Title VII Paper

Today’s employment practices were defined by the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The law sanction in the year 1964 bans discrimination in employment based on religion, national origin, race, color, or gender. From the beginning, Title VII has advanced the laws regarding anti-discrimination. The laws are intended to “promote fairness, equality, and opportunity within the workplace” (Bennett-Alexander & Hartman, 2003, p. 5). This paper will reflect on the history and evolution of Title VII and observe its impact in the working environment. This paper will also recognize the people who are protected under the Title VII act. The paper will conclude with reviewing the policies and procedures any business should have implemented to minimize Title VII claims of violations.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was voted and approved soon after the March on Washington event. It was the largest march in the United States history and citizens of all colors and race pull together to demonstrate to the legislature no longer will racism be tolerated in the United States culture. The Title VII section of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was implemented to prohibit discrimination within the workforce. Rapidly, the Title VII laws became a vital arbitrator of rights (Bennett-Alexander & Hartman, 2001 p 115). Ever since the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Title VII were passed the working environment has significantly changed. There are more minorities and women employees than ever before. Title VII offered protection against discrimination within the work place for people of all religion, national origin, race, color, or gender. This created the foundation to promoted fairness in employment and also provided an opportunity to supply protection against discrimination based on age and disability (Bennett-Alexander & Hartman, 2001. P 117).

Since 1964, the Title VII laws were improved and amended several times. The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA) was passed by congress to protect persons between the age of 40 and 65 years from employment discrimination.

A version of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act was vetoed by Congress approximately 3 years earlier (www.eeoc.gov). The Title VII act was amended again in the year of 1972 to include the Equal Employment Opportunity Act. The Equal Employment Opportunity Act pledged identical opportunities for all of human kind. A year later in 1973, the Rehabilitation Act was passed. The Rehabilitation Act banned the U.S. Federal Government from being discriminative towards eligible persons with disabilities.

Three years after the Rehabilitation Act was passed, in the year of 1976, the Supreme Court ruled in the case of General Electric Co. v. Gilbert, that health insurance coverage for disability for employees in regards to illnesses or accidents, but not for pregnancy did not add up to sex discrimination under Title VII (www.eeoc.gov). However, two years later in 1978, Congress revised Title VII by approving the Pregnancy Discrimination Act. The Pregnancy Discrimination Act stated that discrimination based on pregnancy is illegal sex discrimination. Supreme Court’s Gilbert decision in 1976 was reversed because of this legislation. Several Supreme Court decisions rendered in the 1980s were overturned because of the Civil Rights Act of 1991 passed by Congress (www.eeoc.gov).

References

Bennett-Alexander and Hartman. (2001). Employment Law for Business

New York: McGraw-Hill Primis Custom Publishing.

http://www.eeoc.gov/facts/fs-race.html. Retrieved from the World Wide Web on

February 26, 2005.