President Nixon and Sen. George McGovern expressed today, in separate statements, their opposition to quotas in employment, education, and governmental appointments and affirmed their support of the merit system. Their views were contained in letters to Philip E. Hoffman, president of the American Jewish Committee. In identical letters, written two weeks ago, Hoffman had urged the two political leaders to oppose quotas “in implementing vitally essential affirmative action programs.” Affirmative action programs refer to efforts to bring about equal opportunities for members of disadvantaged groups.
The Nixon and McGovern replies, along with Hoffman’s letter, were made public today by the AJCommittee here and simultaneously by the White House and the McGovern Presidential campaign headquarters in Washington.
Bertram H. Gold, AJ Committee executive vice-president, applauded the positions of the President and Sen. McGovern. Gold cited the need for American society “to rectify historical injustices suffered” by Blacks and other disadvantaged minority groups. However, he added that “the American system, which is an open society, is based on individual rights, not group rights. We are opposed to quotas because quotas are the negation of a man on his worth alone.”
Gold said that the AJ Committee had worked emphatically since its 1906 founding to eliminate discrimination based on arbitrary factors of race or religion. He added that “it would be tragic now to adopt a national policy, whatever the motivation, that would reintroduce the concept of judging a man on the basis of his skin color or the church he attends.”
Both the President and Sen. McGovern praised the AJ Committee’s efforts in combatting discrimination and both pledged further action against quotas. President Nixon wrote that he had asked “appropriate department heads” to review their policies to make certain they conformed with his views. Sen. McGovern said he was planning, in a major statement soon, to deal with what he called the “interrelated issues” of quotas, the merit principle and “affirmative action.”
President Nixon wrote that quotas were not appropriate means of achieving equal employment opportunity. He added he would continue to seek to enlarge government opportunities for men and women of all backgrounds to serve in responsible positions “but the criteria that I have employed and will continue to employ will be based on merit.”
The President endorsed the AJ Committee’s position in support of affirmative efforts “to ensure that all Americans have an equal chance to compete for employment opportunities and to do so on the basis of individual ability.” He added that, in pursuing such programs, numerical goals “must not be applied in such a fashion as to, in fact, result in the imposition of quotas.”
Sen. McGovern called the quota system “detrimental to American society” and he added that “I believe it is both necessary and possible to open the doors that have long been shut to minority group members without violating basic principles of non-discrimination and without abandoning the merit system.” He added that he had pledged in his campaign for the Presidency “to expand the opportunities for employment, for education, for housing and for personal growth and achievement for every citizen. I am confident that this goal can be reached in ways consonant and consistent with our basic commitment to a society based on the principle of full equality in a free society for all Americans.”
The letters described the AJ Committee’s longtime stand and programs for “affirmative action” plans to help Blacks and other members of disadvantaged minority groups, including support of compensatory education programs, open enrollment in universities and special job counseling and recruitment. He warned, however, that such affirmative action programs must not be allowed to lead “to the acceptance by government or the private sector of the concept of proportional rep- resentation which we believe is but a euphemism for quotas.” He asserted that this concept “substitutes new forms of discrimination for old, creates new breeding grounds for intergroup hostility and anger and greatly downgrades the importance of merit.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
