The New York State Commission Against Discrimination today started a public hearing on charges by the American Jewish Congress that the Arabian American Oil Company refuses to hire Jews either for employment in Saudi Arabia or in New York City;
At the opening day’s session a SCAD field representative testified that out of 280 New York employees of the oil company, none had obviously Jewish names and only six had names that might be Jewish. A further check of Aramco records, the witnesses said, indicated that only one of the six was absent from work on Rosh Hashanah 1960 and that this person was absent because he was on vacation;
In his opening presentation, Shad Polier, vice-president of the American Jewish Congress, who is serving as counsel in the case, charged that “Aramco uses the possibility of travel to Saudi Arabia as a formula to disguise the fact that it is actually honoring a commitment to its business partner–Saudi Arabia–to exclude Jews from any part of its payroll, foreign or domestic.”
Chester Bordeau, counsel for Aramco, raised the question of the constitutionality of the proceedings in asserting that Article II of the Federal Constitution gives the executive branch of. the Government the power to conduct the foreign policy and defense of the United States; The Aramco lawyer quoted a 1958 letter by Assistant Secretary of State William M; Rountree that a ruling requiring Aramco to hire Jews for Saudi Arabia would “prejudice the company’s operations” in Saudi Arabia and would “probably adversely affect other United States interests there as well.”
DISCRIMINATION BY ARAMCO IN DOMESTIC EMPLOYMENT EMPHASIZED
In reply, Mr. Polier noted that the State Department official had confined his objections only to a SCAD order that would compel Aramco to employ persons of the Jewish faith in Saudi Arabia–not to any determination that would bar discrimination by Aramco in domestic employment.
“To say that the Constitution requires New York State to permit racial and religious discrimination in the name of the company’s private business arrangements with a foreign government,” Mr. Polier declared, “is to stand the Constitution on its head.”
The SCAD hearing that began today is in accordance with an order handed down last year by the New York State Court of Appeals.
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