Introduction
Can a municipality disregard the results of a civil exam? The answer should be no. New Haven municipality should not disregard the results of a promotion test based on the fact that the exam yielded many qualified applicants from one race, and not enough of the minority since the exam was race-neutral. The municipal was not supposed to ignore the results because the exam was crafted by a professional body that ensured there was no bias towards any race but it focused on their knowledge regarding fire fighting.
History of the case
In November and December 2003 New Haven fire department conducted a racial free promotion test. The test was to fill seven captains and eight lieutenants’ positions. The department had authorized a company in Illinois IO solutions, to design a racial free promotion exam. Io solutions performed their task are required in designing a race-neutral promotion exam. The New Havens three rule stipulated that the three topmost scorers in a test only one of them would fill the vacancy. When the promotion exam results were out the whites scored higher than the blacks and Hispanics. In the captain’s test, the first person from the minority to score highly was in position six followed by another in position eight. The results would have enabled at least two Hispania in the rank of captain while the rest being whites. The lieutenant’s posts would all have been taken up by the whites since the first person from the minority was in position fourteen. Leaders in the New Haven council refused to endorse the names of the qualified candidates thereby making the results of the race-neutral exam invalid (Adversity.net. 2009).
After the 1991 civil rights act new court ruling brought a new dimension in the order of employment and promotion. A precedent set by the Supreme Court put any program incorporating racial or affirmative principle needed to undergo stringent inquiry. The federal law against discrimination was in good faith in helping employers voluntarily help the minority but did not compel them to always incorporate the minority. New Haven council, therefore, was not obliged to incorporate racial principles because the test had been scrutinized by the designing company and was not race-biased (Spicer, R, and Spicer, 1995).
The firefighters were justified to be entitled to the promotions because if there was one race or there were no minority promotion would have proceeded without any delay, thus the white firefighters had been discriminated against. Since the test was occupationally related there would be no reason to bring the issue of race as the disregarding factor. The positions at hand required very highly skilled personnel and declining to promote those who had scored highly would undermine the high standards required in carrying out the designated tasks.
The New Haven municipality was not justified in disregarding the civil service exam because, in the case of Dallas v. Dallas firefighters association of 1998, the final ruling was in favor of those who rightfully qualified for a certain post. In 1988 Dallas city council came up with a personnel policy that gave priority to women and minority people over the whites who had scored higher in the promotional test. At the time women were 15% of the driver-engineer position while the minority was 3% of the lieutenant position. The decision was a result of past prejudice that the council had accented to in1976. By 1992 women comprised 23% and minority personnel comprised 18% of drivers and lieutenants respectively. The council wanted to further extend the proposal for another five years. Dallas firefighters association and individual firefighters filed a suit against the council for discriminating against some of them. The district court ruled in favor of the association and firefighters based on the grounds that the council did not show any convincing reasons and there was no proof of past discrimination. After launching an appeal, the Supreme Court did not contrast the decision of the district court citing that the program was discriminating the white firefighters (Shafritz et al, 2007)
The type of examination administered to the firefighter was an assembled examination. Unlike unassembled exams that assess a candidate’s background, assembled examination accesses the potential of an individual in carrying out a particular job. A lawsuit was filed by Michael Briscoe that contends the writing part is prejudiced against blacks. The suit is from the thought that blacks do not perform well in written exams, of which there is no evidence toward these allegations. Since the firefighters knew the exam as was an assembled exam, the ones from the minority should have put extra effort and read thoroughly to lift up their performance.
The exam sat comprised 60% written and 40% oral. The oral part was meant to increase the chances for the minority groups in passing. This kind of arrangement was part of ensuring fairness in an effort to counter-cultural bias. Such exam setup has been criticized since it does not focus on an individual’s background. Fairness is implied because minorities are outnumbered by the majority. The difference in exam performance or results is directly related to differences between the group’s ability and cognitive skills. The exam can be said to be valid since it met the entire validity criterion. However this issue of including an oral part in the exam was not contested; if they had raised the issued more weight to win the case would have been on their side as the chances of the minority scoring low was well catered for (Spicer, R, and Spicer, 1995).
In Ricci v DeStefano the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the plaintiff. This means that the municipality was not supposed to disregard the test results. The ruling statement stated that the firemen were victims of racial discrimination and that the decision for the municipality to use “raw statistics” violated Title VII Civil Rights Act of 1991. The municipality would have gone ahead and promoted the firemen even though they would face legal suits from the minority. The ruling did not harmonize laws relating to employment; wherein one warns on employers using racial principles while hiring while the other advocates for them to take racism into account. This implies that the municipality should have looked into the matter of racism thoroughly. The court also found out that the municipality’s claim that adopting the results would have brought a disparate impact was not strongly supported (Dorf, 2009).
New Haven council should not have been guided by the racial results in canceling the promotions. It caused some harm to those who qualified for the positions because they had spent a lot of time and resources while preparing. Many had studied for months, bought textbooks, audio and visual material to help them improve their performance. Others incurred expenses through travel to libraries in search of reading materials (Adversity.net. 2009).
The firefighters were justified to be appointed to the vacant positions based on the fact that the municipality had provided equal opportunity to the candidates. They all had sat similar exams that discriminated none of them. All the candidates knew how to read and write, they all had been under formal training regarding firefighting and all were aware of the firefighting guidelines applied in New Haven. This shows that none of the candidates had a competitive advantage over the others (Cohn, 2000).
Finally, the case of Ricci v. DeStefano has not solved the conflicting ideology between protectionism against racism or any other differences, and the one requiring employers not to make employment decisions based on racial principles. It also provides precedence that municipalities and other organizations should not fall for the advocacy of quotas but should instead focus on designing the hiring practices that are justified and do not violate equal and protection principles. Based on the reasons provided above, New Haven municipality was not justified in disregarding the promotion exam that was crafted to be race-neutral on the grounds that the exam yielded many qualified applicants of one race and not enough of the other.
Reference
Adversity.net (2009). Case 50: New Haven Refused to Promote Firefighters Who Scored Highest on Exam. Web.
Cohn S. (2000). Race, Gender, and Discrimination at Work. Boulder: West view Press.
Dorf, M. C. (2009) The Supreme Court Decides the New Haven Firefighter Case. Web.
Shafritz, J. M., Riccucci, N. M. & Naff, K. C. (2007). Personnel management in government: politics and process (6th Ed). London: Taylor and Francis.
Spicer, R. & Spicer, L. (1995). Race Discrimination at Work. London: XPL Publishing.