In a previous post we looked at President Kennedy’s Executive Order 10925, which established the President’s Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity, and we shared a photo of some committee members gathered with President Kennedy and Vice President Johnson that we harvested from a government history web page.
Two quick points about the picture. First, there are sixteen people in the picture, and it looks like they are all white men (see our followup inquiry below). The image helps to crystallize why Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion became key words for civil rights ethos. The keyword Diversity would ask us to notice whether an equal opportunity committee has diversity.
The keyword Equity invites us to ask if there were no qualified men or women of color who could have been invited to serve on the committee. As a general logic of inquiry, DEI tends to hypothesize that where we find such lack of Diversity, the reason is not lack of merit, as DEI opponents would allege. Equity speaks to the process of reaching out, breaking usual habits, and yes, going out of our way to look at places and people that are not in our usual methods.
The keyword Inclusion asks us to ensure that anyone invited to the table is actually welcome to fully participate in the conversation.
So the photo of Kennedy’s Committee on Equal Opportunity offers us a quick start guide to why DEI became the keywords of civil rights ethos.
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In order to to double-check our impression of the photo, we located the first year-end report from the committee that represented its work from Apr. 7, 1961 to Jan. 15, 1962 (an auspicious reporting date, MLK’s 33rd birthday). The first page of the report lists fourteen public members, eleven government representatives, a chairman (LBJ), a vice chairman, an executive vice chairman, an executive director, and a special counsel, graduate of Houston’s Yates High School, Hobart Taylor, Jr.
Among the public members of the Kennedy Committee on Equal Opportunity, we find two women listed, one of whom was a legendary Black attorney and judge, Marjorie McKenzie Lawson. Also listed under public members was the name John H. Wheeler of Durham, NC, who was born on the campus of HBCU Kittrell College* and graduated summa cum laude from Morehouse College in 1929, the year King was born. Is that Wheeler who is pictured in the upper left edge of the photo?
Our followup inquiry turns up evidence that there was more Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the committee than first meets the eye. In addition to those mentioned above, public member Howard B. Woods was an influential Black journalist, editor, and publisher in St. Louis. Religious diversity was exemplified in the appointment of Monsignor George O. HIggins, referred to here as “The Labor Priest.”
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A delightful surprise greeted the eyes of Texas, however, when we noticed that the first name listed under public members was Howard E. Butt Jr. of Corpus Christi, TX. This is a hint of what sometimes goes by the name of “smart money,” the effects of which have been severely degraded in recent years.
Followup question: We identified Kennedy committee members who became wealthy through insurance, banking, and groceries. Is there a correlation between recent trends toward high tech capitalism and anti-civil rights?
*Note: Apparently the Wheeler family moved away from Kittrell College soon after John was born. See this bio of John Leonidas Wheeler.
DEI Sanctuary 
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