by civil servants. That's what a And he points out that while one out of government worker refers to when he or she every eight doctorates is held by a woman says "I'm Hatched." And now, thanks to AFFIRMATIVE ACTION AND THE only one of every fifty full professorships is President Ford's veto the other day, federal IVORY TOWER held by a woman. employes are going to stay Hatched a while The so-called merit system is a scarecrow longer. designed to frighten of! serious attempts to Lord knows why anybody would want to HON. AUGUSTUS F. HAWKINS correct discriminatory practices. Hiring is scrap a law that makes such clean common OJ' CALD'ORNU still done through the old-boy network of recommendations by high ranking professors, sense. But a majority of the House and Sen IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ate, mainly Democrats, :felt otherwise. and while many schools say the minority The enormity o:f that proposed transgres Tuesday, April 27, 1976 pool is limited because of fewer PhDs, some forty pe::-cent o:f all faculty members don't sion of ethical politics boggles the mind. But Mr. then, Congress rarely seems bothered by such HAWKINS. Mr. Speaker, Mr. have a PhD. niceties when on the scent of a pay raise, a Vernon Jordan, executive director of the When fair employment laws first were boost in their own subsidies or, as in this National Urban League, recently com passed we heard the same story, the merit case, a chance to coerce civil servants into mented in his nationally syndicated system would be weakened. Civil servants supporting their campaigns :for reelection. column on the entrenched posture of re wouldn't be as capable, and factory workers The issue, of course, wasn't argued that sistance pased by several of the Nation's wouldn't be as efficient. After at least ten baldly. Heaven forbid. Instead, the drive to colleges and universities to the enforce years' experience with fair employment laws politicize the civil service was advanced with ment of affirmative action programs. we've found those excuses to be a. myth, but all the fervor o:f ringing the Liberty Bell. some college adminlstra.tors still cling to The government's workers, a proponent said, The intent of the affirmative action them. were being denied the rights of the Constitu mandate was to provide equal employ The ugly ghost of "quotas" is also raised, tion. Without sanction to engage in partisan ment opportunities within private indus implying that every American wm b& cat.e politics, they said, :federal employes were try and institutions receiving Federal gorized by his ethnic background when ap "second class citizens." funds. Affirmative action is viewed as one plying for a job. That too ts false. Amrmative Post omce committee chairman Ga.le W. of many programs designed to eliminate action encompasses numerical goals as & McGee, a Wyoming Democrat who rarely discrimination based upon sex or ethnic benchmark with which to measure an em loses his perspective, accused pro-Hatch law ployer's good faith effort to correct pa.st dis makers of slandering the labor unions which origin. However, the reluctance on the crimlnatory hiring practices. have brought "honorable collective ba.rga1n- part of the noncomplying centers of One major affi.rmative action agreement 1ng procedures" Into governmental practice. higher education are indicative of some with a big university gives the school thirty "Let us not forget that these are responsible ominous undertones about our willingess years in which to reach very modest m.inori ty people," McGee declared of federal workers, to achieve the overall goal of the elimina employment goals. So much for coercive "certa.1nly as capable as any other group of tion of discrimination. quotas! Americans to be trusted to use sound judg AFFmMATXVE ACTXON AND THE IVORY Town It would be instructive for many colleges ment and discretion in ordering their own to further heed the words of President Horn. a:fialrs." (By Vernon E. Jordan, Jr.) "Educational institutions and unions have Well, that's for sure. Had McGee and some Long under attack :for their supposed discriminated against minorities and wom o:f the other proponents, Including presiden liberalism, many colleges and universities en," he says. And he goes on to state that tial hopetuls llke Scoop Jackson, Bubert are loudly protesting the need to 1n1t1ate af- changes must be made "if our institutions April 27, 1976 EXTENSIONS OF REMARKS 11451 are to reflect the diversity and talents of the in love and pity, but also in thinking on the between pragmatism and other values in our society of which we are a pa.rt." moral meaning of these events.

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