the pressure on for these other programs. Even though we might have trouble tooling up, I can't think it wouldn't be a good idea. Mr. RODRIGUEZ. It is not only that we are making people aware of the needs and the problems, but making people behave towards these needs. It is not enough just to know. It is more important that they not only know, but care, and put this concern into action. It does no good for us to make people aware unless they are willing to participate in some active activity that will change the situation for the benefit of the people. Senator MONDALE. I will ask Josué González from the committee staff to ask any other questions he wants. BILINGUAL EDUCATION Mr. GONZÁLEZ. You mentioned the Bilingual Education Program funded under Title VII of ESEA. Is there any comparable effort being made by the States, by State Departments of Education to your knowledge, to move in this direction? How much money from the States is coming into this area? Mr. RODRIGUEZ. I am sure that there is some, but I could not categorically tell you what they are. Most of our reporting on title I to the Office of Education, through the Division of Planning and Evaluation, has no block reporting on Mexican American activities or Spanish-speaking activities. We have asked the Program Planning and Evaluation in their questionnaires and their requirements in reports submitted by title I, State and local projects, to have a portion of it indicate those programs that affect the Spanish-speaking, such as bilingual and other types of programs that are directed to the Spanish-speaking. They now have it and we should have some information about it sometime in January. Mr. GONZÁLEZ. Do you think there might be some State money coming into bilingual education? Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Yes. I know, for instance, that the State of Arizona passed $100,000, I think, for their bilingual program, and distributed it to some 19 school districts. I understand the State of Massachusetts at the present time is entertaining some legislation relative to a bilingual bill. I understand they are thinking about more money than $1 million (one million). I understand the State of California is also entertaining a bill relative to bilingual education. These are the three that I know of. One has actually passed and the other two are legislative proposals. Senator MONDALE. Thank you very much for your most useful contribution to this committee. You have helped us to better understand the situation. We may be submitting questions in writing to you. Senator MONDALE. Thank you very much. We will stand in recess until next Tuesday. (Whereupon, at 11:55 a.m. the select committee recessed, to reconvene at 10 a.m., Tuesday, August 25, 1970.) APPENDIX U.S. COMMISSION ON CIVIL RIGHTS, HON. CLAIBORNE PELL, Chairman, Subcommittee on Education of the Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C. DEAR SENATOR PELL: I am writing this letter on behalf of myself and Commissioners Horn, Rankin, Freeman and Mitchell. On Friday, July 10, 1970, Commissioner Manuel Ruiz and Mr. Henry A. Ramirez, a Commission employee, testified before your Subcommittee which is holding hearings in conjunction with the Select Committee on Equal Educational Opportunity on S. 3883, the Emergency School Aid Act of 1970. We are writing this letter to clarify the record. When Commissioner Ruiz appeared before your Subcommittee, he was not speaking on behalf of the Commission but as an individual. The position of the Commission on the Emergency School Aid Act of 1970 was set forth in the testimony of Mr. Howard A. Glickstein, Staff Director, on June 24, 1970. Mr. Ramirez was not advised that he was going to testify until moments before he appeared. Accordingly, he was not able to prepare himself. We affirm the testimony of our Staff Director to the extent it differs from that of Commissioner Ruiz. We are in favor of the double counting provision of S. 3883. We support the deletion of language from Section 5(a) (3) which authorizes the use of funds for educational programs unaccompanied by desegregation or the elimination of racial isolation. We support the Administration's bill whether or not any amendments are attached to it. It is a good first step. We cannot emphasize too strongly that no study is being suppressed by this agency. During the course of Mr. Ramirez's testimony it was suggested several times that the Committee was being provided information not previously made available to it. We believe that such suggestions are unfair and misleading. Mr. Ramirez's testimony, almost in its entirety, is contained in the preliminary staff analysis sent to the Select Committee on Equal Education Opportunity on June 15 and submitted as an exhibit before the Subcommittee on Education on June 24. Both the staff analysis and Mr. Ramirez's testimony explain the methodology of the study, provide data on ethnic isolation, on the number of teachers and their location, on reading and dropout rates, on suppression of the use of Spanish and on educational finances. The only data provided in Mr. Ramirez's testimony that is not contained in the preliminary staff analysis is some information on the composition of school boards. To have suggested that it was more difficult to get information from the Commission than from the Defense Department, when that information already had been furnished, is extremely puzzling to us. The staff of this agency has cooperated closely with the staff of the Select Committee. We have not withheld anything that was appropriate for release. Our Mexican American Education Study involves a great accumulation of data. This has been the easy part. This data now must be analyzed and written up. This is taking time. Adequate staff and funds are assigned to this study, and this is not the cause of the delay. This Commission bases its reputation on the accuracy of its reports. No reports are released until thoroughly reviewed. Part I of this study just went through its fifth draft. It only recently was reviewed by Mr. Ramirez's supervisor. This week, it was reviewed by the Staff Director and shortly will be submitted to the Com(2625) missioners. We would be unfaithful to our mandate if we released reports and data that were not fully and adequately authenticated and reviewed. Some members of the Subcommittee expressed an interest in the Commission's work with respect to Puerto Ricans. The Commission on June 6, 1970, responded to an inquiry by Senator Kennedy concerning our efforts to deal with the problems of Puerto Ricans. A copy of this correspondence is enclosed. Inquiry was made regarding the Agency's work with Indians. This agency has been developing an Indian program. We sponsored a conference of Indian leaders in December of 1969. Since then we have begun preparing informational handbooks which will explain Indian rights in various subject matter areas. This project was undertaken after careful analysis of the various alternatives. We believe it has the potential to be very valuable. Interest was expressed in how we allocate our resources among studies dealing with different racial and ethnic groups. A substantial amount of our very limited resources are allocated to the study of the problems of Spanish surnamed Americans. During the first half of this past fiscal year the project receiving the second largest allocation of funds was the Mexican American Education Project. Our work on Mexican American Administration of Justice problems also received a significant allocation of funds. The hearing we held in San Antonio in December 1968 cost over $200,000, and large sums have been spent in followup on that hearing. In addition, almost all aspects of our work involving the appraisal of the adequacy of Federal civil rights laws and programs deal with the needs of Spanish surnamed citizens. We will be happy to provide you with whatever further information on this score that you require. The Commission on Civil Rights always has been open and forthright in its dealings with Congress. We are distressed at the accusation we are suppressing information. We hope this letter clarifies the situation. We would appreciate it if this letter were included as part of the hearing transcript. Sincerely, THEODORE M. HESBURGH, Chairman. [Enclosure] JUNE 6, 1970. HON. EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Washington, D.C. DEAR SENATOR KENNEDY: Father Hesburgh has asked me to respond to your letter of May 25, 1970, and to thank you for your regards and your kind words about our recent report Mexican Americans and the Administration of Justice in the Southwest. In your letter, you also asked to be informed of the status of a proposed Commission study of denials of equal protection of the laws in the administration of justice affecting Puerto Ricans in the Northeast and whether this study includes the areas of education, housing, employment and political participation. The Commission has been concerned and interested for some time in expanding its studies to include problems of the Puerto Rican community. In our request for appropriations for fiscal year 1970 we included plans to extend the Mexican American administration of justice study to include Puerto Ricans. Because of our extremely limited budget we have been able to undertake only preliminary steps to development of a Puerto Rican project during fiscal year 1970. In our appropriations request for fiscal year 1971 we have reaffirmed our commitment to a Puerto Rican project. The present status of our Puerto Rican program is as follows: 1. There has been a special effort to include Puerto Ricans among State Advisory Committee members. The efforts have been successful in Massachusets, Connecticut and New York. 2. On April 27, the Massachusetts State Advisory Committee held a closed meeting in Springfield on the extent of Puerto Rican participation in community action programs. This meeting resulted from an earlier one held in Boston in the fall of 1969 at which grievances from Puerto Ricans were heard. 3. On April 10, the Delaware State Advisory Committee held an open meeting on police-community relations in Wilmington. This meeting dealt with a number of issues, including relations between the city police and the Puerto Rican community. 4. On May 17, the Connecticut State Advisory Committee sponsored a conference on bilingual education in Bridgeport. 5. The Commission staff has made preliminary field surveys in cooperation with our Northeast Field Office to determine the feasibility of undertaking studies of denials of equal protection in the administration of justice and in education affecting Puerto Ricans. We also have added two Puerto Rican staff members to the Commission, in addition to eight Mexican American professional staff members. Our plans, however, have been delayed by our severe financial crisis of which you are well aware. As you know, our authorization for appropriations, largely through your helpful efforts, recently has been increased by $750,000 by the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. This amount will permit some small increase in the level of Commission activities. Although the Committee voted on this legislation (S. 2455) on May 12, it has yet to be reported to the Senate and remains to be acted on by the House. In addition it will be necessary for Congressional action to be taken to increase our appropriation. As a result, we expect that the first phase of our Puerto Rican program will consist of additional State Advisory Committee factfinding meetings and reports to the Commission. In the past this procedure has led to highly satisfactory results. I believe that the same will be true in the Northeast where the Commission is fortunate in having a number of outstanding State Advisory Committees, in particular the Massachusetts State Advisory Committee, chaired by Father Drinan. I wish to assure you that the Commission fully intends to issue reports on Puerto Rican problems. I will keep you informed as events develop. I also would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your effective assistance in the Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights and the Judiciary Committee in obtaining favorable action on our authorization request. Sincerely, HOWARD A. GLICKSTEIN, Staff Director. U.S. SENATE, Washington, D.C., May 25, 1970. REV. THEODORE M. HESBURGH, C.S.C. DEAR FATHER HESBURGH: I was delighted to see the impressive study by the U.S. Civil Rights Commission detailing the dicrimination against Mexican Americans that exists in the Southwest. The report's recommendations for legislative action were particularly valuable. The study holds considerable interest to the State of Massachusetts where there has been a substantial increase in the past decade in the number of Puerto Rican residents. All institutions have been exceedingly slow to respond to the special needs of this new constituency. At the same time, questions have been raised whether the Puerto Rican community is being discriminated against in the allotment of federal funds and programs in the areas of education, housing and employment. I understand that the Commission has included in its budget statements to the Congress a proposed study of denials of equal protection of the laws in the administration of justice affecting Puerto Ricans in the Northeast. I would appreciate learning of the status of that investigation and whether it includes the areas of education, housing, employment and political participation. Hopefully, the inquiry would furnish the same basis for legislative recommendations contained in the study of discrimination against Mexican Americans in the Southwest. I would be pleased to discuss this matter further with you, and I'm sorry I missed you last week. Until we can meet, best wishes, and my very warm regards. Sincerely, EDWARD M. KENNEDY. Identical letters sent to: Hon. Birch Bayh, Hon. Edward W. Brooke, Hon. Marlow W. Cook, Hon. Thomas J. Dodd, Hon. Peter H. Dominick, Hon. Thomas F. Eagleton, Hon. Mark Hatfield, Hon. Roman L. Hruska, Hon. |