Archive for Quotas
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The American Prospect’s Adam Serwer thinks the Ricci v. DeStefano case is all about white men complaining that they “can’t get a break.” Apparently, studying for and passing a test for a promotion in one’s career and having the results thrown out because too many people in your racial group also qualified for promotions is much ado about nothing.
In his post, Serwer mixes apples and oranges. He says that based on critics’ comments about Judge Sonia Sotomayor being unqualified for the U.S. Supreme Court, America must keep discriminatory practices in place to balance such beliefs. An excerpt:
This is exactly what affirmative action is meant to correct: People coming to the arbitrary conclusion that someone is “an idiot” despite all evidence to the contrary, except if you consider not being a white man evidence. Sotomayor’s detractors see themselves as Frank Riccis, white men whose greatness isn’t recognized because we’re too busy giving brown people who can’t tie their shoes certificates of achievement. But the truth is that in life and in employment, discrimination rarely manifests itself the way it did against Ricci, as something as easy to quantify as an unfair test. It’s far more insidious — a rumor, a feeling, a notion that the person standing in front of you who doesn’t look like you is just “dumb and obnoxious.” So you throw their resume in the “no” pile because you don’t like their name, you seat them in the back of the class, you promote another person. You just can’t really explain why. It’s… just a feeling.
Notwithstanding Serwer’s over-the-top reaction to race preferences opponents’ reasonable concerns about individuals like Frank Ricci being penalized because of skin color, Serwer seems to be saying that racial discrimination against whites is justified to guard against racial discrimination against blacks. Does that make sense? Racial discrimination is okay because racial discrimination exists.
If I’m reading him wrong, I’m sure he’ll let me know.
Incidentally, Sotomayer is connected to the Ricci case. She was on the panel of judges that ruled against the New Haven firefighters, a decision that resulted in the Supreme Court’s review of the case.
Proponents of lowered standards for blacks, whether they think it’s necessary to make up for past discrimination or to increase minority representation, have nowhere to go but in a circle. To justify preferences is to ignore the U.S. Constitution, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the entire Civil Rights movement. The purpose was to put the government out of the skin color business, and for almost two generations, the government has remained in business.
Serwer (disparagingly) links to an excellent article by Richard Cohen, Washington Post columnist. A liberal, Cohen not so much sides with Ricci as he does with fair treatment. He makes the point that Ricci was in no way personally responsible for racial disparities in the fire department and shouldn’t be penalized for them. He writes:
We should never confuse unfair with illegal. Still it would be nice if every once in a while they coincided. That is especially the case in matters such as this because the justification for affirmative action gets weaker and weaker. Maybe once it was possible to argue that some innocent people had to suffer in the name of progress, but a glance at the White House strongly suggests that things have changed. For most Americans, race has become supremely irrelevant. Everyone knows this. Every poll shows this. Maybe the Supreme Court will recognize this.
Liberalism, a movement in which I hold a conditional membership, would be wise to get wise to what has happened. Blatant affirmative action always entailed a disturbing and ex post facto changing of the rules — oops, you’re white. Sorry, not what we wanted. As a consequence, it was not racists who were punished but all whites. There is no need to cling to such a remedy anymore. There is, though, every need to retain and strengthen anti-discrimination laws, especially in areas such as fire departments, where racial discrimination was once endemic. Sufficient progress has been made to revert to treating individuals as individuals. After all, it is not some amorphous entity called “whites” who will suffer: It is un-lieutenant Ricci.
I doubt people on either side of the preferences debate will ever see eye-to-eye. One side believes individuals should be equal before the law regardless of race, and the other side believes racial discrimination in the other direction is justified based on an arbitrary notion of diversity. Speaking only for myself, the issue is black and white, with no shades of gray. A government with the power to discriminate in favor of blacks can use that same power to discriminate against blacks. The issue is not whether pockets of bigotry still exist. The issue is whether racial discrimination is emanating from the government. Everything else is negotiable.
Let’s hope the Supreme Court makes the right decision in Ricci.
Update: When the liberal Los Angeles Times sees the unfairness of throwing out test results because too many whites passed, you know the times are a-changing (pun not intended).
Filed under: Diversity, Judiciary, Quotas | |1 Comment
Whoever thought that 40-some years after the civil rights movement, whites would be suing the government for racial discrimination?
Ricci v. DeStefano, the New Haven firefighters case currently before the U.S. Supreme Court, is the latest in a line of so-called reverse discrimination cases. Although mainstream media use the term “reverse discrimination,” racial discrimination is wrong no matter which group is the target. We can’t make amends for racial discrimination against blacks by permitting racial discrimination against whites. The government must get out of the skin color business if this country has any hope of moving forward in race relations.
Perhaps it was President Lyndon Baines Johnson’s commencement speech at Howard University in 1965 that convinced institutions that discriminating in favor of black Americans was in order. An excerpt:
But freedom is not enough. You do not wipe away the scars of centuries by saying: Now you are free to go where you want, and do as you desire, and choose the leaders you please.
You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, “you are free to compete with all the others,” and still justly believe that you have been completely fair.
Thus it is not enough just to open the gates of opportunity. All our citizens must have the ability to walk through those gates.
This is the next and the more profound stage of the battle for civil rights. We seek not just freedom but opportunity. We seek not just legal equity but human ability, not just equality as a right and a theory but equality as a fact and equality as a result.
For the task is to give 20 million Negroes the same chance as every other American to learn and grow, to work and share in society, to develop their abilities–physical, mental and spiritual, and to pursue their individual happiness.
To this end equal opportunity is essential, but not enough, not enough.
In these words lay the foundation of racial preferences, race norming, and other practices that lower standards for blacks in order to satisfy an arbitrary skin deep-only diversity requirement, alleviate the burden of historical guilt, and penalize non-blacks who had nothing to do with past discrimination. Inevitably, doling out race-based perks to minorities harms members of non-preferred races, a practice obviously unconstitutional. The government’s quest to narrow educational and employment gaps between the races and increase minority representation may be noble in theory. In practice, it’s repugnant. As long as it continues, strained race relations and cases like Ricci v. DeStefano will exist.
This Associated Press article highlights the “reverse discrimination” issue and quotes Roger Clegg, of the Center for Equal Opportunity:
“The laws that Congress wrote are clear — everyone is protected from racial discrimination. Not just blacks, but whites. Not just Latinos, but whites…Quotas do not end discrimination. They are discrimination. The law makes clear that race, ethnicity and sex are not to be part of who gets a government contract or who gets into a university or where someone goes to school.”
Filed under: Judiciary, Quotas, Roger Clegg | |Comments off
In January, I blogged about Texas lawmakers’ efforts to modify the state’s 10 percent admissions policy for tax-supported colleges and universities. If a student graduates in the top 10 percent of his class in Texas, he’s guaranteed admission to any public college or university in the state, regardless of the high school’s academic standards.
University of Texas (UT) President William Powers complained about an unintended consequence of the so-called Ten Percent Plan. It was causing capacity problems. Powers said if lawmakers didn’t change the policy, UT would run out of room for students who are not admitted under the policy.
Last week, a Texas Senate panel voted 4-1 to modify the policy. Students graduating in the top 10 percent of their class would no longer be guaranteed admission to public colleges and universities. Additionally, the bill would cap Ten Percent Plan admissions to 50 percent as opposed to the current 80 percent at UT. The bill now goes to the full Senate. (Source)
The Texas Ten Percent Plan was the result of a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit case, Hopwood v. Texas (1996). The court ruled that using race preferences in college admissions to achieve “diversity” was unconstitutional. Consequently, Texas created a new policy to admit more black and Hispanic students in a race-neutral way. Unfortunately, UT returned to the practice of considering race in admissions after the Supreme Court ruled in 2003 that race could be a factor.
Filed under: Diversity, Quotas | |Comments off
The Dickinson School of Law at Penn State University and the Carlisle Area School District plan to increase racial diversity by encouraging minorities to pursue law degrees and to apply for teaching jobs in local schools. (Source)
There is nothing illegal or immoral about wanting to attract minorities. In fact, that’s what affirmative action is all about. If they desire, institutions may extend outreach to people previously excluded from or denied opportunities. The illegality and immorality of this outreach exists when government-funded institutions treat minority applicants differently from the general pool, which typically involves lowering hiring and admissions standards for minorities.
Pennsylvania presently doesn’t allow initiatives or referendums to appear on the state ballot. Voters in California, Washington, Michigan, and Colorado barred their state and local governments from discriminating against or preferring people in hiring, contracting, or admissions based on factors like race and sex.
Filed under: Quotas | |Comments off
Last November, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit voided a law that established a five percent quota to award defense contracts to so-called disadvantaged small business owners, a decision with the potential to invalidate 8(a) of the Small Business Act contracting programs.
Under the provision, it was presumed that black, Asian, Hispanic, and American Indian business owners were socially disadvantaged.
The court contended that the quota requirement violates the Equal Protection clause “because it authorizes the Defense Department to afford preferential treatment on the basis of race and does not meet a ’strict scrutiny’ standard…Under this requirement, the government must prove that the preference is ‘narrowly tailored to serve a compelling government interest.’”
Last week the Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) announced that the Department of Justice and the Department of Defense will not seek review from the U.S. Supreme Court. The appeals court’s ruling stands. PLF submitted a brief in the case.
From PLF attorney Sharon L. Browne:
“The Administration’s decision to let the Defense Department’s quotas in contracting program die is a victory for fairness, justice, and the principle of equal opportunity…Government discrimination because of race or ethnicity is wrong. This kind of bias sends a harmful message to people that their skin color is what defines them, and in the contracting sphere it undermines efficiency and drives up costs. Everyone who believes in the core values of civil rights and that the law should be color-blind, should welcome the demise of the Pentagon’s practice of tipping the balance by race in the use of public money.”
Visit PLF’s web site to download the case ruling and brief.
Filed under: Judiciary, Quotas | |Comments off
Dilemmas, dilemmas! It seems that Texas’s practice of automatically admitting any student who graduates in the top 10 percent of his high school class is having unintended but reasonably expected consequences. A little background…
In 1996, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled in Hopwood v. Texas that using race preferences in college admissions to achieve “diversity” was unconstitutional. Consequently, the second largest state in the Union adopted the so-called Ten Percent Plan to admit a certain percentage of black and Hispanic students in a race-neutral way. Regardless of a high school’s academic standards, if a student graduates in the top 10 percent of his class, he’s guaranteed admission to any government college or university in the state.
In 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal that Texas schools should be allowed to admit students based on skin color.
Earlier this week, University of Texas (UT) President William Powers discussed one unintended consequence of the Ten Percent Plan. Eighty-one percent of Texas freshmen were admitted through the 10 percent rule. If lawmakers don’t change the policy for 2009, says Powers, UT will run out of room for students who are not admitted under the policy. (Source)
“We’ve lost control of our entering class because we don’t have any discretion on the admissions,” Powers said. (Would using race to admit students fall under his definition of discretion?)
Powers says allowing students to transfer from community colleges may remedy the problem.
The Ten Percent Plan has achieved the goal of increasing the number of black and Hispanic students, but what about qualifications? Are relatively under-qualified 10-percenters being admitted over non-10-percenters who nevertheless have superior qualifications? Without any statistical backing whatsoever – just a good dose of common sense – I’d say the answer is OF COURSE. The plan obviously is being used as a proxy for race.
Filed under: Diversity, Quotas | |1 Comment
A Washington Post columnist recently wrote about a ruling we blogged about last month. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit voided a law that established a five percent quota to award defense contracts to so-called disadvantaged small business owners. The decision may invalidate 8(a) of the Small Business Act contracting programs. (Source)
“The impact of the decision is unclear; the court’s focus on an old Pentagon rule to decide the case created uncertainty about whether the set-aside remains,” writes Joe Davidson. “But if the panel’s ruling stands, the implications for minority-owned companies that received almost $15 billion in fiscal year 2006 in Defense Department contracts could alter a long-standing program that allowed under-represented groups access to lucrative government contracts.”
Strike another blow for racial spoils.
So-called minority-owned businesses will have to get by on quality of service and reputation. Davidson believes businesses owned by racial minorities should get preferential treatment to “right a long series of wrongs that have accumulated over generations.” The problem is the people who receive government set-asides don’t have any legal claims to reparations-type of compensation, nor do the people penalized for being white bear any legal responsibility for discriminatory actions of the past.
But that’s my contention, not the Federal Circuit’s. (If I were queen of the world!) Davidson notes that Congress didn’t present strong evidence to show that the Department of Defense was a “passive participant in pervasive, nationwide racial discrimination” to justify preferential treatment to right racial wrongs of the past.
I would be eager — eager — to see evidence that minority-owned businesses didn’t receive certain contracts because the businesses are owned by blacks or women, and not because they’re not competitive. Good luck with all that.
Filed under: Judiciary, Quotas | |2 Comments
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has voided a law that established a five percent quota to award defense contracts to so-called disadvantaged small business owners. According to Government Executive, the decision may invalidate 8(a) of the Small Business Act contracting programs.
Under the provision, blacks, Asians, Hispanics, and American Indians were presumed to be “socially disadvantaged,” whether individual owners are actually disadvantaged or not.
The court contended that the quota requirement violates the Equal Protection clause “because it authorizes the Defense Department to afford preferential treatment on the basis of race and does not meet a ’strict scrutiny’ standard…Under this requirement, the government must prove that the preference is ‘narrowly tailored to serve a compelling government interest.’”
Bravo to the court for applying the Equal Protection clause to people of all races, as it was intended. Setting aside government contracts for someone based on skin color obviously is wrong, although it would be more obvious to some if set-asides harmed blacks. Consistency is the key. Racial discrimination, no matter who benefits, is wrong.
Filed under: Judiciary, Quotas | |Comments off
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