There is a great need for people who can teach the English language as a second language and people who need to be trained in the Spanish language to carry on certain job skills.

One of the very interesting programs is one with regard to offenders who are serving in the State penitentiary in Joliet, Ill., and a number of the inmates unfortunately are Spanish speaking and they have very limited opportunities for training there except that there is an ongoinng program now to train in the Spanish language.

I think probably the only question that I wanted to ask in that respect is this: Is there any bar or any limitation on employment under civil service regulations or practices, which discriminates against exoffenders, whether Spanish speaking or English speaking or some other language?

Mr. KATOR. NO, Mr. McClory, all persons are subject to review and investigation as to their background, but ex-offenders as such are not disqualified. As a matter of fact, we have an on-going program where we absorb offenders into the Federal Government while they are still serving their term in order to try to move them into society.

We look at each case on an individual basis.

Mr. McCLORY. So you do give job opportunities in this rehabilitation process and you do not discriminate against them. If they serve their time they have paid their debt to society in the sense that you cooperate in trying to make them law abiding and self-supporting respected citizens?

Mr. KATOR. That is right. It would, of course, depend on the job that the individual was being looked at for. But the fact he was an exoffender would not in and of itself disqualify him.

On the application form we ask only for convictions. We eliminated the question on arrest which often happens with other groups. Mr. MCCLORY. Thank you very much.

Mr. EDWARDS. The gentleman from New York, Mr. Sandman. Mr. SANDMAN. Is conviction of a felony a bar to Federal employment?

Mr. KATOR. No: except in case of treason.

Mr. SANDMAN. You say your forms no longer delve into whether or not the person was ever arrested, but I understand from what you answered of Mr. McClory, they do ask if you have ever been convicted of a crime?

Mr. KATOR. Right.

Mr. SANDMAN. And of course the gravity of the crime, I assume, has something to do with whether or not he is hired?

Mr. KATOR. Very much.

Mr. SANDMAN. If a person were convicted of embezzlement he certainly would have some bar to being employed in some area where he is going to handle Government money.

Mr. KATOR. Yes; I tried to indicate that.

Mr. SANDMAN. So there is some bar.

Mr. KATOR. Yes: it would depend on the job where he would work. Mr. SANDMAN. I was very interested in some of the remarks in your statement here that you made such strides in employing minority groups even though Federal employment has declined over a period of years.

Now, you may have answered this question before. I came in late. But I would like to know, was this accomplished at the sacrifice of any other kind of group?

Mr. KATOR. We don't think so, Mr. Sandman. We think what we have done is remove certain barriers and opened up opportunities. In looking at the total number and percentage of minority people in the Federal Government, we like to take pride in some recent progress. The overall figure has not changed substantially in many years. It is now 19.5 and 3 or 4 years ago it was probably 19 percent.

I think I have these figures. Within the last 10 or 15 years we have certainly had a large total number of minority people within the Federal Government. They have largely, in the past, however, and this is now changing, been concentrated in our lower grade levels. This is one effort we are trying to change that particular pattern.

Mr. SANDMAN. Your objective, I take it, is still to hire the best person for the job regardless of any kind of nationality, race, color or creed.

Mr. KATOR. Absolutely. We want to hire the best qualified and we want to make sure we have no barriers to that.

Mr SANDMAN. Because a person is a certain color or belief it is no reason why he shouldn't be given a chance, that is the whole endeavor, right?

Mr. KATOR. Yes.

Mr. SANDMAN. I don't know if you know the answer to this, but my district is the largest glass producing district in the world. In this area we have had a very severe shortage of people wanting to work in that industry even though it pays well. The glass plants have signs which they say have been up and unchanged for 5 years to the extent they will hire anybody who is willing to work.

The major plants in the area only recently were examined by someone from the Atomic Energy Commission, of all places, which seems to have jurisdiction over a discrimination in employment in the glass industry. I don't know what relation it has to the Atomic Energy?

Now, there was a lot of publicity that the person who made the survey, with regard to such plant, found that there was a great disparity in the nationality groups and the color groups as compared to the population of the surrounding area, to such an extent that there was a recommended penalty against that plant.

Now I am wondering if that kind of private employment, that kind of oversight is the same standard that we try to follow in Federal employment?

Mr. KATOR. No. Mr. Sandman, I imagine what you are referring to is the contract compliance requirements under the Department of Labor, the Office of Contract Compliance, where the AEC may have been the prime contractor in this particular factory and for that reason was given the responsibility for making the review. But the standards that we have in the Government for employment are merit and fitness for the job and open competitive system with the best qualified person to be hired. That is our basic proposition and we stick to that.

We want to make sure that everybody has that opportunity to compete and that is really what our equal employment opportunity program is all about.

Mr. SANDMAN. Thank you.

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. Kator, the Chair reserves its opinion as to how the program is going. It is a good program. As outlined in words, it is excellent. However, as of the moment, we can't say how well it is doing.

I might say I personally find it hard to understand how a massive program in the 50 States can have two people before Mr. Costales became the head, and now has three-statistically that is a third more and that is how statistics can fool you.

Federal Government discrimination in employment against Mexican-Americans in this country has been very serious. The President pointed this out, and we are going to have quite a number of other witnesses who will testify that Spanish-surnamed individuals have been getting a bad deal from the Federal Government for a long time. They have the lowest paying jobs, they are the first to go.

And the President is quite correct in requiring that the Civil Service Commission take this responsibility in trying to improve the situation after all of these years of discrimination.

Now, just for a moment, let's talk about the Civil Service Commission. You are like the emperor's wife, you should be doing a better job than any other agency with regard to eliminating employment discrimination; should you not, because after all, you are the enforcement agency?

Here is what the Civil Service Commission is doing according to figures submitted to the subcommittee. The Civil Service Commission has no employees of Spanish surname in the GS-16 to 18 levels. In the Government as a whole, 0.4 percent of the GS-16 to 18 category are Spanish-surnamed and yet in the agency with the responsibility for implementing the 16-point program, the percentage is zero.

In addition, your own figures indicate that the Civil Service Commission in November 1970, the latest figures available, had 2.3 percent Spanish-surnamed employees as compared with the Government-wide average of 2.9 percent.

So

your agency is below the average, Mr. Kator. How can you assume this leadership role if you can't do it within your own agency?

Mr. KATOR. Mr. Chairman, I won't sit here and tell you we are satisfied with the kind of record we have. We want it to improve and it has in fact improved. The figures I have and we just took a quick survey when we learned about the hearings-are as of March 1, and show significant increases in both total number of jobs and in the grade levels for Spanish-speaking.

Actually, our percentage now is almost 3, which is an increase over what it has been in the past.

I might add that I personally don't feel that any less thrust to the program is given simply because an individual may not at this particular moment be in a supergrade slot. This is subject to change all the time and one day you have them and one day you might not.

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. Kator, in response to question No. 9 concerning performance by Spanish-surnamed persons in the Federal service entrance examination, you stated that "There is no evidence of test taking handicaps on the part of Spanish-speaking persons.'

Are you saying, Mr. Kator, that Spanish-speaking people, MexicanAmericans, Puerto Ricans, are able to compete on an equal basis with the general population despite all the evidence we have of the in

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feriority of the basic education provided by the public schools in most Mexican-American communities?

Mr. KATOR. Well, Mr. Chairman, we don't keep any records by race or ethnic origin of how people compete on that particular examination. What I am saying is that given comparable skill levels, college, for example, which is the primary route for taking the Federal service entrance exam, we see no reason why Spanish-speaking persons would do any worse or differently than other persons.

Now the test itself, we consider a valid measure and recently the district court here in the District of Columbia found it was a jobrelated tool in accordance with the Griggs decision and we feel that there is no evidence certainly that we have that it, in fact, discriminates against Spanish-speaking.

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. Zeifman?

Mr. ZEIFMAN. In compiling the data that you submitted to the subcommittee, you indicated in response to Congressman Waldie's question that the data was compiled by each individual supervisor making a head count sort of thing?

Mr. KATOR. Yes.

Mr. ZEIFMAN. In making such a head count, would it be possible, for example, for a supervisor to include a Brazilian born person of Anglo Saxon origin who spoke Spanish as his native language?

Mr. KATOR. He might. We don't say that these figures are 100 percent accurate. Just as that error might be made, the other error on the other side might be made.

Mr. ZEIFMAN. In making such a head count each individual supervisor would, to some extent, be called on to exercise some degree of discretion.

Mr. KATOR. That is right. We provide a definition and within that definition he makes some exercises of judgment.

Mr. ZEIFMAN. In your figures you indicated that the percentage of Spanish-surnamed Federal employees in 1967 was 2.6 and that the percentage has increased now by three-tenths of 1 percent to 2.9.

Could it be possible that in view of the fact that the Federal Government has been advocating very strenuously for a 5-year period now a resolution of this problem, that the increase in the percentages could be in some way a reflection of the zeal, so to speak, of the individual supervisors who were anxious to turn up with a good head count?

Mr. KATOR. Well, I couldn't buy that at all, really. My answer would be no. I wouldn't think any Federal supervisor would provide incorrect figures to make this head count.

Mr. ZEIFMAN. Has the Civil Service Commission done any spot checking or follow up to ascertain what the possibilities of error were in gathering these statistics?

Mr. KATOR. The only way we would do that would be through our individual surveys on site and if the figures there that had been reported for that installation don't match what they have on site, it would turn up, of course, but I can't say that is an overall nationwide review. Personally I don't think any is necessary.

Mr. ZEIFMAN. Čould you distinguish between affirmative action and preferential hiring? Is there a distinction?

Mr. KATOR. Yes, we don't engage in preferential hiring. What we are trying to do about affirmative action is try to assure that the barriers that may exist because of past societal disadvantage and other reasons are down and the people have an opportunity to compete on equal basis.

Preferential treatment would be the adding, for example, which has been suggested by some groups, of certain points, or to give outright preference and say, "We will hire an individual because he is black, because he is Spanish descent."

We do not do that. We think this would be completely inconsistent with the merit system.

Mr. ZEIFMAN. Would it be permissible for you to do that legally? Mr. KATOR. No, sir.

Mr. ZEIFMAN. Could you provide the subcommittee with a legal analysis of the court decisions which in your view indicate that it would not be permissible for you to do that?

Mr. KATOR. Yes. We would start from the basic premise of the Civil Service Act itself which requires the basis on merit and fitness for the job, but we will be glad to supply it. (Requested material found on age 171 of this document.)

Mr. EDWARDS. We thank you very much, Mr. Kator, and Mr. Costales. Speaking just for myself, I don't think it is unreasonable to expect that the Federal Government, as the Nation's largest employer with 212 million Federal employees, would not be able to employ minorities approximately in the same proportion that exist in the population: the number of Spanish-surnamed people, particularly the most disadvantaged, the ones with the most difficult employment problems, the Mexican-Americans and the Puerto Ricans.

I am not speaking here for a quota system, I am only trying to reaffirm but not in as eloquent words, the President's message. As I said earlier, the statistics to date are not encouraging. Even during the past 6 or 7 years, the increase has only been from 2.6 percent in 1967 to 2.9 percent in 1971.

So we will be looking with great interest and anticipation and encouragement upon the 16-point program by the Civil Service Commission.

Tomorrow the committee will hear Representative Herman Badillo of New York, who represents probably more Puerto Ricans of American descent and native Puerto Ricans than any Congressman, and Chairman Henry M. Ramirez of the President's Cabinet Committee on Opportunities for the Spanish-speaking.

We might be in touch with you again, either for additional testimony or for questions in writing.

We thank you again for your appearance here today and until tomorrow morning at 10 o'clock, the subcommittee is adjourned.

(Whereupon, at 12 noon, the subcommittee was recessed to reconvene at 10 a.m., Thursday, March 9, 1972.)