Abstract
The United States of America is home to people from different race, religion, sex, caste, colour, nationalities, etc. To protect the rights of people at workplace and colleges, the American government has passed legislations. Some of the legislations are the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act 1964 and Affirmative Action 1961. Civil Rights Act 1964 Title VII is a legislation that helps Americans from different religious faiths to practice their religion. Management at different organizations are expected to adhere to their employee’ religious requirements and employees are accommodated. Affirmative Action was created to ensure discrimination at the workplace and education can be ended, and diversity could be practiced through an environment of equal opportunity for Americans. These rights have helped Americans over the past decades in the form of equal opportunity and civil rights. Also, they have helped in a developing an environment of tolerance among people of different religious faiths and race.
Keywords: Affirmative Action, legislation, etc.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII) underlines that it is against the law to discriminate against a person on the basis of his/her race, nationality, colour, religion or sex. According to the Title VII, it is also against the law to retaliate or hit back against a person just because a complaint has been made about discrimination; or discrimination charge is filed; participated in an investigation or lawsuit over discrimination. Title VII applies to employers having more than 15 employees, which includes the local, state and the federal governments. Two practices from Orthodox Judaism, Hinduism and Mormonism that can be easily accommodated and two that cannot be accommodated are:
Orthodox Judaism
Wearing a Yarmulke and understanding the relevance of the Sabbath are two issues that are important for management to recognize and give necessary freedom to their Orthodox Jew employees. Wearing a Yarmulke is a practice that is allowed for an Orthodox Jew employee who feels the need to wear their Yarmulke for religious reasons. Also, employers should not schedule any promotion related tests that ensures that Sabbath observers are unable to participate. But, employers cannot be forced to move tests for all promotion related tests, especially for employees who follow other religions. Demanding work is closed for all Jewish religious holidays is a practice that management can find difficult to accommodate, especially when the majority of the employees come from other religions (Kasdan, 2008).
Hindu
Any Hindu women wearing traditional Indian attire, such as Sari can be easily accommodated at the workplace. Also, a Hindu employee requesting vegetarian food for them in the office cafeteria for his/her religious beliefs are also within the rights and management can ensure the needs are fulfilled. But, a Hindu employee asking for only vegetarian food to be served to all employees during the Hindu’s holy Navratras could be tough to accommodate when employees from other religion expect to be served with vegetarian food. Another request that might be tough for management to follow can be of celebrating Hindu festival such as Diwali when most of the employees do not come from the same culture or religion (Hindu American Foundation, 2014).
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS)
Consumption of tea and coffee is prohibited for Mormons; therefore, management can ensure that Mormon employees are not given any coffee or tea during at the workplace. Similarly, Mormons are discouraged to work on Sundays, therefore a Mormon employee should not be expected to work on Sundays and the management can accommodate their religious practice. Tithing practice is part of Mormonism, where Mormons pay 10 percent of their gross income to church before paying for other financial obligations. Management has no right to force a Mormon employee to not pay the church, but they can ensure that other employees from different religions are not forced to pay 10 percent of their gross income. Similarly, Mormon employees observe the Sabbath and management needs to accommodate their needs, but asking for all employees to follow the Sabbath guidelines can be avoided by the management (Hooda, 2012).
Affirmative Action
American President JFK (John F. Kennedy) in 1961 issued an executive order (10925) that mandated al government contracts to take “affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin” (Cornell University, n.d.). In U.S., since the year 1965, all government contractors are needed to provide documentation of their programs for affirmative action through compliance reports. According to the executive order (11246), these reports should have all necessary information related to “the practices, policies, programs, and employment policies, programs, and employment statistics of the contractor and each subcontractor..” (Cornell University, n.d.) The essential purpose of the affirmative legislation is to ensure fair employment opportunities are available that helps in developing an employee base that provides a clear reflection of the qualified workforce demographics in the job market. Employers receiving federal funds or who contract with American government are required to provide documentation of their metrics and practices of affirmative action. Under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, affirmative action also works as a remedy, where court can find that the employer has engaged in any discriminatory practice intentionally.
Initial Intent
Affirmative Action has been in practice since 1965, when President Lyndon Johnson signed the executive order (11246) into legislation. The initial intent of the Affirmative Action legislation is best demonstrated in Johnson’s own words: “You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say you are free to compete with all the others, and still just believe that you have been completely fair” (The Leadership Conference, 2016). President Johnson’s words eloquently state the intent behind the legislation of affirmative action programs for achieving equal opportunity, in different fields of higher education and employment. The emphasis was placed on an equal opportunity as the programs were meant for breaking down the barriers, both invisible and visible, for levelling the playing field and ensuring that everyone gets an equal opportunity. The affirmative actions are meant to provide equal results – rather proceeds on the notion that if equal opportunity is to be provided, women, African Americans, disable people and another group of people facing discrimination would end up being represented fairly in the country’s educational institutions and workforce.
Bakke v. Regents
Allan Bakke applied twice for admission at the UC Davis School of Medicine and was rejected by the college both times. The medical school has a reservation of 16 places for qualified minorities in the class of 100 as the school’s affirmative action program. The reservation was used as the redressing program for the longstanding minority exclusions from medical education and profession. While Allan Bakke was rejected, other minority applicants with lower testing scores and grade point averages were given admission. This decision of the school violated the Equal protection clause excluding Bakke on the basis of his radical background. Allan Bakke first sued in the California court, alleging that the school's policy of admission violated 14th Amendement’s Equal Protection Clause and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VI). The California Court agreed and found that the implied quota system discriminated explicitly against racial groups. They came to an understanding that “no applicant may be rejected because of his race, in favor of another who is less qualified, as measured by standards applied without regard to race” (McBride, 2006).
Basis of Conclusion
The Supreme Court decided in favour of Allan Bakke and banned the fixed racial quotas. But, the court allowed affirmative action practicing schools to keep considering race as an important factor among several in their decision process of admissions. The conclusion was on the basis of Allan Bakke's qualifications as both his test scores and GPA scores were better than the students given admission. Since, his scores exceeded the admitted students; Bakke was able to justify that both Fourteenth Amendment and his Civil Rights had not been practiced in his case. The court considered a landmark ruling as Bakke was able to contend in both California and Supreme Court that his exclusion was solely on the basis of his race, and equal opportunity was not given breaking the federal legislation of Affirmative Action. The Court based their decision on the medical school’s racial discrimination against the whites, because 16 out of 100 spots were taken out of their reach on the basis of racial prejudice (McBride, 2006).
Affirmative Action –Pros and Cons
Pros. Affirmative action helps to ensure that colleges and workplaces across the United States of America maintain diversity. Diverse workplaces and colleges helps in creation of tolerance in the community as it exposes people to different ideas and cultures, which are diverse and different from their own. Affirmative action also helps disadvantaged people from different backgrounds of the country, especially people who are not habitual of getting several opportunities to further their education or improve their career. Affirmative Action gives everyone equal opportunity and helps in compensating the group of people or races who have been forced to remain economically and socially behind the superior class, religion or race (Mount Holyoke College, n.d.).
Cons. Affirmative action is another form of discrimination, as it reverses the trend. The historical discrimination against minorities, does not justify the discrimination of non-minorities in the present. Under the U.S. law, everyone is equal and needs to be treated on an equal scale. Affirmative action also destroys any notion of meritocracy as race is given priority in the process of admissions and hiring. People who are given a position in college or work on the basis of Affirmative Action are mostly found to be unprepared for the tasks. It results in low-self-esteem among people from minority. Affirmative action also reinforces racism and stereotypes, as people are not accepted by the non-minorities (Mount Holyoke College, n.d.).
Evaluation of Affirmative Action
Affirmative Action is a just legislation that has helped in uplifting the minorities in the United States of America after years of oppression from the white supremacists. In one way, continuing the legislation is in the best interest of the country as the social and economic gap between the White and Black/Hispanic/American Indian (natives) community remain widespread. Affirmative action still remains one of the ways to help American public maintain healthy balance of diversity and develop a true representation of the demography in classrooms and workplaces. The only change that I would like to propose is to ensure that Affirmative Action should be used to help people who remain socially and economically weaker, rather than focusing on a race. Many people from the Black, Native and Hispanic community have done well for themselves in past decades, but there are some people within these communities and the non-minority who need Affirmative Action to help uplift their social class and economic situation.
Conclusion
People from different religious faiths such as Judaism, Hinduism and Mormonism get the advantages of the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The civil right helps to ensure that workplaces in American remain free of discrimination and everyone is treated equally in the law. Affirmative Action has helped people from different races and religion in the United States of America to receive equal rights in their workplace and education. Also, many have grown in an environment where diversity has been practiced and they have learned about other cultures and religions in the country. This has helped many Americans to develop religious tolerance towards, people from other cultures, religions, etc.
References
Cornell University. (n.d.). Affirmative Action. Retrieved 12 March 2016 from,
https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/affirmative_action
Hindu American Foundation. (2014). Know Your Rights. Retrieved 12 March 2016 from, http://www.hafsite.org/media/pr/knowyourrights
Hooda, S. (2012, 5 June). Walmart Threatened To Fire Mormon Worker For Observing Sabbath. Retrieved 12 March 2016 from, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/walmart-threatened-to-fire-mormon-worker-observing-sabbath_n_1572088.html?section=india
Kasdan., I. (2008). Religious Accomodation in the Workplace: Your Rights and Obligations. Retrieved 12 March 2016 from, http://www.jlaw.com/LawPolicy/accommodation.html
McBride., A. (2006, December). Regents of University of California v. Bakke (1978). Retrieved 12 March 2016 from, http://www.pbs.org/wnet/supremecourt/rights/landmark_regents.html
Mount Holyoke College. (n.d.). Arguments For and Against Affirmative Action. Retrieved 12 March 2016 from, https://www.mtholyoke.edu/~jesan20l/classweb/pright.html
