Opinion ID: 3204484
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Development of the Exams Over Time

Text: In 1971, Congress noted that the United States Commission on Civil Rights (USCCR) found racial discrimination in municipal employment more pervasive than in the private sector. H.R. Rep. No. 92-238, at 17 (1971). According to the USCCR, nepotism and political patronage helped perpetuate preexisting racial hierarchies. U.S. Comm'n on Civil Rights, For All the People, By All the People: A Report on Equal Opportunity in State and Local Government Employment, 63–65, 119 (1969), reprinted in 118 Cong. Rec. 1817 (1972). Police and fire departments served as particularly extreme examples of this practice. See, e.g., Wesley MacNeil Oliver, The Neglected History of Criminal Procedure, 1850–1940, 62 Rutgers L. Rev. 447, 473 (2010) (Officers who delivered payments to their superiors were practically assured of retention and even promotion, regardless of their transgressions.); Nirej S. Sekhon, Redistributive Policing, 101 J. Crim. L. & Criminology 1171, 1191 (2011) (Police departments were prime sources of patronage jobs.). Boston's police department was no exception: As far back as the nineteenth century, a subjective hiring scheme that - 8 - hinged on an applicant's perceived political influence and the hiring officer's subjective familiarity with the candidate (or the candidate's last name) was seen as the primary culprit behind a corrupt, inept, and racially exclusive police force. See, e.g., George H. McCaffrey, Boston Police Department, 2 J. Am. Inst. Crim. L. & Criminology 672, 672 (1912) (This system worked very unsatisfactorily, however, because places on the police force were invariably bestowed as a reward for partisan activity.). At both the state and local levels, Massachusetts officials eventually gravitated toward competitive exams as a tool to accomplish an important public policy of moving away from nepotism, patronage, and racism in the hiring and promoting of police. Boston Chapter, N.A.A.C.P., Inc. v. Beecher, 504 F.2d 1017, 1022 (1st Cir. 1974) ([C]ivil service tests were instituted to replace the evils of a subjective hiring process . . . .); see generally League of Women Voters of Mass., The Merit System in Massachusetts: A Study of Public Personnel Administration in the Commonwealth 3–5 (1961). At the statewide level, this movement resulted in legislation and regulations aimed at ensuring that employees in civil service positions are recruit[ed], select[ed] and advanc[ed] . . . on the basis of their relative ability, knowledge and skills and without regard to political affiliation, race, color, age, national origin, sex, marital status, handicap, or religion. Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 31, § 1. - 9 -