Oversight Hearing Addresses Politicization of the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division
Feature Story by Tyler Lewis - 3/28/2007
Civil rights leaders warned of a troubling shift in the Justice Department's commitment to civil rights at a March 22 House oversight hearing.
Testifying before the House Subcommittee on the Constitution, which has oversight over the DOJ's Civil Rights Division, Wade Henderson, president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the nation's largest and oldest civil rights coalition, said: "Over the last six years, we have seen politics trump substance and alter the prosecution of our nation's civil rights laws in many parts of the Division."
In 2006, DOJ's Civil Rights Division brought only six housing discrimination cases, compared to 20 in 2006. Four career section chiefs and two Deputy Chiefs in the Division have been forced out of their jobs.
"If the rule of law is to have any meaning, if the civil rights laws this Committee produces are to have any value, then we must be assured that those laws will be enforced without fear or favor," said Chairman Jerrod Nadler, D. N.Y., in his opening statement.
Created in 1957, the purpose of the DOJ's Civil Rights Division was to act as the primary guardian of American's civil rights.
But some witnesses testified that conflict between Bush appointees and career attorneys has been so bad that it has damaged career attorneys' morale.
Joe Rich, a 37-year veteran of the Division, said morale is so low that 54 percent of the attorneys in the voting section and 64 percent of attorneys in the employment section have left, transferred to other sections, or gone on details since April 2005.
"Given the passions that civil rights enforcement generates, there has always been potential for conflict between political appointees…and the stable ranks of career attorneys," said Rich.
Rich said that the conflict between appointees and career attorneys in the past was usually diffused by "vigorous debate…with [each] learning from the other," but now "there appeared to be a conscious effort [by political appointees] to remake the Division's career staff."
Witnesses also testified that legitimate civil rights cases have not been brought and the "honors program" for hiring attorneys – which ensures that the Division recruits the best lawyers in the country on civil rights – has been abandoned in favor of a more politicized hiring process.
William L. Taylor, chairman of the Citizens' Commission on Civil Rights recommended that Congress create a select committee in both chambers to conduct a two-year review of the Division's enforcement of civil rights laws.
"This is a tall order, but we believe that the dire circumstances of civil rights enforcement compel such steps," said Taylor. "As our society grows more diverse, strong civil rights laws are essential."
