AT&T and the Private-Sector Origins of Private-Sector Affirmative Action

Journal of Policy History

Volumn 20, Issue 4, 2008, Pages 542-568

  Williams, Benton ^a  

^a DEPAUL UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 77954354983     PISSN: 08980306     EISSN: 15284190     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/jph.0.0027     Document Type: Article

References (56)

1. A few of the leading scholars on Affirmative action and examples of their work: Nathan Glazer, Ethnic Dilemmas 1964-1982 (Cambridge, Mass. 1983), and
2. Affirmative Discrimination: Ethnic Inequality and Public Policy (New York, 1975)
3. Herman Belz, Equality Transformed (New Brunswick, N.J. 1991)
4. Hugh Davis Graham, Civil Rights and the Presidency: Race and Gender in American Politics, 1960-1972 (New York, 1992)
5. The Civil Rights Era: Origins of a National Policy, 1960-72 (New York, 1975, 1990), and
6. his edited anthology, Civil Rights During the Nixon Administration, 1969-1974 (Bethesda, Md. 1989)
7. Stephan Thernstrom and Abigail Thernstrom, America in Black and White: One Nation, Indivisible (New York, 1997)
8. Russell Nieli, ed. Racial Preference and Racial Justice: The New Affirmative Action Controversy (Washington, D.C. 1991)
9. Paul D. Moreno, From Direct Action to Affirmative Action: Fair Employment Law and Policy in America, 1933-1972 (Baton Rouge, La. 1997)
10. Raymond Wolters, Right Turn: William Bradford Reynolds, the Reagan Administration, and Black Civil Rights (New Brunswick, N.J.: 1996)
11. Thomas Sowell, Civil Rights: Rhetoric or Reality? (New York, 1984)
12. Preferential Policies: An International Perspective (New York, 1990), and
13. Race and Economics (New York, 1975)
14. Charles Murray, Losing Ground: American Social Policy, 1950-1980 (New York, 1984).
15. John David Skrentney, The Ironies of Affirmative Action: Politics, Culture, and Justice in America (Chicago, 1996).
16. See Lois Kathryn Herr, Women, Power, and at&t: Winning Rights in the Workplace (Boston, 2003)
17. Phyllis A. Wallace, “Employment Discrimination: Some Policy Considerations,” 155–75, in Discrimination in Labor Markets, ed. Orley Ashenfelter and Albert Rees (Princeton, 1973), 156
18. Marjorie A. Stockford, The Bellwomen: The Story of the Landmark at&t Sex Discrimination Case (New Brunswick, N.J. 2004). Considering the sheer size and power of the gigantic at&t, it is tempting to conceive of it as a Goliath, and considering the valor of those who challenged at&t's request for a rate increase, it is equally tempting to see them collectively as David. Neither the former's power nor the latter's valor is in question here. Beyond eeoc as David, perhaps equally heroic and inspiring were the efforts of the grassroots supporters of eeoc, including Wallace herself. These included women and minority employees of Bell documented in Wallace and Stockford (above) and in Nancy MacLean, Freedom Is Not Enough: The Opening of the American Workplace (Cambridge, Mass. 2006). At pp. 130-33, MacLean asserts that eeoc inspired fear in employers as a result of the at&t Consent Decree. Rather than dispute the findings of these and others that the eeoc and grassroots activists were necessary to the implementation of Affirmative action, I suggest that an at&texecutive was also necessary and that none alone was sufficient. The only point at which I significantly part company with MacLean is that I believe nothing from this conflict that resulted in the Consent Decree inspired fear. Rather, it provided a model.
19. Douglas North, Growth and Welfare in the American Past: A New Economic History (Englewood Cliffs, N.J. 1966).
20. Alfred DuPont Chandler Jr. The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business (Cambridge, Mass. 1977, 1980).
21. Employment practices that favor white men are addressed in Ira Katznelson's book, When Affirmative Action was White: An Untold History of Racial Inequality in Twentieth-Century America (New York, 2005).
22. Alfred Blumrosen is widely recognized as the leading chronicler of eeoc and employment discrimination law generally. As my study is not about eeoc or even the law, but an employer, I do not cite him. However, this discussion of an employer that was confronted by eeoc would not be possible without the groundwork he laid. See Black Employment and the Law (New Brunswick, N.J. 1971)
23. Modern Law: The Law Transmission System and Equal Employment Opportunity (Madison, 1993)
24. and his edited volume, The Foundations of Equal Employment Opportunity (Washington, D.C. 1972).
25. Lois Kathryn Herr, Women, Power, and at&t: Winning Rights in the Workplace (Boston, 2003), 17.
26. U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, “A Unique Competence:” A Study of Equal Opportunity in the Bell System (Washington, D.C. 1971), 12, 32, 35-36, 39, 42.
27. The Petition for Intervention fi led with the fcc was subsequently published as U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, “A Unique Competence:” A Study of Equal Opportunity in the Bell System (Washington, D.C. 1971). In their brief in support of the petition, Copus and the other attorneys present an almost indisputable case that at&t was in violation of Title VII. The brief and petition were slightly over 300 pages. The litigation fi le (now contained in several boxes at the National Archives in College Park, Md. in Records Group 403) contained more than 15,000 pages of at&t documents produced in response to discovery requests. However, the case did not turn on whether at&t was violating Title VII. It turned on whether eeoc could find a way to compel at&t to change.
28. “Interview and Appraisal of Applicant; Name: Ivy Vaughn,” Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company, marked eeoc-C-1535, carbon copy, na, Record Group 403, Box 35, at&t Litigation.
29. “Notes for Selectors--Switchman Bids,” 24 February 1969, Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company, carbon copy, na, Record Group 403, Box 35, at&t Litigation.
30. See Herr, Women, Power, and at&t, 79–93.
31. Date Book, “R. D. Lilley” 1970, Box 5, Robert D. Lilley Papers.
32. Herbert R. Northrup and John A. Larson in their article “The Impact of the at&teeo Consent Decree” (Philadelphia: Industrial Research Unit, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, 1979), 9–10, contend that a benefit that fl owed to at&t was the assurance that at&t's 1970 request for a rate hike and future requests would not be blocked by allegations of discrimination. There are two problems with this analysis: the Consent Decree contained no such guarantee of immunity from future charges, and there is no reason to believe that at&t was going to lose before the fcc.
33. Herr, Women, Power, and at&t, 144, quoting from her telephone interview with Copus.
34. New York Times, 11 January 1973, 53, col. 6.
35. “White Man's Sensitivity Riot Key, Says Lilley,” The [Newark, N.J.] Record, 9 January 1968
36. “Newspaper Clippings on Report of Governor's Select Commission on Civil Disorder in N.J.” 10 February 1968 [not labeled, but subsequent volumes are labeled volumes 1 and 2], Box 5, Robert D. Lilley Papers.
37. Allan T. Demaree, “The Age of Anxiety at a.t.&t.” Fortune, 81, no. 5: 156–60, 261-72.
38. “Taking Part: A report on New Jersey Bell's commitment to help solve the problems of the cities,” New Jersey Bell Telephone Company, Box 10, Biographical, Folder: “Lilley--Biographical--New Jersey Bell c. 1965,” Robert D. Lilley Papers.
39. Michael Flamm, Law and Order: Street Crime, Civil Unrest, and the Crisis of Liberalism in the 1960s, Columbia Studies in Contemporary American History (New York, 2005), 85–88, 226
40. William O'Neill, Coming Apart: An Informal History of America in the 1960's (New York, 1971), 176.
41. “News” wabc, New York, and abc Network, 10 February 1968, 3:55 p.m. copy of television transcript in “Newspaper Clippings on Report of Governor's Select Commission on Civil Disorder in N.J.” vol. 2, 15 February 1968, Robert D. Lilley Papers.
42. Thomas J. Sugrue argues that Skrentny and Graham (see note 2) and other Affirmative action scholars acknowledged but downplayed the role of protest in northern cities in shaping federal Affirmative action policy. “Affirmative Action from Below: Civil Rights, the Building Trades, and the Politics of Racial Equality in the Urban North, 1945-1969,” Journal of American History 91 (June 2004): 145-73, 147. While Sugrue focuses on labor and civil rights activists in Philadelphia and their influence on policymakers, the Newark Riot had a signifi cant influence on Lilley.
43. Walter W. Straley, Introduction to untitled manual by Hugh Folk, marked eeoc- C-1537, carbon copy, NA, Record Group 403, Box 35, at&t Litigation.
44. “Biography: John D. deButts,” 1 February 1972 [no other publication information], p. 1. Box 7, Folder: “Lilley--Corporate Committee Work--at&t,” Robert D. Lilley Papers.
45. “Biography: William L. Lindholm,” 1 February 1, 1972 [no other publication information], p. 1. Box 7, Folder: “Lilley--Corporate Committee Work--at&t,” Robert D. Lilley Papers.
46. Demaree, “The Age of Anxiety at a.t.&t,” 158.
47. Demaree, “The Age of Anxiety at a.t.&t,” 156.
48. Sugrue, “Affirmative Action from Below,” 147.
49. See Northrup and Larson, “The Impact of the at&t-eeo Consent Decree,” 9–10. They list four.
50. See note 17 and accompanying text. Five years later, the Supreme Court upheld an agreement similar to the Consent Decree in U.S. Steelworker v. Weber, 443 U.S. 193 (1979).
51. Herr, Women, Power, and at&t, 148.
52. Herr, Women, Power, and at&t, 130.
53. Herr, Women, Power, and at&t, 26.
54. at&t itself maintained the policy after the expiration of the Consent Decree in 1979. Much has been written about the impact of Affirmative action generally. Jonathan Leonard has been very effective in measuring the economic impact of Affirmative action in employment. He does not distinguish between federal-contractor Affirmative action and private-sector Affirmative action, as he is measuring results. “The Impact of Affirmative Action Regulation and Equal Employment Law on Black Employment,” Journal of Economic Perspectives 4 (Autumn 1990): 47-63, is just one example of the dozen or so articles he has authored on this topic. For the effect in higher education
55. see, for example, William G. Bowen and Derek C. Bok, The Shape of the River: Long-Term Consequences of Considering Race in College and University Admissions (Princeton, 1998).
56. Jennifer Klein, For All These Rights: Business, Labor, and the Shaping of America's Public-Private Welfare State (Princeton, 2003), 48–49.