LDF Charges Collusion Between Bethlehem Steel and AFL-CIO in Discrimination Case

    Press Release B me {. 

May 27, 1971 
For Immediate Release 

LDF CHARGES COLLUSION BETWEEN BETHLEHEM STEEL 
AND AFL-CIO IN DISCRIMINATION CASE 

Baltimore, Md. --- In a class action suit brought on 

behalf of black employees of the Bethlehem Steel Corporation's 

Baltimore operation, attorneys for the NAACP Legal Defense and 

Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF) have charged collaboration between 

Bethlehem Steel and AFL-CIO Steelworkers unions in efforts to 

keep blacks confined to lower job classifications and poorer 

paying jobs. 

The complaint, filed yesterday (5/26) in the U.S. District 

Court for the District of Maryland, names as defendants the 

Bethlehem Steel Corporation, United Steelworkers of America, its 

locals 2609 and 2610, as well as the AFL-CIO. It charges violations 

of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the National Labor Relations Act 

and lists more than 30 practices in use at Bethlehem Steel which 

discriminate against black employees. They include: 

* maintenance of racially segregated departments and units where 

blacks are restricted to lower paying and less desirable jobs, 

discriminatory denial to black employees of jobs, promotions or 

transfers to higher level and more desirable jobs, including 

clerical and supervisory positions, 

outright refusal to permit blacks to transfer to certain units, 

use of tests which are: not professionally developed; culturally 

biased; lack correlation between test performance and job 

performance; generally required only for transfer or promotion 

out of minority job classes or departments, 

continued -- 

NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, Inc. | 10 Columbus Circle | New York, N.Y. 10019 | (212) 586-8397 

William T. Coleman, Jr. - President Jack Greenberg - Director-Counsel 



BETHLEHEM STEEL SUIT PAGE TWO 

* refusal to allow blacks to take tests for promotion unless 

recommended by a supervisor, 

* refusal to give black employees on-the-job training for the 

tests which whites normally receive, as well as refusal to 

inform blacks of transfer rights and advancement opportunities 

* use of a departmental system of seniority, which penalizes 

long-tenured blacks who receive transfers into whiter departments 

* transfer of whites from white units to supervisory levels in 

black units, even when blacks within the units have more 

seniority, 

* discrimination in the application of health and safety standards, 

* discrimination againstblack employees in the dispensing of 

vacation pay, retirement, sick and supplemental unemployment 

benefits, 

* harassment of blacks who speak out against racial discrimination. 

The LDF suit also charges that the AFL-CIO, its union and 

locals have failed to protect their black members from Bethlehem 

Steel's discriminatory policies and practices and have refused to 

negotiate their elimination. The complaint describes the actions 

of all defendants as wilful, intentional and malicious. 

Working on the case are three LDF cooperating attorneys, 

Kenneth L. Johnson, Gerald Smith, and Charles Josey, all of 

Baltimore, and Jack Greenberg and William Robinson of the LDF's 

New York headquarters. 

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For further information contact: Attorney William Robinson or 
Sandy O'Gorman (Public Information 
212-586-8397 

NOTE: Please bear in mind that the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational 
Fund, Inc. is a completely separate and distinct organization, 
even though we were established by the NAACP and retain those 
initials in our name. Our correct designation is NAACP Legal 
Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., frequently shortened to LDF.