Sponsors of Fepc Bill Fight Move to Strip It of Penalty Provisions As Hearings Open

A Senate Labor and Public Welfare Sub-Committee, which opened hearings today on a bill to bar discrimination in employment, introduced by Sen. Irving M. Ives, was told by Sen. Ives and Sen. Dennis Chavez, a co-sponsor, that FEPC legislation without enforcement provisions would be ineffectual. Their statements came after indications that there will be attempts to modify the measure to strip it of all penalty provisions.

Rabbi William F. Rosenblum of New York, president of the Synagogue Council of America, supported the bill “as an American citizen interested in the welfare of all Americans and especially in preserving those institutions that are vital to our democracy.” Answering Sen. Ellender, Rabbi Rosenblum said that, taking the country as a whole, race, national origin and religion, in that order, determine discrimination.

“There are some parts of the nation which are more liberal than others,” he continued, “but there still persist in industry, as well as in education, particularly in many areas of employment, practices which make it impossible for people of certain religious and racial groups to receive fair and equal consideration when applying for jobs.”

The Rev. Edward Cardinal, director of the Shiel School of Social Studies in Chicago, under prolonged and sharp questioning by Sen. Ellender, said that the educational system cannot be relied upon to answer the problem of discrimination “as long as we have the quota system in our universities.” Ellender confirmed that he had received letters from “many Jews” in Louisiana “asking that I intercede with some schools in my state to permit them entry.” He professed lack of knowledge about establishment of quotas in colleges, but granted that “the situation as respects (quotas for) the Jews is correct.”

Father Cardinal read a statement prepared by Bishop Shiel of Chicago, the largest Roman Catholic archdiocese in the world, expressing full support for the FEPC bill.