It is true that some claims of employment discrimination based upon race and
color involve minority groups, such as Native Americans, Hispanics, Asians,
and Jews. Nevertheless, an overwhelming majority of court and arbitration
awards concerning race have resulted from complaints filed by blacks. The
pivotal role of blacks in formulating federal law, state law, and union work
rules governing discrimination has carried over into all phases of public and
private employment and offers an insight into the types of problems,
complaints, and solutions that will arise as other forms of employment
discrimination come under closer consideration.

Arbitration awards cover an array of employment discrimination problems
that is much narrower in scope than the sum total of employment
discrimination problems decided by the courts. The interpretation of race
discrimination law by the courts has given legal meaning to legislative
standards governing (a) the employment status of workers as well as (b) the
conditions under which employees work. On one hand, the records reveal
thousands of court decisions that have given meaning and clarity to the
disparate impact and disparate treatment concepts embodied in the Civil Rights
Act of 1964. The courts have examined, detailed, and determined an enormous
body of human rights complaints, providing a law to govern employment
practices that arbitrators frequently reference. The courts have also established
broad employment standards under other legislation such as the 13th
Amendment, the 14th Amendment, and the Civil Rights Act of 1866. On the
other hand, published arbitral awards reveal that arbitrators seldom examine
disparate impact claims and even more seldom decide violations of the U.S.
Constitution or the Civil Rights Act of 1866. Thirty-six percent of the
arbitration awards reported in this book involve race discrimination.

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