The function of the survey was to determine the majority-minority relations in industry in an attempt to discern the nature and extent of the minority problem in Minneapolis economic life.

The information upon which the full report is based was obtained principally from questionnaires mailed to employers and trade-union locals; from personal interviews with employers, local trade-union officials, individual wage earners, and from public and private agencies concerned with industrial relations in the city of Minneapolis.

While conditions here are probably not substantially different from those to be found in other northern cities of comparable size, there are important points which ought to be brought to the attention of the public.

EDUCATION AND TRAINING OF WORKERS

(1) That of the group surveyed, the Jewish and Negro employees have a higher median average of basic schooling (years 1-12, nonvocational) than do while Gentile employees.

(2) That the attainment of a given occupational level by a member of a minority group required a proportionately higher educational achievement as the intensity of the feeling against a minority group increased. Thus, the educational attainment, to achieve a given occupational level, for Negroes must be greatest, for Jews somewhat less, and for Nisei, the least of the minorities studied.

(3) That the proportion of white Gentile workers having trade or business education was larger than that of Jews or Negroes, though over 80 percent of all three groups had not had any such training.

(4) That through the war production training program, both in number of jobs trained for and promotions based upon such training, proportionately, the Negro workers reporting ranked highest, the Jewish group next, and white Gentiles third. Yet this has not been reflected in a significant change in occupational status of the minorities relative to the majority in the postwar pattern as of the end of 1946.

(5) Even when facilities for vocational training are available to the minorities, they sometimes lack the incentive to train because of the prospect that they cannot get jobs and wage rates available to white Gentiles with similar qualifications. The Negro feels this more keenly than Jews or Japanese-Americans.

(6) Some form of training was offered its employees by 90 percent of the firms reporting; but between one-third to one-half of those hiring the minorities gave them no training.

(7) While about one-third of the unions offered apprenticeship training, it was not a significant source of vocational training for the minorities. Only from 5 to 18 percent of the unions had the minorities in their training programs. Negroes fared worst and Jews best among the minorities in such programs.

(8) War production training experience in Minneapolis during World War II demonstrated that minorities, like white Gentiles, will respond to vocational training opportunities when they have a reasonable prospect of employment at the skills learned at standard wage rates and an opportunity for promotion in keeping with their training and efficiency on the job. However, it was too limited in duration and content to be directly transferable to normal peacetime jobs.

EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES FOR MINORITIES

(1) The wide difference between kinds of jobs held by white Gentiles and minority groups has prevailed over a long period, and at the time of this study, showed little sign of change. However, since that time some progress has been made in opening job opportunities, particularly for Negroes, in department-store clerking. Nevertheless, this difference between the kinds of jobs held by white Gentiles and minority groups is strong evidence that minority status is important in Minneapolis in the selection of workers for jobs. The Jewish group has remained concentrated in clerical and sales jobs; Negroes in nonmanufacturing service jobs of the lower and less desirable levels.

(2) Jews face obstacles in industrial employment, like Negroes and JapaneseAmericans, though higher levels are open to them than to the other minorities studied.

(3) The presence of a substantial group of Jewish employers provides one special field of job opportunities open to Jewish workers. This is a situation not typical of other minorities.

(4) The present position of the minority groups as compared with that of white Gentiles is a little different from that held in 1940. However, they have shared with wage earners generally the improved economic status which has accompanied rapidly expanding industrial activity during the period 1940 to 1947. (5) The community at large, as well as industry, is deprived of the full productive potential of minority groups as workers through:

(a) inequalities of opportunity for training.

(b) established practices of discriminatory labor recruitment.

(c) discouraging of technically qualified individuals whose opportunities for advancement are limited by their race, creed, color, or national origin. burdened with the resultant social costs of such inequitable treatment.

(6) One of the most serious and yet most elusive obstacles to the fair employment of minorities is discriminatory practices of recruitment agencies. The elimination of such practices depends, finally, upon the action of employers since they control the channels of recruitment through which the great majority of workers are employed and also have the final right to accept or reject applicants from any such agency.

However, the employment agency forms the initial contact between the employer and prospective employee and is thus in a strategic position to either promote or discourage fair employment practices. In many cases these agencies can assist in the process of educating employers to the advantages of nondiscriminatory personnel practices.

UTILIZATION OF MINORITIES

Users v. nonusers.-Of 523 firms reporting prior to January 1, 1947, the following percentages of firms hired the listed combinations of minority group people: 63 percent hired no Jews, Negroes, or Japanese-Americans; 37 percent hired one or more Jews, Negroes and/or Japanese-Americans; 13 percent hired Jews only; 5 percent hired Negroes only; 2 percent hired Japanese-Americans only; 9 percent hired Jews and Negroes; 3 percent hired Jews and Japanese-Americans; 1 percent hired Negroes and Japanese-Americans; 3 percent hired Jews, Negroes, and Japanese-Americans.

Of 340 manufacturing firms responding, 39 percent hired and 61 percent did not hire one or more Jews, Negroes, or Japanese-Americans; 163 nonmanufacturing firms responding, 31 percent hired the minorities while 69 percent did not. The following percentages of firms in the listed main industry groups in 1947 employed one or more members of the minorities studied:

Textile and apparel_.

Machinery---.

Wholesale and retail trades___

Printing, publishing, and paper manufacturing group_

Planing mill, furniture, and other wood products__

Personal services_.

Iron, steel, nonferrous metals, etc_-_

Food and kindred products---.

Finance, insurance, banks, and real estate_

Transportation, communication, and utilities_

Percent

88

46

40

39

37

36

32

28

24

18

On the basis of 1947 experience, in all main industry groups except textiles and apparels, members of the minorities can expect employment in less than one-half of the firms.

Distribution of users.—Of 184 firms responding that they do employ the minorities, 72 percent were in the manufacturing industries and 28 percent were in non-manufacturing service industries.

Size of firm.-The average size firm in Minneapolis is small (28 employees); that of firms not employing the minorities is even smaller (20 employees); while those employing minorities are concentrated among the larger-than-average-size establishments (55 employees). The 40 percent of all firms which employed the minorities, numbered among their labor force 80 percent of the estimated total employees.

Occupational distribution.—Of the three minorities studied, a qualified Negro was most narrowly restricted as to the occupational levels he might expect to reach; the Japanese-American was somewhat less restricted; and the Jew had the best opportunity, though he too suffered real limitations, particularly in the upper occupational levels. Of the firms employing the minorities, 48 percent of

those employing Negroes, 13 percent employing Japanese-Americans, and 10 percent employing Jews, respectively, used them at the unskilled labor level.

Period of utilization.-In point of tenure as industrial workers in Minneapolis, the Jewish minority is the oldest and most stable of the three while the Negro and Japanese-American groups are younger and their status in industry more uncertain and unstable. About 75 percent of the present employers of Jews had them on their pay rolls prior to January 1, 1942. However, 60 percent of those hiring Negroes and 80 percent of those hiring Japanese-Americans employed them since January 1, 1942.

MINORITIES AND UNIONS

The union and minority adjustment.-The discriminatory treatment of the minorities by unions has an important effect upon industrial relations. Failure to accord equal treatment and rights to all workers may result in intergroup tension and disharmony which leads to low levels of productiveness. Furthermore, in order to maintain internal strength and stability, which is essential to effective collective bargaining, it is important that unions adopt and maintain a policy of representing with equal vigor all of its members.

Significance of minorities in union locals. Of the sample studied, 62 percent of the Negroes, 59 percent of the white gentiles, and 51 percent of the Jews belonged to a union.

While a larger percentage of Negroes than Jews were union members, the Jewish group was more widely diffused among the unions, e. g. 72 percent of the locals had Jewish members and 62 percent had Negroes.

Negro and Japanese-American workers had membership in labor organizations in proportion to (Negro) or more than proportionately to (Japanese-American) their numbers in the total population, while Jewish memberships were less than proportional to their memberships in unions respectively; and was proportionately larger than that of their white gentile brothers.

Membership status.-The overwhelming majority of reporting union locals did not officially deny membership right to Jews, Negroes, or Japanese-Americans. But most of the locals whose parent internationals maintain a discriminatory policy with regard to one or more of these minorities did not reply. Because these are concentrated among the highly skilled craft unions which exercise close control over the hiring and training of workers in their crafts, their practices seriously limit both the immediate and the long-range employment opportunities of the minorities.

Participation.-Of all union locals reporting (in 1947) the minorities were judged average or above average on the basis, respectively, of 10 standards of a good union member in the following percentage of locals: Jews, between 94 and 97 percent of the locals; Negroes, between 93 and 100 percent of the locals; Japanese-Americans between 80 and 100 percent of the locals.

Of all union locals reporting on participation of the minorities in union affairs, 23 percent had Jewish, and 15 percent had Negro officers; 19 percent had Jewish and 10 percent had Negro board members.

Minority policy and its implementation.-Eighty percent or more of the union locals reporting felt that the three minorities were beneficial to the success of the labor movement of Minneapolis, and about 80 percent indicated that they were making some effort to educate their memberships to the acceptance of a policy of equal work opportunity for all members. However, a sizable number of locals was noncommittal on such matters.

Education and persuasion through talks and discussions in meetings and through the distribution of antidiscrimination literature constituted the most generally used union methods of promoting fair employment practices; efforts to enact antidiscrimination clauses in the local constitutions and to gain their inclusion by employers in union-management contracts were next in importance. Specific machinery for enforcing the avowed nondiscriminatory policy was found to be rare. Only 6 percent of the locals reporting had antidiscrimination committees or their equivalent.

A substantial majority of the locals expressed a willingness to foster fair employment practices by refraining from giving aid and comfort to recalcitrant employers or to rebellious members of their rank-and-file membership whose actions contributed to discriminatory patterns of minority utilization. However, whereas between 90 and 100 percent of the unions reporting were willing to cooperate with employees who wished to convert their employment practices to a nondiscriminatory pattern, only between 65 and 70 percent of them were certain

that they would persuade white members to accept such a policy when this group expressed open opposition to it.

RECOMMENDATIONS

The committee makes the following recommendations:

(1) That educational programs in human relations be encouraged and initiated by employers and recruitment agencies; that educational programs in human relations now sponsored by labor organizations be expanded in scope, participation and intensity.

(2) That members of minority groups be encouraged to follow vocational, business or academic training for which they are best qualified.

(3) That vocational counselors recommend to those whom they counsel, training in the field of employment in which the individual shows the greatest aptitude without reference to the counselee's race, color, creed, or national origin.

(4) That apprenticeship courses and employer training courses be open to all workers on an equal basis.

(5) That sound State fair employment practices legislation, with enforcement powers, be enacted and judiciously administered.

(6) That the Minneapolis Fair Employment Practices Ordinance as amended October 29, 1948 be given wide publicity as to its contents and purposes; further that employers, unions and recruitment agencies be fully informed as to its progress to the end that the public as a whole will give its wholehearted support to the ordinance and its effective administration.

(7) That the activities of the Joint Committee on Employment Opportunities be made known to the public and full public support for the work of this committee be sought in a further effort to open up new job opportunities for the minorities.

(8) That unions and employers jointly agree to place some stipulation in collective bargaining contracts through which both parties recognize the unfairness of discriminatory practices based on race, creed, color or national origin and agree that no discrimination shall at any time be permitted to exist in the particular plant, company or industry for which a contract is being negotiated.

Bradshaw Mintener, chairman; Stuart Leck, Alfred Wilson, George
Prouty, John Sherman, Walter Feldman, Arthur Randall, Neil
Cronin, Thomas Vennum, Cameron W. Elliott, Kenneth Emanuel-
son, Clarence Benson, Douglas Hall, George Johnson, Oscar
Winger, George McDonald, Rubin Latz, Norman Carle, Ernest
Donaghue, William Seabron, Judge E. F. Waite, Hubert Schon,
Funio Hangai, members.

Mr. KANE. Within the past 2 months, the Ohio State Employment Service reported that two out of every five job openings referred to its offices openly bore discriminatory specifications. A survey of employment opportunities for Jews in public accounting in Cincinnati revealed that the 15 largest public accounting firms employing a total of 286 accountants have only three Jewish employees, and have employed a total of only 11 Jews over the 30 years.

The Michigan State Employment Service reported as of May 1948, that "about three-quarters of recent job listings for unskilled workers were not open to nonwhite workers." This report is cited in a memorandum prepared by the Michigan Committee on Civil Rights. The same memorandum cites a survey made among employment agencies by the Jewish Community Council of Detroit, which elicited the information that most banks and trust companies hired only white Christians. Other surveys cited indicated that many areas of employment were virtually closed to foreign-born, Catholics and others. Despite a severe labor shortage in Detroit, employers refused to employ qualified nonwhite workers.

According to an official publication of the United States Employment Service (Labor Market Information, August 1948):

One of the key factors limiting expansion of Detroit's industrial machine has been the inability to achieve maximum utilization of labor reserves. While the

total number of job seekers appears adequate to meet the labor demand, hiring specifications have cut sharply into the "employability" of certain workers' groups.

Here is the most direct possible testimony to the depressing effect upon industrial efficiency of minority discrimination in employment. On the opening day of these hearings, Representative Clare Hoffman of Michigan testified that there was no significant amount of employment discrimination in his State, and he asserted, presumably from personal observation, that there was virtually no such discrimination in his own district. As for conditions in the State of Michigan as a whole the statement of the Congressman must be weighed against the facts which I have just cited from impartial official sources. As to conditions in the Congressman's own district, it would be most extraordinary indeed if of all the State of Michigan, that corner which has chosen Mr. Hoffman to represent it should be free of discrimination in employment-the more so since in the city of Lansing, the State capital, and within an hour's motoring time from the eastern boundary of Mr. Hoffman's district, the Lansing chapter of the Michigan Committee on Civil Rights in January 1948 found what it calls the following "amazing situation":

No stores have employed colored clerks or office help. No offices have hired colored secretaries or stenographers, or bank tellers or cashiers. No restaurants have hired colored waiters, or theaters ushers or ticket sellers. There are no colored bus drivers. No municipal office or department has employed a colored person for any other purpose than janitors or maintenance. Only two factories have one colored salaried employee each. When employers were asked the reasons for this discrimination they were very frank to say that it was because of color.

In a report on segregation in Washington, the National Committee on Segregation in the Nation's Capital has revealed the shocking extent of all forms of racial discrimination here in this very city, the seat of our National Government. Here are but a few points in the indict

ment:

Negroes are excluded from most skilled trades by the craft unions, and from whole industries by management policy. In retail trade, utilities, communications, and transportation, they have little chance. The telephone company employs no colored mechanics or linemen. The big department stores deny Negro women a chance to become clerks-even one large bargain store whose customers are two-thirds Negro. In 1940, three-quarters of all Negro jobholders were employed as laborers, domestics, or service workers while only one-eighth of white employees were in these categories. Even in the city government, a Negro cannot get a job as a water-meter reader, a building inspector, a weights-andmeasure inspector, or as a guard in a jail.

In view of these and other equally lamentable facts, it is a source of especial gratification that H. R. 4453 specifically extends the coverage of the legislation to the District of Columbia.

During the war and the period of high employment which followed it, many members of minority groups found employment in jobs which had previously been closed to them. However, now that employment is beginning to decline, the long-established principle of last hired, first fired has come into play. Its effects are clearly evident in the statistics on initial claims for unemployment insurance during the early weeks of the present year. Those statistics show a national increase in claims of about 20 percent, as compared to increases ranging from 85 percent to 200 percent in the 12 Southern States in which the majority of the Nation's Negroes live and work.