United States Department of Labor
Office of Administrative Law Judges Law Library

NOTICE: THIS INDEX WAS PREPARED BY THE CIVIL RIGHTS DIVISION, OFFICE OF THE SOLICITOR, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR, FOR INTERNAL USE. IT IS NOT AN OFFICIAL INTERPRETATION OF THE CASES, AND WAS LAST REVISED IN NOVEMBER, 1996.

Return to Table of Topics, 503 Index

The Act was not automatically implemented on its stated effective date, September 26, 1973. The effective date was June 11, 1974, when the Secretary of Labor issued the implementing regulations. OFCCP v. Burlington Northern Railroad, 80-OFCCP-6, ALJ Order Granting defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment and Dismissing Complaint, June 12, 1980, slip op. at 4; Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary for Employment Standards Final Decision and Order of Dismissal, December 11, 1991.

The regulations promulgated June 11, 1974, will be applied prospectively only, not retrospectively. Id. at 5.

DOL has no authority to exercise its enforcement power under the Act prior to promulgation of implementing regulations. OFCCP v. Western Electric Co., 80-OFCCP-29, ALJ Rec. Dec., March 4, 1981, slip op. at 4, rev'd and remanded on other grounds, Deputy Under Secretary for Employment Standards, April 24, 1985.

Section 503(a) lacks language which, by its own terms and standing alone, directly required nondiscrimination and affirmative action by Government contractors towards "qualified handicapped individuals" on the date of enactment. Instead, it mandated the development of such requirements through "a [contract] provision requiring . . . affirmative action to employ and advance in employment qualified individuals." The precise requirement, i.e., the affirmative action contract clause, was to be "implement[ed] . . . by promulgating regulations within ninety days" after enactment. Until such time as the regulatory affirmative action contract clause was issued through promulgation of 20 CFR Part 741 and thereby made applicable to contracts executed after October 11, 1974, see 20 CFR § 741.54, the statutory language indicates that contractors, such as Burlington, were not subject to Section 503 requirements, since such requirements devolved from the statutory mandate of a contract clause to be prescribed in the implementing regulations, rather than from the statute itself. OFCCP v. Burlington Northern, Inc., 80-OFCCP-6, Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary for Employment Standards, Final Decision and Order of Dismissal, December 11, 1991, at 11-12.

[Section 503, without its implementing regulations], did not provide contractors with the "requisite clarity" to put them on sufficient notice that a nondiscrimination prohibition would be applicable to contracts let after the date of enactment by operation of the statute itself, rather than through the subsequent insertion of a standard and formal affirmative action clause by contracting agencies as a later date. Id. at 16.