*This is the second part of a series of two parts. Read the first part here.
In the summer of 1969, protesters closed more than a dozen projects in Chicago, giving rise to the Builders Association of Chicago and the unions holding a closed and five -hour negotiation session. Weeks later, white construction workers went through a crisis, breaking down a job department audience over the dispute. When negotiations between contractors and activists in Pittsburgh fell, protesters closed a stadium project, followed by mass arrests in other manifestations. Seattle black protesters closed more than 30 projects and 2,000 white construction workers went to the City Council.
One of the most effective routes to break the integration logjam was the Philadelphia Plan, which required low bidders to agree before a contract award to use a representative number of minority workers in each trade. It was created in response to the demands of local business leaders, who wanted a uniform approach to the equal opportunity problem. It was started by the Federal Executive Board of Philadelphia, an intergent group, and covered five counties. A plan revised in 1969 requested to increase membership in minorities in six operations from its 1969 number of less than 2% to 19% and 26% in 1973.
The Philadelphia Plan was attacked when the general of the North -American controller Elmer Staats, prepared by members of the Congress and Industry, ruled the illegal plan, arguing that he forced contractors to discriminate white workers. The Secretary of Labor, George Shultz, rejected Staats’ vision as a non -controller and remained firm. Despite a strong effort to Congress to kill the plan, President Nixon supported him and survived.
Efforts to get another 18 cities to elaborate their own plans were affected by the resistance of local unions and officials. An Editorial ENR of 1970 stated: “It is clear that the President, the Governors and the mayors do not intend to enforce the law … Until there is enough reform of the labor law to make collective bargaining less shameless, minority groups are justified in using all non -lethal weapons in their command by shame and pressing the establishment.”
The Philadelphia plan was intended for a prototype. The labor department directed 73 cities in 1970 for intensive assistance in developing its own “Natal City Plans”, and deployed 30 additional offices of federal contracting staff. The progress was slow. In September 1972, 56 cities had adopted plans in the hometown, and the labor department had imposed compulsory plans in five cities. A year later, an ORCC audit of 31 plans found that less than a third of the Union premises had fulfilled the minimum standards of the plan.
Images of the files enr
A turn tide
Probably the first black contractor on Enr’s cover was Fred Eversley. In 1969, its two companies had a total volume of $ 25 million contracts and a portfolio that included churches, banks, an IBM plant and model cities. He told Enr how to accept a small business administration loan would indicate in the industry that it had no liquid assets and that link companies would consider it insensitive. “Link requirements are the greatest restriction on growth, especially for minority or small contractors,” he said.
A 1974 study, “Union Control of Labor Training”, carried out by Herbert Hill, National Labor Director of the NaACP, found that the Government had replaced voluntarism and good faith efforts instead of fulfilling the learning dissemination programs and the plans of the hometown. He described the learning system as a prolonged, inefficient, union controlled, exclusive, rigored against minorities and still eluded by most white craftsmen. However, statistics published by the labor department found that between 1970 and 1975, the percentage of minority learners in all learning trades grew up to 17.5% of 9.1%, to 44,000 of 18,000.
An article from 1976 stated: “ There is no resolution in the long duration dispute on how to improve compliance with the affirmative action rules … The original execution plans were based on a joint effort that involves contractors and construction unions. But the growth of open store work leaves an increasingly important segment in the industry outside this scheme. ”
The second Court of Appeals Circuit in 1976 confirmed the imposition of a racial quota on membership in a almost white sheet workers’ union, local NYC 28, stating: “ When it comes to recalcitrant unions that have challenged a smoother means of applying a mathematical goal of members can be the only effective means of eradicating discriminatory practices and remedying the effects of last discrimination ”.
In 1976, the Secretary of Transport, William Coleman Jr., announced that minority contractors would be awarded to 15% of the work of the railway rehabilitation project in the northeastern northeastern corridor, the largest federal government commitment to minority contractors up to that time. A study by the federal road administration of road construction work in the same year found that minorities expanded up to 21% of this labor force in 1973, 19% in 1969, despite minorities that represent only 11.6% of all civil works in 1973.
A $ 4 billion public works bill in 1977 had a 10%minority business requirement. The administration of the economic development of the trade of the Department was responsible for the subsidies. ENR publishers supported it at that time. The contracts funded by the bill were awarded at the end of 1977, with almost 15% of the funds that went to MBE. The general associated contractors carried out a wide legal struggle against the requirement, and the AGC chapters filed against it on 10 of the 11 federal judicial circuits. In 1980, the Supreme Court would rule in one of these cases, Fullilove v. Kreps, which MBE establishments were legal.
The National Association of Minority Contractors threatened to close protests if AGC demands were successful. According to Paul King, chairman of the NAMC EDA Supervisory Committee, $ 400 million accounted for less than 1% of the $ 50 billion public construction market. “For the AGC, which states that less than 1% of public construction dollars should not go to a disadvantaged group, it borders immoral.”
A report from the Office of Labor Statistics found that the proportion of black workers in eight construction trades increased between 1972 and 1980. The plumbing share increased to 8.5% of 5.1%, electricians by 4.1% of 2.8%, Freemasons to 14.6% of 13.6% and machinery operators up to 6.2% of 4.9%.
The Supreme Court ruled in 1979 that private companies were free to provide special help to black workers to achieve jobs and promotions, despite the prohibition of Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Law on the use of race as a criterion in labor decisions. Carter administration officials greeted the sentence as a wide statement of government equal to labor efforts. The business community welcomed her as a definitive guide to avoid the dresses of reverse discrimination.
The NAMC stated in 1979 that it believed that there was “a continuous and systematic form of racial discrimination” for guarantees. A publisher related to Enr said: “ While linking and financing are usually cited as larger obstacles of minority contractors, the basic problem behind them, as well as many others, seems to be in subtle factors that produce the lack of confidence and respect. ” Softshoe ” in the office of a banker or the bond and request a loan or a deputy.
In the 1980’s, opposition to affirmative action requirements began to soften. In 1982, the OFCC stated that the plans of the hometown were “a viable mechanism” to help contractors achieve affirmative action goals and, therefore, the agency does not have to review individual contractors to check compliance. The plans created support to integrate the industry by involving contractors, unions, minorities and local governments. “They are a way to finance the fact that OFCC has no jurisdiction over the unions,” said an unnamed source to Enr.
In the Administration of Reagan, usdot issued a rule in 1983 for a 10%MBE goal. State governments confused the promising us Dot industry that they would achieve or overcome the previously controversial objective. The Logjam was broken.
