Tower Amendment

The Tower Amendment, proposed to the United States Senate in 1974, was meant to restrict the power of Title IX, which was signed into law by former President Richard Nixon on June 23, 1972. Title IX states that “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance" and was signed into law by former President Richard Nixon on June 23, 1972, the amendment, however, was never ratified.[2] Senator John Tower, a Republican from Texas, sought to exempt revenue-producing sports from Title IX. It was meant to “provide equal access for male and female students to the educational process and the extracurricular activities in a school, where there is not a unique facet such as football involved”. [3] However, his proposal was rejected by the Senate and so he started a group movement along with several other senators to pass this amendment. [1] They felt that requiring equal federal funding for both girls and boys sports would curtail the profits made by revenue-producing sports. [1] For example, a male sport such as football, which requires more money for gear and events, as well as produces more revenue, than a sport like girls volleyball, might suffer if their funding was significantly decreased. They firmly believed that this mandate would hurt the schools and that the federal government was overstepping its constitutional powers, and that the only “reasonable solution [was] to allow revenue producing sports to support themselves while making excess funds available to other sports for men and women”. [3]

Despite the rejection from the Senate, other senators who supported Tower’s proposal and joined forces, creating the Javits Amendment one month after the Tower Amendment’s rejection. The Javits Amendment was similar to the Tower Amendment, and was proposed by Senator Javits, a Republican from New York. He requested that the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) issue regulations on Title IX regarding intercollegiate athletic activities. [1] He, like Tower, believed that revenue-producing sports should not be taken into account when considering Title IX compliance. However, his proposal was also rejected, and the HEW instead required that schools provide equal opportunity to men and women in athletics. Still, the growing group of senators and representatives continued to push for restrictions on Title IX. In 1975, Representative O’Hara, a Republican from Michigan, introduced House Bill 8394, which proposed the usage of revenue produced by a certain sport to pay for that sport’s extra cost, then use the excess to pay for additional costs in other sports. [4] However, his bill died in committee. [5] Then, in 1977, Senators Tower, Bartlett, and Hruska introduced Senate Bill 2106, which would exclude revenue-producing sports from Title IX. Though the fight continued, the Senate rejected this last attempt at passing the amendment. In the 1984 ruling of Grove City v Bell, the Supreme Court stated that Title IX did not apply to sports, except in the case of scholarship opportunities. [4] This ruling was reversed by the Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987, which required equality in federal funding for sports. Still, opponents of Title IX did not give up, and the National Wrestling Association, the College Gymnastics Association, and the US Track Coaches Association, representing male sports, filed suit against Title IX, saying that the regulations were unconstitutional. The Department of Justice dismissed the suit of narrow grounds, and the government continued to enforce equal spending in sports. The Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act was passed in 1994 to reinforce equality in federal funding for schools, and required that coeducational colleges and universities that used federal funds for student financial aid programs needed to submit annual reports with information about intercollegiate athletics programs. [6]

Women Participating in Sports 1970s with Former Democratic Senator Birch Bayh. [7]

The Tower Amendment was named after former Republican Senator from Texas, John Tower. He was a campaign worker under presidential candidate, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and experienced many feats during his time entering the U.S. Senate. He is known for opposing both the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 The Tower Amendment liquidated the rule that both men and women’s  intercollegiate sports, taking place in federal financially funded institutions, needed to generate the same amount of revenue. Many senators disagreed with the Tower Amendment and their reasoning stemmed from arguments made by former Democratic Senator, Birch Bayh, that it would create “blanket exemption from Title IX” and propositions from the Subcommittee on Education that “all athletic scholarships should be limited to men”. [8] Some senators thought this would nullify the work done with through the passage of Title IX in 1972. [8] The efforts to reduce the regulations around revenue producing sports under Title IX led to a pattern of amendments being proposed and denied by the Senate. For example, The Javits Amendment, proposed after the Tower Amendment was dismissed by the Senate, suggested regulations on intercollegiate sports from the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare in 1974. [1] Additionally, House Bill 8394 in 1975 faced a similar fate. [9]As journalist Karen Blumenthal noted,"These sports, mainly football and basketball, had huge budgets already established for men, which coaches wanted untouched by other programs, especially women's programs. But, as Blumenthal added, "How even could the balance be if the 105 spots on a football team at the time--and the 105 athletic scholarships that went along with them--didn't count at all"? [10]

Some senators believed that the passing of the Tower Amendment  would not affect title IX, which would continue to apply appropriately to the rest of intercollegiate athletics, including the production of money to sustain less revenue producing sports. Other senators thought that the amendment was diluted. The Tower Amendment called for sports to split the revenue of their major revenue producing sports and apply it to other less revenue producing sports. [8] The Republican Senator from Nebraska, Roman Hruska draws the attention towards Nebraska football and how they made 800,000 dollars one season. [8] He questions how much money the government will make him give to women's athletics. He also questions what will happen if the football program declines and there is no more money because they had to share it. He believes that the enactment of the law would get rid of confusion and complicated measures that Title IX includes. The Tower Amendment was believed to help protect the revenues of major producing sports at each college. Other Colleges such as Southern Methodist University voiced similar concerns about the controlling of revenues through Title IX. [8]

• Title IX
• Education Amendment of 1972