Executive Order 10925, signed byPresidentJohn F. Kennedy on March 6, 1961, required government contractors, except in special circumstances, to "takeaffirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed and that employees are treated during employment without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin". It established thePresident's Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity (PCEEO), which was chaired by then Vice PresidentLyndon Johnson.[1]: 3 Vice Chair and Secretary of LaborArthur Goldberg was responsible for the "general supervision and direction" of the Committee's operations.[1]: 3–4 Ten other senior executive appointees also sat on the Committee.[2]
The first draft, written by Goldberg and futureSupreme Court justiceAbe Fortas, was reviewed byHobart Taylor Jr. andGeorge Bunn. Based on the perceived inefficacy of PresidentDwight D. Eisenhower's earlier Executive Orders on civil rights, Taylor and Bunn coined the term "affirmative action" to emphasize that employers must actively combat discrimination, rather than passively addressing claims of workplace discrimination as they arise.[3]
Following passage of theCivil Rights Act of 1964 and President Johnson's 1965Executive Order 11246, the Committee's functions were divided between theEqual Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and theOffice of Federal Contract Compliance (which in 1975 was renamed the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs).[4]
Opponents of the PCEEO and Executive Order 10925 included SenatorJ. Lister Hill, asegregationistDemocrat fromAlabama, who claimed that the committee and the executive order were overreaches by the federal government into the private business of America.[1]: 7
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