N.Y. Supreme Court Rules Against Aramco’s Refusal to Employ Jews

The State Commission Against Discrimination was “arbitrary and capricious” in allowing the Arabian-American Oil Company to ask job applicants about their religious affiliations, the Appellate Division of the State Supreme Court ruled yesterday.

The ruling of the five-man court was unanimous. It was made on an appeal filed by the ARAMCO asking for a reversal of a decision by New York Supreme Court Justice Henry Epstein ordering the company to desist from such practices. The ARAMCO contends that it asks the applicants to state their religion because it must comply with ban on entrance of Jews to Saudi Arabia where ARAMCO conducts its field operations. justice Epstein, in his order barring inquiry about the applicants’ religion, said the State Commission Against Discrimination made itself the “vassal of a foreign potentate.”

A spokesman for the SCAD, commenting today on the ruling of the Appellate Division, said the SCAD will not act on the ruling because there is a possibility that the ARAMCO might appeal against the ruling. An immediate hearing by SCAD was urged by Shad Polier, who serves as an attorney for the American Jewish Congress in the case.

Mr. Polier charged that ARAMCO “used the religious question on its job application form as a device for barring Jews not only from employment in Saudi Arabia but from jobs in its New York City operation, where the company has over 800 employees.”