Because, regardless of what opinion we give we are going to displease somebody, but that is my view on contracts. If it is purely administrative and the Commissioners do not act to prevent the Chairman from executing purely administrative contracts then that matter falls within the authority of the Chairman.

Mrs. CHISHOLM. If I understood you correctly, you indicated that the AFL-CIO had been given a period of 60 days in order to be able to respond to the complaint or complaints that were filed.

Have any other groups, State agencies or companies ever been given as much as 60 days in view of the fact that the law stipulates that a respondent has 10 days within which to respond to a complaint filed with the Commission?

Mr. CAREY. I don't think any other group has ever responded within 60 days. The point is, the law does not require response within 60 days. The law simply requires that once a charge is received-Let's use the hypothetical.

If you were to file a charge with the Commission, within 10 days we would give notice of your filing of the charge under the statute to the employer or union that you were grieving against.

The 60-day period is a very short period because 706 requires or envisions an investigation by the Commission. The problem of the whole backlog, which is what we have really been zeroing in on, is that there is no investigation at all for 18 months or two years and it is that period of time which causes the backlog.

So, the fact that an employer, under 1601.14 of our regulations, mav present his or her view of the facts within 60 days does not slow down the process of investigation. Indeed, it speeds it up.

There is nothing in the AFL-CIO agreement which makes the 60day period sacrosanct. The Commission, tomorrow, if that understanding were entered into, could abrogate it. All it is, is simply responding to a request by somebody charged for an opportunity to do what they already can do under 1601.14 of our regulations;, namely, provide us with a package of facts and a proposed remedy.

Mrs. CHISHOLM. Just one last question. The contract with the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights is being held up at this moment. Is that administrative or policy?

Mr. CAREY. The reason it is being held up is because the General Counsel has written a legal opinion which says-I believe this is the reason it is being held up-that says that the granting of the direct grant of Commission funds to clinical law programs, or related programs, for the purpose of aiding in the enforcement of Title VII is a policy matter which must be voted upon by the Commissioners and may not be administratively determined by the Chairman.

Mrs. CHISHOLM. Thank you very much. No further questions.
Mr. HAWKINS. Mr. Steiger.

Mr. STEIGER. I have two questions. Yesterday, as I heard the discussion between the Chairman and yourself on your perception of the problem of the pre-1972 law investigation cases and the post-1972, it was my understanding that one of your difficulties as General Counsel with the work that had been done prior to the 1972 amendments wasthat there was a different standard being used by those who investigated those charges versus what you felt you had to do in taking the

case to court.

Am I correct in that perception of what the problem is?

Mr. CAREY. That was one of the difficulties, one of the reasons for the high rejection rate. I did not mean to encompass all of the reasons. That was merely one of them.

Mr. STEIGER. What work are you now trying to do in terms of trying to deal with the Commission and the staff of the Commission so that you can get cases which will come to you which will have sufficient work done of a sufficient standard so that you can take it into court without rejection?

Mr. CAREY. We have done two things with respect to what might be called the smaller cases. We had drafted a proposal whereby the General Counsel's staff will go to the district offices, look at the files, review them and select out those which would appear, through a preliminary review by those who eventually would have to take them to court, to be proper litigation vehicles.

Once that determination is made, then the conception is that the General Counsel's staff would work with the compliance side of the agency or the investigators to instruct them as to the manner in which the investigation ought to be conducted.

With respect to the so-called larger cases, those that might, for example, involve an airplane company in California, or a mining company with many facilities, a so-called 707 pattern and practice case, we have received from the Chairman approval of a procedure whereby a team headed by a General Counsel lawyer will direct the methodology of the investigation so that, as Commissioner Lewis pointed out, we will avoid to the extent possible the arrival of cases in our office which have to be reinvestigated.

I might say I feel like I am expressing an outrageous lack of humility by suggesting we ought to instruct the compliance side of the agency with respect to how to investigate a case since they have been doing that since 1965, and the lawyers in my office have only really been on board to any great extent since late 1972.

Mr. STEIGER. Yesterday both you and the Chairman presented some figures to us which said, as I recall that chart you had, that 392 cases were approved for litigation, and yet, as of last week, there were only 268 of those cases that had been filed.

Why the difference between what had been approved versus what has been filed?

Mr. CAREY. Because we drew somewhat on the past practice of the Justice Department and also, on some of the personal observations that I have acquired both when I was formerly with the Justice Department and when I was in private practice, which is that there are many times that if you have a compliant in your hand and you have nothing left to do but go to the clerk's office in a Federal district and have the clerk stamp it, that that mere physical act of stamping the complaint, which makes it a public record, tends to harden the resolve of a company or a union against settlement simply because, if for no other reason than that the case then makes the newspapers.

In order to attempt to give the companies and the unions, as well as ourselves, that one last chance to avoid publicity and to avoid having to actually go into court and to achieve an honorable settlement, we instituted what we call the presuit letter procedure, which means that after the Commission approves the filing of a lawsuit by the General

Counsel's Office, we will send the final copy of the complaint which we intend to file to the company or the union, as the case may be, instructing the respondent company or union that we are prepared immediately to file such a lawsuit in this form, unless, within a very short period of time, and I think we have it now worked down at the outside that the maximum will be 60 to 90 days, unless they can convince us that they have their checkbook ready and their procedures prepared to do those things which would give the Commission the relief which it is requesting in the complaint.

In other words, it is the one last chance. Now, the fact that we have done that accounts for the reason why we have cases which have been authorized for suit but which have not yet physically been filed.

The result of the presuit letter procedure today has been mixed, but in large measure, I think it can be said to have been successful in resulting in settlements that we might not ordinarily have received. I might also say that each settlement which we obtain we are required to take to the Commission and explain to them. By that I mean, to take to the Commission a memorandum which compares that which we achieve through the litigation process as compared to those things which were asked for quite some time ago through the so-called compliance or conciliation process.

And I think, with one or two exceptions at the most, the relief which we have attained through the litigation process has been far greater than the minimum standards which were attempted during a conciliation process.

Mr. STEIGER. I am all through. May I just ask if you can give us an analysis of those cases which have been authorized but haven't been filed in terms of how long they have been outstanding, how many settlements have, in fact, been reached, how many times that has been presented to the Commission, the Commission's response in those cases presented to them?

Mr. CAREY. I think we could present that for the record. Yes, sir. You would like us to present that for the record?

Mr. STEIGER. Yes.

Mr. CAREY. Yes, sir.

Mr. HAWKINS. I was going to suggest, Mr. Carey, there are numerous other questions that members of the committee would like to ask. I would suggest a letter be directed to you including the questions that are remaining, a letter over the signature of the Chair and Mr. Steiger as the ranking Republican member, directing these questions to you, which would include these settlements through presuit letter procedure and your views on self-enforcement and other questions I am sure are quite important to us.

We will try to agree on a reasonable length of time to receive it so it can go into the appendix of the hearing record.

Mr. CAREY. We would be happy to respond to such a letter.

Mr. HAWKINS. Without objection, we will follow that procedure. Mr. Carey, we wish to thank you and the other witnesses appearing with you this morning, Mr. Robinson and Mr. Sape, for the contribution which you have made at these hearings. It has been helpful to the committee.

We hope to continue to have the same type of cooperation which you have exhibited thus far.

Mr. CAREY. Thank you very much, sir.

Mr. HAWKINS. The next witnesses will be a panel of witnesses associated with the Association of Official Human Rights Agencies.

The association is represented on the panel this morning by Ms. Margaret McKenna, acting executive director; Mr. Arthur L. Green, chairman of the Federal Liaison Committee and executive director of the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities. Ms. McKenna and Mr. Green are accompanied by Ms. Eleanor Holmes Norton, chairman of the New York City Commission for Human Rights; Mr. Galen Martin, executive director of the Kentucky Commission on Human Rights; and Mr. Homer C. Floyd, executive director of the Pennsylvania Human Rights Relations Commission. Will the witnesses pleased be seated.

Two additional statements have been submitted to the committee, one by the chairman of the New York State Commission on Human Rights, and another by the National Organization for Women.

Without objection, those two statements will follow the presentation of the witnesses seated at the witness table.

May I give a blanket welcome to all of you. I did have some remarks that were to be made in an introductory statement, but because of the lateness of the time, we will proceed directly to hear from the witnesses.

I assume the first person will be Ms. McKenna, the acting executive director of the Association of Official Human Rights Agencies.

STATEMENTS OF MARGARET MCKENNA, ACTING EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, THE ASSOCIATION OF OFFICIAL HUMAN RIGHTS AGENCIES, ARTHUR L. GREEN, CHAIRMAN, FEDERAL LIAISON COMMITTEE, AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CONNECTICUT COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND OPPORTUNITIES, ACCOMPANIED BY ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, CHAIRMAN, NEW YORK CITY COMMISSION FOR HUMAN RIGHTS, GALEN, MARTIN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR KENTUCKY COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS, AND, HOMER C. FLOYD, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, PENNSYLVANIA HUMAN RELATIONS COMMISSION

Ms. MCKENNA. Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. I would like to present Mr. Arthur Green, who represents the association today. Mr. Green is the executive director of the Connecticut Commission but he speaks. today for the Association of Official Human Rights Agencies.

In that capacity, he is chairman of the Federal Liaison Committee and the past chairman of the association.

Mr. HAWKINS. Mr. Green, you may proceed. Your statement in its entirety will be entered in the record at this point. [Mr. Green's prepared testimony follows:]

TESTIMONY OF ARTHUR L. GREEN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CONNECTICUT COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND OPPORTUNITIES, REPRESENTING INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF OFFICIAL HUMAN RIGHTS AGENCIES

My name is Arthur L. Green. I am Executive Director of the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities. I have been asked by Vivian L. Caver, President of the International Association of Official Human Rights Agencies, to speak to this committee on behalf of the Association, of which I am the past chairman and current chairman of its Liaison Committee. With me,

is Margaret McKenna, Acting Executive Director of the International Association of Official Human Rights Agencies who assisted in the preparation of this statement.

The International Association of Official Human Rights Agencies or IAOHRA, is a non-profit tax exempt corporation, drawing our membership from government agencies at the state/local levels which administer anti-discrimination laws and ordinances. There are approximately 550 such agencies, including state-wide "human relations commissions" in nearly every state. Human Relations Commissions enforce Civil Rights laws and ordinances concerning employment, housing, public accommodations, voting rights, law enforcement and credit.

Our concern here is with enforcement of employment discrimination laws and virtually all agencies have laws or ordinances in this area. Several agencies' laws extend employment discrimination protections not only to race, religion, color, sex and national origin, but to age, marital status, physical disability and sexual orientation.

These agencies in the IAOHRA constituency are the ones referred to in Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, section 706, to which charges of employment discrimination filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission are first "deferred" before EEOC assumes jurisdiction. Through its regulations EEOC has named those agencies enforcing legislation which is equal in coverage and enforcement to Title VII.

There are approximately 47 agencies designated as deferral agencies by EEOC. This number includes 11 agencies which are on provisional status either because the coverage or enforcement is more limited than Title VII.

We are here today to discuss possible extension of the scope of EEOC authority to other areas of employment discrimination but first to attempt to analyze the reasons for and solutions to EEOC's “backlog crisis". The backlog is estimated at over 100,000 cases and it continues to grow. Why the backlog exists can only be answered by speculation-rapid growth of EEOC as an agency and related management problems and the awareness of citizens as to their rights under the law, are two factors.

Our role here today is to suggest why and how the state/local agencies can help alleviate this problem. Many, if not all, have the enforcement power and expertise necessary. Basically, they need four things from EEOC in order to fulfill the original intent of Congress with respect to these agencies.

1. Money. Most, if not all of these agencies have budgetary problems. They need money to hire investigators. Why give money to these agencies and not add to EEOC's own staff? One basic factor is size. State/local agencies at present have fewer of the management system problems EEOC is facing. These agencies can process cases on an average for less than half the amount of money that EEOC must spend. States process cases more rapidly than the two or three year wait at EEOC for an investigation to begin. State/Local agencies are geographically and philosophically closer to problems in their own areas.

2. Acceptance of State/Local Findings.-Section 706 of the Civil Rights Act calls for EEOC to give "substantial weight" to state/local agency findings. What is substantial weight? Per se acceptance of a finding? Total re-investigation of the charge? It has not been defined by EEOC. Its definition and procedures for review are the core of the deferral process and vitally important to any program to alleviate the EEOC backlog. This agency believes that findings of deferral agencies should be accepted by EEOC with limited, if any review.

The designation of an agency as a deferral agency means that that agency has coverage similar to Title VII. Detailed review which may amount to reinvestigation defeats the very purpose of deferral. Review procedures if they are to exist, must be streamlined and efficient. There must be an assumption on the part of EEOC field personnel that state/local agency findings are correct, an attitude on the part of EEOC and deferral agencies that professional standards exist and are followed by both members of this partnership.

IAOHRA surveyed the deferral agencies and found that review and acceptance of state/local cases findings varies from region to region and even district to district. Many deferral agencies have never had a case accepted and closed by EEOC after presenting their agencies' findings to EEOC. It has actually only been in recent months that any substantial number of cases has been accepted by any EEOC district office and administratively closed. Once a state/local agency has been designated as 706 agency, any re-investigation can create serious credibility problems on both sides.