In the previous blog I referred to the case that I brought in 1971 against the Bank of California on behalf of minorities and women. We won that case and it became the most important anti-discrimination judgment before or since.
It was my job to find the woman and black plaintiffs for the case.
The job proved to be difficult. It took me four months
When I hear women complain about the bad old days and how poorly women were treated I have to keep my mouth shut. The reason is simple. Not only did women not complain, but when encouraged to complain and rebel they absolutely refused. In the early 60s I remember trying to get a group of women to take public action on women's rights and got absolutely nowhere.
When I set out to find a woman plaintiff in the Bank of California case I invited nearly a dozen bank managers and staff to individual lunches with me. In each case I showed the woman a printout of the wages for each individual in the bank as well as the personnel data. I showed each woman that she was paid less than comparable men who had less experience and less educational background. In each and every case, the woman told me that she ‘was not worried’ that her boss ‘would soon recognize her and increase her compensation’.
So much for the latent womens’ rebellious spirit of the times.
I did not experience this lack of willingness to act with the black bank employees I took to lunch. In those cases, I was told that the individual would be fired for becoming a plaintiff in a racial discrimination case. When I replied that the judge would protect the plaintiff's job, I was told that I was a fool and didn't understand the white justice system. (The black bank employees were right, except that we drew a good judge in that case.)
In the end I found a former employee to be the woman plaintiff and a black banker who was turned down for a job at the Bank of California on the same day he was hired at another bank.
The fact of the matter is that women did not revolt and sympathize with any of the prominent women’s movement leaders of the era.