Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, April 18, 1995                   TAG: 9504180146
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

REVERSE-BIAS CASES STAND

In one case, the justices let stand a lower-court ruling that a plan for promoting black firefighters in Birmingham, Ala., unlawfully discriminated against whites.

And the justices let a white man collect $425,000 from a Pittsburgh company he accused of denying him a promotion because of his race.

In Birmingham, Lt. Charles Brush, president of the majority-white Birmingham Firefighters Association, said, ``We've always contended this is not a race issue, it's a fairness issue.''

But Lt. Carl Cook, president of the all-black Birmingham Brothers Inc., said affirmative action ``has helped the whites who have cried and whined ... because they have gotten the attention. The squeaky wheel gets the grease.''

Neither Supreme Court action was a ruling.

But Monday's action came amid growing debate in all three branches of government over whether affirmative action still is needed to help minorities - and whether such aid is fair to non-minorities.

Republican leaders in Congress are seeking elimination of most affirmative action. President Clinton has asked for a review of the 100-plus federal programs that invoke affirmative action.

The high court is expected to announce a major decision by July on a white-owned company's challenge to a federal highway program that offers special help to minority-owned small businesses.

In other matters Monday, the court:

Heard arguments in an important environmental case over the scope of the federal Endangered Species Act. At issue is whether the law bans destruction of wildlife habitats on private property, including logging in forests inhabited by the northern spotted owl.

Agreed to use a lawsuit stemming from the 1983 downing of a Korean airliner over the Soviet Union to clarify what damages can be awarded when Americans die on international flights.

Refused to shield a Secret Service agent from being sued for taking along a CBS camera crew when he searched a Brooklyn, N.Y., home three years ago. The lawsuit says he violated the residents' right to privacy.

In the Birmingham case, city officials and black residents argued that the plan for promoting firefighters was a valid effort to remedy past bias against blacks.

The city had agreed in 1981 to settle a discrimination lawsuit by starting an affirmative action plan aimed at increasing black employment in the fire department to 28 percent - the share of blacks in the county labor force.

The plan set a temporary goal of promoting blacks to half of all fire lieutenant openings each year until 28 percent of those jobs were held by blacks. A group of white firefighters sued in 1982.

The fire department ended the 50 percent annual rate in 1989 because it had met its goal. The white firefighters' lawsuit continued because they were seeking back pay.

The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled for the white firefighters last year, saying the promotion goal violated the Constitution's guarantee of equal protection and a federal civil rights law.

The appeals court said it found no valid basis for the 50 percent promotion goal when blacks made up a much smaller share of the firefighters eligible for promotion.