Undoubtedly many types of discrimination contribute to the "ghetto" 5/

scheme. But unequal employment opportunity must be considered a

central factor which perpetuates the current situation. As Berl I. Bernhard, Staff Director of the Commission on Civil Rights pointed

out:

*** in the last analysis, the minority citizen can
only better himself by increasing his income; and this
is to be done only if he is qualified for employment,
and if people will employ him at other than menial
tasks. 6/

In 1959, the average nonwhite family earned about 56% of the

average white family income in the District, a ratio that has remained

white-collar and managerial category in the metropolitan area were held by whites, while the majority of Negro workers could be found in either

Negro

service or manual labor positions.

Past and present discrimination

must be held accountable for this imbalance, and it is the function.

of this report to present some of the casuses and possible remedies for such discrimination.

The next pages are a summary of the employment situation in the Washington area based on the Employment Conference and materials submitted to the Committee. Following the summary are the findings and

the recommendations of the D.C. Advisory Committee.

D.C. Employment Conference 12. (Testimony of Honorable Berl I.
Bernhard, Staff Director, U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.)

5/

6/

Ibid.

I. THE IMPACT OF UNEQUAL RIGHTS

Discrimination is a relative term.

If you are the director of

personnel services at the Potomac Electric Power Company, you would

take pride in the fact that:

Today if a customer comes to our office to pay his bill,
the receiving teller may be a Negro; if he calls our
office to inquire about a bill, he may talk to a Negro;
if he calls to have service transferred from one place
to another, he may talk to a Negro; the man who comes to
read the meter in his basement may be Negro; if he appears
to be having voltage trouble, the man who comes to make
tests may be a Negro. All of these activities are in
different Departments of the Company. 1/

But if you are Julius Hobson, president of the Washington chapter

of CORE, you have a different story to tell:

We tried to get from PEPCO a statement of agreement on
the hiring of Negroes at all job levels, and I don't
mean just for window dressing, but in regard to the
basic jobs in PEPCO, such as electricians.

There are no Negro electricians at the company. There
are no Negroes in electronics. There are no Negroes in
training for these jobs, and they are the basic jobs in
PEPCO. 2/

As a union official, you are aware of the problems, but your personnal commitment to fair employment is unequivocal:

The national policy of the AFL-CIO is well-known to this
panel and to the Advisory Committee, and we subscribe
100 percent to the national policy in the field of race
relations.

*** Of the hundred locals affiliated, I think only a
handful do not have some Negro members. * * * We
have been doing all we can in this field, by our actions
and by our communications with the local unions. 3/

1/ D.C. Employment Conference. (P. 2 of statement of Harry Boyd, Potomac Electric Power Company.)

3/

Id. at 188. (Testimony of J.C. Turner, Greater Washington Central
Labor Council.)

Or, if you are executive secretary of the Building Trades Council,

you cite some encouraging figures:

*** Bricklayers Local No. 1 has about 35 percent Negroes,
and Bricklayers Local No. 4 about 90 percent. *** Nearly
all (of the Carpenters Locals) have Negro members, but no
records are kept according to race. *** For the Cement
Makers, it is about 75 percent. *** The Electrical
Workers have one Negro. *** The Engineers * * * have
about 200 Negro members. *** The Steam Fitters just
recently took in one Negro. * * * The Plumbers recently
took in one *** the Plasterers have about 25 percent
Negro membership. * * * The Roofers have about 75 percent
of Negro workers. * * * The Tile and Terrazzo Workers
indicate that none have applied to local unions. *** 4/

The statistics somehow seem less impressive when you are Stokeley Carmichael, a member of the Non-Violent Action Group at Howard University:

The Federal Government appropriates all the money to Howard
University for its new buildings. *** The contract * * *
is given by the GSA. *** currently working on the new
gymnasium are a number of Locals. *** The Electrical Local
#26 employs two Negroes and one (Negro) journeyman. The
Sheetmetal Union #102 employs no Negroes. The Plumbers
Local #5 and the Steamfitters Local #02 employ no Negroes
at all. *** We think it is a blatant insult for GSA to
assign these Locals and these Unions to build the new
gymnasium on our site. *** We are not going to take this. 5/

Few observers would deny that some progress has been made in

combatting employment discrimination in the Washington area. The concerted efforts of the Federal and District governments, of private organizations, of industry and the labor movement, have led to increasing opportunities for members of minority groups. But for those who are being discriminated against, the question of how much discrimination exists is no longer central; the point that it exists at all is cause enough for anger.

(Testimony of Joseph Curtice, Building Trades Council.) (Testimony of Stokeley Carmichael.)

In Washington, however, we have not reached that advanced stage

where only vestiges of the problem remain.

ment is widespread, and substantial.

Discrimination in employ

Today, nearly ten years after the momentous Supreme Court school desegregation decision, the Nation's Capital is not an integrated city. It is not integrated in education, it is not integrated in housing, and it is far from integrated in employment. A foreign visitor--or, for

that matter, a high school student from Iowa--will soon discover the "ghettos" of the city; he will see schools only a few blocks apart that

are virtually all-white or all-Negro; he will notice the racial make-up of the city's menial laborers.

The median income of nonwhite citizens in the District is only 70 percent of that of white citizens. The econoic gap has shown

very little change over the last twenty years.

unemployed persons in the District are nonwhite.

Seven out of ten

The average nonwhite

family earns 56 cents for every dollar earned by the average white

3/

family, and that 56 cents represents the work of more bread-winners 2/ per family. Such, in the words of John B. Duncan, the District's first Negro Commissioner, is "the price of unequal opportunity." Inroads have been made by minority groups during the past decade in securing employment where it was previously denied.

Opportunities

in government have increased, but the great bulk of Negroes are concentrated in the lower income groups. In the Federal Government, in 1961,

1/

D.C. Employment Conference Conference. (P. 2 of statement of
Honorable John B. Duncan.)

2/

Id. at 15. (Testimony of Honorable Berl I. Bernhard.)

3/ Id. (P. 2 of testimony of John B. Duncan.)