LCCR Celebrates Civil Rights Division Anniversary by Looking Forward
Feature Story by Christina Stanley - 9/19/2007
The Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice, the entity that has been the foundation of much progress in equal treatment under the law, celebrates its 50th anniversary this year.
The Department has come under considerable scrutiny over the past few months. A number of high-ranking Department of Justice officials have resigned, including Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Wan Kim, after months of hearings into the extent to which the Department's work has become politicized.
In a report entitled "Long Road to Justice: The Civil Rights Division at 50," the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights Education Fund (LCCREF) examines the history of the Division and proposes recommendations to restore the Division's effectiveness and a return to its original mission.
Wade Henderson, president and CEO of LCCR, highlighted several of the report's recommendations in his September 5 testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the anniversary of the 1957 Civil Rights Act. "Members of the Committee, today you begin a process that is long overdue—a process that will … [create] a roadmap for our way back to vigorous enforcement, integrity, and justice," said Henderson of the Congressional effort to assess the current state of the Civil Rights Division.
On September 9, 1957, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1957, which created the Civil Rights Division within the Department of Justice. Since then, the Division has been at the forefront of ensuring equal justice under the law, from spearheading the fight to end school segregation to promoting racial, ethnic, and gender diversity and prosecuting hate crimes.
The reports' recommendations focus on three main areas of concern: a sharp decline in the total number of cases prosecuted by Division attorneys, changes in the Division's civil rights enforcement priorities, and recent politicization of the attorney hiring process.
Under the Bush Administration, the Division filed an average of only six Title VII employment cases per year since 2000, compared to an average of 17 per year during the first two years of the Clinton Administration.
In perhaps the most drastic policy change in recent years, the Department of Justice announced in 2003 that it would stop filing disparate impact cases involving housing discrimination. These cases gave individuals a platform from which to fight all practices that result in discrimination, even if there was no discriminatory intent.
This reverses decades of policy aimed at stringent civil rights enforcement. To address these rollbacks, the report recommends a return to vigorous enforcement of existing civil rights laws and an expansion of authority under the Fair Housing Act.
Henderson said that the controversial firing of four career section chiefs and two deputy chiefs is an area in which the Division has particularly faltered in recent years. "[T]he Civil Rights Division must restore its reputation as the place for the very best and brightest lawyers who are committed to equal opportunity and equal justice," said Henderson. "That is not politics; it is civil rights enforcement."
LCCREF's report was accompanied by the launch of a new campaign website, ReclaimCivilRights.org, devoted to raising public awareness about the importance of robust federal civil rights enforcement.
