A clearance procedure for exchanging information about complaints of employment discrimination against Jews by national firms was announced here today by the National Community Relations advisory Council.
Louis Feinmark, chairman of the NCRAC Committee on Employment Discrimination, explained that the 38 affiliated Jewish organizations of the NCRAC will report all such complaints of discrimination that come to their knowledge. These reports will be filed in the NCRAC office. Any cooperating agency reporting a complaint will be promptly notified if complaints against the same firm have been received from other places.
“The value of this clearance system will increase as the reports accumulate,” Mr. Feinmark said, in commenting on the new procedure. “One of the great drawbacks to effective action on discriminatory employment policies against Jews has been lack of dependable information about the practices of particular firms or industries.”
Mr. Feinmark pointed out that complaints made in any one city do not provide a reliable basis for judging whether or not a particular firm or industry makes a policy of anti-Jewish discrimination or whether the practice is due to the prejudices of a particular personnel director or other branch official.
“Establishment of a central channel for the clearance and reporting of complaints will facilitate such determination,” Mr. Feinmark said, “will provide a more solid basis on which to determine the most effective approach to the firm, and will yield evidence that will help to assure the success of such negotiations as may be undertaken”.
The institution of the clearance process carries out one of the recommendations of the NCRAC Joint Program Plan for Jewish Community Relations in 1954, namely “that procedures be developed in the NCRAC for the clearance and reporting of all cases of employment discrimination involving national firms.” The need for such a clearance system was also stressed by a Conference on Jewish Employment Problems, held last December.
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