Equal employment opportunity
Equal employment opportunity is equal opportunity in employment. Examples of legislation to foster it or to protect it from eroding include the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which was established by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to assist in the protection of United States employees from discrimination. The law was the first federal law designed to protect most US employees from employment discrimination based upon that employee's (or applicant's) race, color, religion, sex, or national origin (Public Law 88-352, July 2, 1964, 78 Stat. 253, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000e et. seq.). Employment discrimination entails areas such as firing, hiring, promotions, transfer or wage practices and it is also illegal to discriminate in advertising, referral of job applicants, or classification. The Title is pertinent in companies affecting commerce that have fifteen or more employees. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is section 705 of the title.
Diane R. Williams
Diane Williams began working at the U.S Department of Justice in 1972 as a 23-year-old single mother. She worked in the Justice Department’s Community Relations Service as a public information aide, where she was intimately familiar with the racial tensions of the time. Although she had previously been given several positive reviews of her work, she was dismissed from her position at the U.S Department of Justice after filing a complaint about a supervisor Harvey Brinson's unwanted sexual advances. She stated her supervisor’s treatment was illegal under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars employers from discriminating against workers on the basis of sex, race, religion, national origin, or color.