Opinion ID: 399394
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Interrelation of the Rehabilitation Act and the Subsection (u) Hiring Program

Text: 18 A brief summary of the material discussed in the foregoing sections suffices to highlight the issues raised by this case. Since World War II both Congress and the civil service authorities have pursued laudable efforts to ensure that the federal government provides employment opportunities to the severely handicapped. Nevertheless, the emphases of the programs, and the understanding behind each program of what harm required action, varied from program to program over time. Until the mid-1960's both Congress and the Executive Branch seemed to focus on removing artificial impediments to employment of the handicapped through normal competitive processes. Beginning in 1964, however, the Civil Service Commission increasingly relied on using excepted service authority to place the most severely handicapped in appropriate federal positions. This course of action gave federal employers a great deal of flexibility in matching specific applicants to jobs that they could perform, and it guarded against hidden biases in the competitive examination process. 23 On the other hand, relying on excepted service appointments also operated to deny important job protection and promotion benefits to those handicapped persons who were eventually employed. 19 In 1973 Congress mandated affirmative action for handicapped persons, not only in hiring but also in placement and advancement, throughout the federal government. And, although the original Rehabilitation Act was silent on the matter, the 1978 Congress confirmed that the federal courts as well as civil service authorities should have a role in enforcing its affirmative action guarantee. Furthermore, Congress demonstrated that it perceived discrimination against the handicapped as fundamentally similar to other forms of discrimination-on the basis of race, sex, national origin, or religious belief-addressed in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. At the outset nondiscrimination against the handicapped was perhaps seen as merely fair play and good federal policy, a recognition that the disabled had performed valuable services during the war and that handicapped veterans should have a role in postwar society, 24 but by 1978 Congress had made it clear that nondiscrimination was an obligation, not a gratuity. 25 20 The civil service programs that began in 1969 certainly went a long way toward discharging that obligation. Not only did the government hire more severely handicapped employees, see notes 16 and 18 supra, but it also made important progress in opening up a variety of jobs to the handicapped. A Chain of Cooperation, supra note 16, at 6-7. The affirmative action plans drawn up after 1973 surely deepened federal officials' awareness both of opportunities for employing the handicapped in their departments and of the subtly discriminatory aspects of day-to-day life on the job. Furthermore, the Civil Service Commission's programs show an appreciation for the number of physical and mental conditions that at times exacerbate the effect of physical disabilities. 26 Nevertheless, until 1979 those employees classified as severely handicapped and given excepted service appointments had long-range employment prospects and protections significantly different from those of their co-workers in similar or identical jobs. The fact that this aspect of the system was modified in 1979 by Executive Order, see note 22 supra, suggests that we are not alone in suspecting some dissonance between the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the pre-existing programs that, in the absence of specific efforts to interpret the statute, bore the burden of implementing it. 21 Mr. Shirey's federal employment occurred during a period of rapid change in the status of the handicapped as federal employees. He was hired shortly before the Rehabilitation Act was first passed and separated shortly before it was amended in 1978. The record does not disclose why he received an excepted service appointment rather than undergoing a competitive examination with special accommodations, 27 but soon after he began working at Goddard NASA instituted an affirmative action plan that relied heavily on subsection (u) appointments to meet its obligation under the Rehabilitation Act. 28 Had Mr. Shirey been more fortunate, perhaps, the reduction-in-force might have come 15 months later, by which time he could have attained full competitive service status under Executive Order 12125, see note 22 supra. However, he was not so fortunate, and thus he presents for our decision the question whether an agency's refusal to provide equal job protection and promotion rights to its severely handicapped employees violated Section 501 of the Rehabilitation Act.