Federal Employment
The president's commission began its operations by addressing employment discrimination practiced by the federal government—the obvious place to start. The nation's largest employer, it had sixty thousand women on its payroll. Moreover, the government practiced a blatant form of sex discrimination: agency heads by law could limit jobs to persons of one sex or the other. Taking steps against sex discrimination in the civil service presented few procedural problems and, because the form of discrimination was so bald, few ideological problems.
Sex discrimination in the civil service had a long history. The first women clerks had been hired specifically to provide cheap labor. In 1864 Congress enacted a law allowing the appointment of female clerks at a rate of six hundred dollars per year, half the lowest government wage. By 1870, however, with more than seven hundred women employed in federal offices in Washington, Congress passed a new provision permitting department heads to hire women to fill the regular clerkship grades and to pay them the commensurate salary. In the revised statutes, adopted the following year, this section came to read: "Women may, in the discretion of the head of any department, be appointed to any clerkship therein authorized by law, upon the same . . . conditions . . . as are prescribed for men."[10] Although clearly intended as an authority to pay women the same rate as male clerks, the Civil Service Commission (CSC) interpreted the provision to mean that Congress had granted agency heads the absolute right to specify the preferred sex of a worker for any job. Agency heads used their prerogative almost invariably to select women for the low-paying jobs and men for the more responsible ones. In 1919 only 5 percent of new
women federal employees received salaries over $1,299, compared to 46 percent of the men. Under pressure from the Women's Bureau coalition, the CSC that year had rescinded the rule barring women from more than 60 percent of the civil service examinations, but it maintained the right of agency heads to designate sex in requesting names from the eligibles list for employment. In 1923 the Classification Act mandated equal pay for equal work regardless of sex, but the right of federal managers to hire by sex was not addressed. Finally, in 1932, just before his term was to expire, President Herbert Hoover, acting on the advice of Republican members of the National Woman's party, issued an executive order rescinding the right of agency heads to select by sex, although reserving the right to the Civil Service Commission in the case of jobs where sex represented a bona fide occupational qualification.[11]
Although this decision pleased the National Woman's party, the Women's Bureau coalition had mixed feelings. Before the passage of the Veterans' Preference Act during the Harding administration, they too had argued for the change. But because veterans had points added to their scores automatically, women had less chance of falling among the top three eligibles from which appointments were customarily made. Therefore, the Women's Bureau preferred selection by sex, which at least gave women access to clerical positions and permitted sympathetic agency heads, like Mary Anderson, to choose women regardless of the availability of men with higher scores. The interests of each side reflected its class orientation. The NWP sought to open opportunities so that able women could move into upper-level jobs; the Women's Bureau concerned itself with the right of women to entry-level positions.[12]
Soon after FDR became president, the Women's Bureau gained enough leverage to assure the outcome it sought. The bureau pointed out that under Hoover's executive order, appointments of women to the civil service did actually decline (although the Depression, which impelled all employers to give preference to men, probably accounted for the change at least as much). Mary Anderson asked the new president to countermand Hoover's instructions. In response, the Civil Service Commission polled women's organizations throughout the country;
with six replies in favor of restoring the previous rule and two preferring the new one, Roosevelt's attorney general ruled that Hoover's executive order had been illegal. Only Congress, he said, could rescind the power it had given agency heads to select by sex. In October 1934, to the NWP's disgust, Franklin Roosevelt reversed Hoover's directive.[13]
The policy remained in force throughout the forties and fifties, although it had become increasingly apparent that, veterans preference or no, selection by sex consigned women to low-level jobs. In 1954 the median grade for women had been four; for men, seven (excluding postal employees). Out of every hundred women federal workers, 80 percent held jobs in grades one to five, compared to only 25 percent of the men; less than 1 percent of women served as administrators, as opposed to 9 percent of males. By 1959, the median for men had risen by two grades but remained at GS-4 for women; half of all women were found in the four lowest grades, compared with only one-fifth of the men. Even in professional positions, the median grade for women was lower than for men generally, GS-7 compared to GS-9.[14]
Despite these facts, repeated presidential statements about the need for women in policy-making positions, and the increasing disapproval of women's organizations, neither the Democratic nor the Republican administrations of these decades took steps to limit the right of federal managers to select by sex. Complaints and appeals to the CSC and the attorney general brought the response that only Congress could revoke this authority. But when, in 1957, Representative Marguerite Stitt Church (R-Ill.) introduced a bill to amend section 165 of the Revised Statues to remove the discretion in appointments, the Civil Service Commission reacted unenthusiastically, and the bill died in committee.[15]
The CSC had not deemed the status of women federal employees a problem. Although a 1959 federal employment survey had found that women, still one-quarter of the federal labor force, continued to be clustered in the lowest grades, the commission failed to identify discrimination as a cause of this situation. After all, it noted, more men than women were trained professionals and therefore were naturally classified in the higher grades. Yet
the Commission did concede that even in fields such as social administration, which contained as many women as men, the median grade for men was still GS-13, and that for women was GS-12. The commission suggested that still another factor might account for the disparity: the traditional employment pattern of women. Because women left the labor force to raise children, the "interruption of their careers retards their progress up the promotion ladder."[16] Nevertheless, the commission cheerfully observed, there was still room for women at the top. Out of 575,990 women federal employees, 18 had attained positions among the 1,496 employees in grades sixteen, seventeen, and eighteen, slightly over 1 percent.[17]
In seeking to eliminate so obvious a form of sex discrimination within the civil service, the President's Commission on the Status of Women did not need to address the conflict between motherhood and equal opportunities at work, and in the presence of the Civil Service Commission it did not have to draw up formal rules regarding penalties or affirmative action. In addition, John Kennedy was already on record favoring the eradication of sex bias in the civil service. When he announced the creation of the presidential commission, Kennedy (with prompting from Peterson, Senator Philip Hart [D-Mich.], and others) had expressed his belief that the federal career service should be a "showcase" of equal opportunity in employment. He at that time instructed John Macy, chairman of the Civil Service Commission, to review policies and procedures to ensure that selection was made solely on merit without regard to sex. As president, Kennedy could execute additional PCSW recommendations on the subject without further ado.[18]
The PCSW promptly recommended the policy change and John Kennedy promptly implemented it. Robert Kennedy reversed the ruling made by Roosevelt's attorney general, and the president put CSC chief John Macy in charge of eliminating the discriminatory practice of selecting personnel by sex. "Bona fide occupational qualification" exceptions would be few.[19]
Merely forbidding agency heads from excluding women did not mean that more women would be hired, and no one considered penalizing executives who did not place women in upper-level jobs; nevertheless, change was visible as early as a
year later. Many agencies had appointed women to particular positions for the first time, and the CSC had instituted monitoring procedures. Although the configuration of employment did not change at once, the idea of equal opportunity for women in employment had been introduced, confirmed, and legitimated.[20]
The president's commission also addressed, albeit cautiously, the other form of federal employment of women: presidential appointments. Although no woman representative of the Democratic National Committee sat on the commission (a fact that irritated many DNC members), the PCSW nevertheless recognized administration appointments as being worthy of attention. Still, criticism of the administration would be impolitic, so the members decided to focus on the needs for the future rather than the failures of the past. The commission's recommendation on nominations read: "Increasing consideration should continually be given to the appointment of women of demonstrated ability and political sensitivity to policy-making positions."[21] The White House did not find the suggestion objectionable, and Dan Fenn, head of the administration's "Talent Search," met with Margaret Hickey, chairman of the commission's Committee on Federal Employment, to find a way to implement it. Fenn deplored the practice of merely supplying lists of names of women seeking positions. He therefore proposed a small committee of women who would help locate the right woman for a given job and lobby to appoint her—in short, that the president's commission perform the function India Edwards had fulfilled for Truman. But because the commission had less than one year to its conclusion, it could not assume such a responsibility. Kennedy's appointment record remained undistinguished.[22]