Timeline of Crucial Wage Gap Legislation
Click on a year to find out more about the legislation released that year that helped advance the rights or minorities and attempted to close the wage gap.
NB: EO is the shorthand for Executive Order.
Executive Order 10925
"To ensure that governement contractors take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color or national origin."
Details
Signing Date: March 6, 1961
President in Office: John F. Kennedy
Background: When President John F. Kennedy took office in 1961, it became clear to him that the practice of equal employment in government contactors needed to be improved, broadened, and enforce. His intent with this Executive Order was to affirm that the government was dedicated to ensuring equal emplyment for all qualified persons in companies that were Federally funded. This EO is often referred to as the birthplace of Affirmative Action.
The EO and its Achievements: The EO was released not to prevent discrimination, but instead for "taking the initiative" and practice fair employment. It also created the President's Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity (PCEEO). The PCEEO was in charge of ensuring fair hiring practices, along with the ability to sanction and disbar contractors that did not follow the guidelines in this EO. Overall the EO was exteremly successful, aiding thousands of minorities in their search for labor, and adding hunderds of blacks to the governement's workforce. The EO was crucial to future legislation, such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and shifted the objective of government legislation from attempting to simply prevent discrimination to forcing contractors to practice fairer employment practices and aiding minorities. Lastly, the PCEEO created the foundation for the long-lasting Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, created under in 1964.