Law Commons^™

The New Logic Of Affirmative Action, Charles W. Collier

UF Law Faculty Publications

Is affirmative action inherently preferential, discriminatory, and thus inconsistent with the Constitution's guarantee of equal protection? This question is basic to the legal discussion of affirmative action, and yet it seems to me that it has not been adequately addressed, much less analyzed. Clearly, there is no shortage of individual abuses and misuses in the name of “affirmative action,” and these have been amply documented elsewhere. My primary concern is with what might be termed the “logic” of affirmative action.

Sexual Orientation: A Plea For Inclusion, Sharon E. Rush

UF Law Faculty Publications

White women and people of color have made significant scholarly contribution toward a better understanding of patriarchy and racial hegemony. Other outsider scholars, such as lesbians, gay men, and bisexuals, also have spoken out about how hegemony subordinates them to the dominant culture. That subordination creates a common pain of exclusion. All subordinated people should explore the sources of common pain that come from exclusion from the power and privilege generally enjoyed by members of the dominant culture.

Virtual Equality As Constitutional Reality: An Introduction, Berta E. Hernández-Truyol

UF Law Faculty Publications

Equality is, to be sure, an elusive concept. More often than not, we find it much easier to describe what is unequal (we know it when we see it) than affirmatively to explain equality. This definitional dilemma rises to new heights when courts, in exercising their interpretive legal functions, have to provide all persons the equal protection of the laws."

Over the course of American history and jurisprudence, the Supreme Court itself has a checkered past when it comes to judicial application of rights to equality. In the beginning, there was slavery - the quintessence of unequality - and the …