Women Activists, Southern Conservatives, and the Prohibition of Sex Discrimination in Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act

Abstract

TITLE VII OF THE 1964 CwI RIGHTS ACT PROHIBITED DISCRIMNAtion in employment on basis of sex as well as on bases of race, color, religion, and national origin. This prohibition was added to civil rights bill through an amendment on floor of House of Representatives by Howard Worth Smith of Virginia, an ardent opponent of legislation as a whole. Because his motives in proposing amendment were questionable, because of occasionally facetious tone of debate on amendment, and because women's rights were generally not taken seriously then, prohibition of sex discrimination originally tended to be lightly regarded, even after it became law. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), established by Title VII to administer law against employment discrimination, initially treated ban on sex discrimination as something of a joke. Others, however, did not. In first two years of enforcement, over four thousand charges of sex discrimination were lodged, representing roughly one-quarter of all complaints. EEOC's languid record of enforcement precipitated formation of National Organization for Women in 1966, an important institutional development in birth of women's rights movement. Pressure from this and other groups and individuals, along with a changing consciousness about sex roles, led in time to more rigorous enforcement and generally sympathetic court rulings. By 1975 legal experts on women's rights could aptly characterize Title VII the most comprehensive and important of all federal and state laws prohibiting employment discrimination. 1