The Legal Environment of Human Resources Management 57
Title VII of the act deals specifi cally with discrimination in employment:
it prohibits discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national
origin. The passage of this law was not without controversy. Many politi-
cians (mostly in the South) thought that a federal law forbidding discrimi-
nation would usurp states ’ rights. Congressman Howard Smith of Virginia
tried to defeat the bill by including sex as one of the protected classifi cations.
He hoped that the insertion of sex would render the bill foolish and lead
to its defeat. The act passed with the inclusion of sex, and today litigation
concerning sex discrimination is common.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 created the U.S. Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission (EEOC) to investigate complaints and try to
resolve disputes through conciliation. The act was amended in 1972 by
the Equal Employment Opportunity Act, which extended its coverage to
state and local governments and to educational institutions. At this time, the
EEOC was granted enforcement powers to bring action against organiza-
tions in the courts if necessary to force compliance with Title VII.
The EEOC requires that most organizations submit annual EEO
forms, identifying the demographic breakdown of their employees. Data
from these forms are used to identify possible patterns of discrimination
in particular organizations or segments of the workforce. The EEOC may
then take legal action against an organization on the basis of these data.
Title VII does not prohibit discrimination based on seniority systems,
veterans ’ preference rights, national security reasons, or job qualifi ca-
tions based on test scores, background, or experience, even when the use
of such practices may correlate with discrimination based on race, sex,
color, religion, or national origin. Section 703(e)(1) of Title VII permits an
employer to discriminate on religion, sex, or national origin in instances
where religion, sex, or national origin is a bona - fi de occupational quali-
fi cation (BFOQ) reasonably necessary to the normal operation of that
particular business or enterprise. For example, a BFOQ that excludes one
group (for example, males or females) from an employment opportunity
is permissible if the employer can argue that the essence of the business
requires the exclusion, that is, when business would be signifi cantly af-
fected by not employing members of one group exclusively. One case that
dealt with this issue was United Automobile Workers v. Johnson Controls (1991).
Johnson Controls is a car battery manufacturer that excluded fertile
women from jobs where there was high exposure to lead. Fertile men were
not automatically excluded and were given a choice as to whether they
wanted to risk their reproductive health. The company argued that this
policy falls within the BFOQ exception to Title VII. In its 1991 decision,