Black Immigrants and Race Preferences
It’s retro Tuesday!
According to a study published two years ago in the American Journal of Education, the proportion of black immigrants at private and the most competitive colleges and universities was higher than the proportion of black Americans. First- or second-generation black immigrants, who accounted for 13 percent of black students age 18 or 19 attending colleges and universities in the U.S., accounted for over a quarter of black students at selective colleges. (Source)
Why the discrepancy?
The study notes statistical differences between black American and black immigrant students, which include the following: 1) immigrants were more likely to be raised by two parents; 2) their fathers were “much more educated;” and 3) immigrants were more likely to have attended private schools.
The article notes the ruckus raised in 2003, when Lani Guinier (pictured) complained about black immigrants, who are not descended from American slaves, benefiting from race preferences. (The assumption is black students, regardless of nationality or whether their ancestors experienced human bondage, are admitted under lowered standards.)
Columnist Clarence Page weighed in on the discussion and said immigrants simply work harder. In a 2004 column he wrote:
“Why are black students whose families have been in America for generations being left behind by newcomers, including black newcomers from other countries?…They work harder, in part, because their parents work harder – and their parents work harder because of their relentless optimism: Where others might see a dead-end job, immigrants of all colors see an entry-level opportunity.”
Henry Louis Gates told the New York Times, “We need to learn what the immigrants’ kids have so we can bottle it and sell it, because many members of the African-American community, particularly among the chronically poor, have lost that sense of purpose and values which produced our generation.”
Race preferences are discriminatory, no matter who benefits. Do preference proponents have the moral authority to declare that some “people of color” are more deserving of preferences than others?
