Supreme Court Asked to Review Waters v. Wisconsin Steel Works Case

    Distribution: Waters v.} isconsin Steel release dated 2/25/75 

1. Release & Copy of Cert delivered 2/24 to John B.Oakes (Editor, 

The New York Times) at suggestion of Ernest Holsendolph, and 

mailed 2/24 to: 

. Jack Landau, Newhouse National News Service 

. Jack MacKenzie, Washington Post 

. S.d.Micciche, Boston Globe News Bureau, Washington 

- Jim Hyatt, Wall Street Journal, Washington 
. Grant Dillman, Washiggton Bureau Mgr, UPI 

. Marvin Arrowsmithk Bashington Bureau Chief, AP 
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. San Francisco Chronicle (Washington) 
Detroit Free Press (Washington 

Release mailed to 20 black press (2/24) 

2. Release distribtted over PR Newswire to Eastern Seaboard outlets (2/25) 

Release & Copy of Cert hand delivered (2/25) to: 

Bob Semple, national news desk, The New York Times 

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Jerry Fobtlick, Newsweek 

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Release Mailed to(2/25) 

43 

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William Raspberry, Washington Post 



From: Norman Bloomfield 
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund 
10 Columbus Circle 
New York, N.Y. 10019 

(212) 586-8397 

Contact: Barry Goldstein or Mike Baller 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 

NEW YORK, N.Y., Feb. 25 - The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational 

Fund has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review the fundamental issue of 

job layoffs and job recalls based on the widely used "last hired, first 

fired" principle, it was announced today by Jack Greenberg, the fund's 

director-counsel. 

The case, Waters v. Wisconsin Steel Works, concerns an Appellate 

Court decision in Chicago which last August held that district courts do 

not have the discretion or power to deal with layoffs which stem from 

seniority systems, even where such systems perpetuate past discrimination 

against blacks and give preferential treatment to whites. 

The Seventh Circuit's ruling overturned a district court decision 

of May, 1973 which upheld charges brought by two black bricklayers against 

the Wisconsin Steel Works of International Harvester Co. and the United 

Order of American Briceagere/seone Masons, Local 21. 

In that ruling, the district court upheld the plaintiffs’ allega- 

tions that, prior to April 1964, the company hired only white bricklayers, 

and that after 1964, it gave preferential treatment to those hired during 

the "white only" period. The court concluded that such preferential treatment, 

including job recall rights, had a discriminatory impact. 

Since the record revealed that the seniority system and hiring 

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policies were discriminatory, the district court ruled that company and 

union employment practices violated the law -- that the defendants’ 

seniority system was not a "bona fide" system under Title VII of the Civil 

Rights Act of 1964. 

Commenting on the Legal Defense Fund's petition to the high court, 

Mr. Greenberg noted: "The case arises from the practice of hiring blacks 

last when employment is rising and firing blacks first when the work force 

is reduced. The problem has long obstructed economic opportunity for blacks, 

and is one reason for the chronically higher level of unemployment among 

non-whites." 

NOTE TO EDITOR: ‘The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund is a 

completely separate organization, even though originally 

established by the NAACP in 1939. Our correct designation is 

NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., frequently 

shortened to Legal Defense Fund. The organization has a 

national staff and headquarters in New York City, and 

works with 400 cooperating attorneys throughout the country.