"reverse Discrimination": A Bad Precedent

    The recent court decision against Detroit's Phoenix, the black firefighters' organization, sets an unfortunate precedent which, if allowed to stand, could jeopardize other affirmative action programs.

    The point in promoting thirty black firefighters before white colleagues with more seniority is that without strong action of this type, racial discrimination in organizations like the Fire Department tends to go on forever.

   There are only three minority Fire Department employees at the command level (Sergeant or above); two are Latinos and one is black. Only four of 173 engine operators come from minorities.

   Whites who have risen through the seniority system, unlike the Police Department, have risen on years of service alone-not performance, reliability , attitude, or any other criterion. According to Phoenix President Napoleon Howard, perhaps 300 of them live outside the City, in violation of the residency requirement.

    Black firefighters say that the backward social attitudes of many of their well-entrenched white colleagues make them hard to get along with in the high-stress world of firefighting and make them less than enthusiastic about fighting fires and saving people in communities they would never enter otherwise.

   In its eight years of existence, Phoenix has pushed for increased professionalism in the Fire Department and has worked hard to improve its community relations; the black firefighters, among other things, hold an annual benefit to raise money to help Christmas-time burn-out victims.

     Unfortunately, their case landed with a judge who might be considered a liberal in his native Lapeer County, but whose decision makes him a dangerous reactionary in Detroit.

      The black firefighters, who are supported in their effort by the City, have vowed to take their case through the legal system until victory. Some theorize that Judge Churchill fully expected his decision to be overturned. We hope it is.