The Jewish Labor Committee urged the United States Senate today to vote against confirmation of Federal Judge Clement F. Haynesworth as a Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court on grounds that his record showed hostility to organized labor and a willingness to perpetuate racial segregation in public schools.
Charles S. Zimmerman, president of the Jewish Labor Committee, which represents 500,000 Jewish members of trade unions, expressed the organization’s opposition to Judge Haynesworth in a letter to Sen. James O. Eastland, (D., Miss.) chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
“Our country’s efforts to give black Americans and other minorities a feeling that they are first class citizens will be seriously impaired by this appointment,” he wrote. “If the Senate confirms this appointment, black and other Americans who espouse equal rights for all of our citizens may have good reason to question the Senate’s credibility on this issue. We are disappointed with President Nixon’s recommendation of Judge Haynesworth.”
If Judge Haynesworth’s nomination is confirmed, he will fill the Supreme Court seat resigned earlier this year by Justice Abe Fortas. It will also mark the first time since President Woodrow Wilson’s appointment of the late Justice Louis D. Brandeis that the U.S. Supreme Court will be without a Jewish member.
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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.
