A Quotas-vs.-Voters Dilemma

By Alain L. Sanders

The first major test of George Bush's civil rights commitment reached the Oval Office last week in the form of a 30-page document. The Civil Rights Act of 1990 -- passed last week by overwhelming majorities in both houses of Congress -- seeks to strengthen protections against discrimination in the workplace, making it easier for minorities and women to prove civil rights violations against employers. But Bush is threatening to veto it.

The President insists he wants to sign a civil rights bill, but not one that will force "businesses to adopt quotas in hiring and promotion." Democratic leaders say the President's excuse is a sham. "We've met every legitimate concern of the Administration, and our efforts have been met with nothing but political sloganeering," charges Texan Jack Brooks, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

The latest political impasse with Congress presents Bush with a tough election-year dilemma. The President does not want to alienate black voters, about half of whom currently support him in opinion polls. But neither does he want to jeopardize the crucial votes of blue-collar Reagan Democrats who oppose any hint of racial job quotas. Tepid conservative supporters and worried business groups, moreover, say they are against any law that could draw more civil rights claims into court. "This is a turning point, a defining moment in the Bush presidency," says Ralph Neas, executive director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, one of the principal lobbyists for the legislation.

The 1990 Civil Rights Act would reverse half a dozen decisions by the Reagan-engineered Supreme Court that have raised a wall of technical obstacles for minorities and women bringing discrimination lawsuits against employers. Among other things, the bill would ban racial harassment on the job and expand existing laws to permit victims of race, religious or sex bias to win judgments against their employers and collect damages.

By far the most contentious issue is a provision that would reimpose on many businesses that are sued the burden of showing that their racially or sexually imbalanced work forces result from "business necessity" rather than bias. Corporate leaders and the President claim the provision will nudge companies to hire and promote workers according to statistical race or gender formulas, simply to avoid costly discrimination lawsuits. Backers of the measure say the fear is unfounded: the act stipulates that it does not "require or encourage" quotas.

The stalemate between the President and Congress worries many Republicans who do not want the G.O.P. to be perceived as anti-civil rights. Former Transportation Secretary William Coleman, a prominent black Republican involved in intensive negotiations to salvage the measure, warned the President last week that a veto would subject the "country and the Republican Party to years of divisiveness." Apparently in order to avoid just such a possibility -- and in the face of demonstrations in front of the White House -- the President last Saturday sent Congress proposals for an 11th-hour compromise.

With reporting by Jerome Cramer/Washington