AF Adopts Regular Dismissals For All Except Disloyalty Cases, Evening Star (Article, September 1954)
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AF Adopts Regular Dismissals For All Except Disloyalty Cases
By Joseph Young
The Air Force Department has dispensed with its [employee] loyalty-security firing program except in cases relating to Communist or other subversive activities.
All other cases that normally would come under the loyalty-security program are handled under regular civil service dismissal procedures.
Air Force officials say their method of handling cases has bolstered civilian [employee] morale without jeopardizing the department's or the Nation's security.
In declining to use the summary firing authority of President Eisenhower's April 27, 1953, security-loyalty program, except in cases directly dealing with subversion or disloyalty, the Air Force could pave the way for similar actions by other agencies.
Such charges as excessive drinking, chronic indebtedness, gossiping, questionable friendships, mental illnesses and even homosexuality, are not tried under the loyalty-security program, except when they are directly related with Communist activity or other subversive actions.
Instead, the [employees] are dismissed under regular civil service dismissal procedures.
A top Air Force official had this to say:
"There is no doubt in our minds that [employee] morale in Government has suffered as a result of the loyalty-security program. When [employees] know that they can be dismissed summarily as a security risk on almost any kind of charge, they naturally are apprehensive about their jobs.
"What's more most [employees] know that if they are fired as security risks, even though the charge has nothing to do with communism, they are labeled as disloyal in the minds of the public. And getting another job is virtually impossible.
"Therefore, what we are doing is to use the loyalty-security program only in cases where national security is involved.
"By doing this, we are not hurting the country's security one bit. Rather, we are strengthening it by keeping up the espirit de corps of our [employees].
"If a man or woman drinks, gossips, hangs around with wrong companions, owes money, or is a homosexual, we waste no time in getting rid of them. And it is easy to get rid of them promptly under regular civil service procedures.
"But by doing it this way, we at least save the [employee] the stigma of being fired under the loyalty-security program. It at least gives them a chance to make a new start and repair their lives and try to get another job.
"Of course, if any subversive element is involved, we fire under loyalty-security. But in most cases we proceed under regular civil service dismissal procedures."
Under civil service procedures, an [employee] can be fired, within five days of being presented with charges. In the case of veterans, they have an appeal but can be suspended from the payroll pending outcome of the appeal.
Air Force officials say their system is working very well.
"If we have the goods on an [employee], we can get rid of them just as quickly under regular civil service procedures," one of the officials said. "And by doing that, we are not indiscriminately lumping every one together as Communist spies."
