Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons^™

Book Review: In The Matter Of Color: Race & The American Legal Process-The Colonial Period. By Leon Higgenbotham, Jr. , 12 J. Marshall J. Prac. & Proc. 731 (1979), Robert Kratovil

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Affirmative Action And The Harvard College Diversity-Discretion Model: Paradigm Or Pretext?, Alan M. Dershowitz, Laura Hanft

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Unresolved Problems Of Reverse Discrimination, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

The current widespread use of remedial affirmative action programs makes the legitimacy of reverse discrimination a pragmatic social concern. That alone, however, would not explain the intense interest generated by Regents of the University of California v. Bakke. The question posed in the case compels our attention because it forces a choice between two values that occupy a high place in the liberal conception of justice and claim substantial support in the equal protection clause. On the one hand, justice requires that groups that have previously suffered gross discrimination be given truly equal opportunity in American life; on the other, …

Bakke As Precedent: Does Mr. Justice Powell Have A Theory, Vincent A. Blasi

Faculty Scholarship

What does it all mean? The Supreme Court's decision in Regents of the University of California v. Bakke invites assessment at many levels. Was it really a "Solomonic compromise" worthy of our constitutional tradition, as some prominent scholars have suggested? Or does the decision represent, as I believe it does, a disturbing failure by the Court to discharge its responsibility to give coherent, practical meaning to our most important constitutional ideals? Does the uncharacteristically opaque and simplistic opinion of Justice Stevens mask deep divisions and ambivalences among the four justices who subscribed to it? Can there be any validity to …

Racial Vote Dilution In Multimember Districts: The Constitutional Standard After Washington V. Davis, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

This Note argues that the effect-oriented standard for multimember-district vote-dilution claims is unaffected by the Washington intent requirement. Part I outlines the manner in which multimember districts can dilute minority voting strength. After summarizing Washington's intent requirement, Part II surveys the post-Washington vote dilution cases and demonstrates that the applicability of the intent standard to vote dilution claims is uncertain. Part III first suggests two ways in which White and Washington may be reconciled. That section then argues that White is unaffected by the intent requirement because the standard for vote dilution fits within a fundamental interest analysis …

Discussion Of Papers Presented By Nathaniel R. Jones And Daniel D. Polsby, Robert Allen Sedler

Law Faculty Research Publications

Comments on Metropolitan Desegregation and the Courts

The Expansion Of Federal Jurisdiction And The Crisis In The Courts, Harry Phillips

Vanderbilt Law Review

Diversity jurisdiction has undergone intensive scrutiny and criticism for many years, with some commentators advocating repeal, and others urging retention. Among the critics of diversity jurisdiction are some of the legal profession's most prominent members. Roscoe Pound, Louis D. Brandeis, and Charles William Eliot were members of a committee that questioned diversity jurisdiction as long ago as 1914, and Senator George W. Norris of Nebraska led the Senate Judiciary Committee in recommending repeal of diversity jurisdiction in 1928. In 1954, Associate Justice Felix Frankfurter, an ardent foe of diversity jurisdiction, referred to "the mounting mischief inflicted on the federal judicial …

The Race, Class And Housing Conundrum: A Rationale And Proposal For A Legislative Policy Of Suburban Inclusion, Charles E. Daye

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

Judicial Protection Of Minorities, Terrance Sandalow

Articles

In United States v. Carolene Products Co., Justice Stone suggested by indirection that there "may be narrower scope for operation of the presumption of constitutionality" when courts are called upon to determine the validity "of statutes directed at particular religious . . . or national . . . or racial minorities."' In such cases, he explained, "prejudice against discrete and insular minorities may be a special condition, which tends seriously to curtail the operation of those political processes ordinarily to be relied upon to protect minorities, and which may call for a correspondingly more searching judicial inquiry."' Forty years later, …

Racial Preferences In Higher Education: Political Responsibility And The Judicial Role, Terrance Sandalow

Book Chapters

... Professors John Hart Ely and Richard Posner have established diametrically opposed positions in the debate. Their contributions are of special interest because each undertakes to answer the question within the framework of a theory concerning the proper distribution of authority between the judiciary and the other institutions of government

...Professor Ely [see pp. 208-216, herein] defends the constitutionality of racial preferences, essentially on the ground that the equal-protection clause should not be read to prevent a majority from discriminating between itself and a minority only to its own disadvantage. The predicate for an active judicial role is lacking, ... …

Book Review: Graglia, Disaster By Decree, Robert A. Sedler

Law Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

The Thirteenth And Fourteenth Amendments: Constitutional Authority For Federal Legislation Against Private Sex Discrimination, Emily Calhoun

Publications

No abstract provided.

Bakke: A Compelling Need To Discriminate, Theodore J. St. Antoine

Articles

Two of America's most cherished values collided head-on a few months ago, when the U.S. Supreme Court began to come to grips with the most significant civil rights suit since the school desegregation cases of 1954. Arrayed on one side is the principle of governmental "color-blindness," the appealing notion that the color of a person's skin should have nothing to do with the distribution of benefits or burdens by the state. Set against it is the goal of a truly integrated society, and the tragic realization that this objective cannot be achieved within the foreseeable future unless race and color …

A New Dimension In Equal Protection?, Theodore J. St. Antoine

Articles

Two of America's most cherished values will collide head-on this year, when the U.S. Supreme Court comes to grips with the most significant civil rights suit since the school desegregation cases of 1954. Arrayed on one side is the principle of governmental "color-blindness," the appealing notion that the color of a person's skin should have nothing to do with the distribution of benefits or burdens by the state. Set against it is the goal of a truly integrated society and the tragic realization that this objective cannot be achieved within the foreseeable future unless race and color are taken into …

Illusion And Contradiction In The Quest For A Desegregated Metropolis, Henry Mcgee

Faculty Articles

A decade of litigation in which the central issue of discrimination essentially was uncontested thus far has failed to disestablish racial segregation or produce desperately needed low-income housing for Chicago blacks. Recently, the unconcluded litigation has produced a unanimous United States Supreme Court decision exposing suburban racial sanctuaries to the possibility of integrated public housing units. Although the first-named plaintiff in the suit, Dorothy Gautreaux, did not survive the decision, the extent of her posthumous triumph is the central theme of this article. Although Gautreaux superficially indicates that a federal judge has the power to desegregate federally subsidized housing and …

Proportional Representation By Race: The Constitutionality Of Benign Racial Redistricting, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

Wilson raises two questions that are basic to the use of "benign" racial classifications in drawing legislative districts. First, is there a constitutional right to proportional representation and, second, if there is no such right, are there circumstances under which a scheme devised to provide proportional representation is constitutionally permissible. This Note will demonstrate that, while the Supreme Court recognizes the constitutional right of each individual to participate on an equal basis in the community's political process and to enjoy an undiluted vote, it denies any constitutional right of groups to proportional political representation. It will then show that the …

Affirmative Action: Hypocritical Euphemism Or Noble Mandate?, Theodore J. St. Antoine

Articles

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was adopted in an atmosphere of monumental naivete. Congress apparently believed that equal employment opportunity could be achieved simply by forbidding employers or unions to "discriminate" on the basis of "race, color, religion, sex, or national origin," and expressly disavowed any intention to require "preferential treatment." Perhaps animated by the Supreme Court's stirring desegregation decisions of the 1950's, the proponents of civil rights legislation made "color-blindness" the rallying cry of the hour. Today we know better. The dreary statistics, so familiar to anyone who works in this field, tell the story. …

Power(Lessness) And Dispersion: Comments On Chester Mcguire's The Urban Development Act Of 1974, Community Development Funds And Black Economic Problems, Henry Mcgee

Faculty Articles

Professor McGee discusses Chester McGuire's comprehensive, provocative and good-humored assessment of the Housing and Community Development Act of 1974 (HCDA). McGuire suggests both ominous and benign trends in the shift of political power and allocation of material resources in the United States. In analyzing the McGuire’s assessment of the HCDA, Professor McGee addresses how the act affects minority groups, particularly Black Americans.

Immunity Under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983, Ernest B. Fullwood

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

Rural Land Banking: The Canadian Experience, John Mcclaughry

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

Benign Discrimination In Employment Viewed As Protection Of The Restitution Interest Of Minority Persons, Jack H. Glymph

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Burden Of Brown On Blacks: History-Based Observations On A Landmark Decision, Derrick A. Bell Jr.

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

Employer Racial Discrimination: Reviewing The Role Of The Nlrb, Lawrence F. Doppelt

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The NLRB and various commentators rely upon three basic legal arguments in rejecting this interpretation: first, the EEOC, and not the NLRB, is the sole and proper agency for litigating racial issues; second, employer racial discrimination does not interfere with the protected rights of employees under the Act, and third, it is not, and never was, Congress' intent in passing the Act to bring racial discrimination within its purview. Unquestionably, each of these legal arguments has, or at some time had, surface appeal, and, at one time, considerable force. The great mass of legal commentary supports at least one of …

Judicial Scrutiny Of "Benign" Racial Preference In Law School Admissions, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

Racial preferences for blacks generate ambivalence in those who care about racial equality and also believe that individuals should be judged "on their own merits." This ambivalence is reflected in divergent "equal protection" values, the value of eliminating barriers to equality imposed on minority groups and that of distributing the burdens and benefits of social life without reference to arbitrary distinctions. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that after Marco DeFunis, Jr. challenged the constitutionality of racial preferences for admission to a state law school, the Supreme Court's resolution of the issue was awaited with intense interest and some trepidation. For …

The Protection Of Respect And Human Rights: Freedom Of Choice And World Public Order, Myers Mcdougal, Harold Lasswell, Lung-Chu Chen

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

Racial Preferences In Higher Education: Political Responsibility And The Judicial Role, Terrance Sandalow

Articles

Controversy continues unabated over the question left unresolved by DeFunis v. Odegaard: whether in its admissions process a state law school may accord preferential treatment to certain racial and ethnic minorities. In the pages of two journals published by the University of Chicago, Professors John Hart Ely and Richard Posner have established diametrically opposed positions in the debate. Their contributions are of special interest because each undertakes to answer the question within the framework of a theory concerning the proper distribution of authority between the judiciary and the other institutions of government. Neither position, in my judgment, adequately confronts the …

Negro Demonstrations And The Law: Danville As A Test Case, James W. Ely, Jr.

Vanderbilt Law Review

In at least some measure, the Negro demonstrations of the 1960's were an attempt to create tensions and intimidate the white public into taking actions favored by the black minority, or, that failing, to provoke such a savage reaction from the whites as to arouse national public opinion. Violence and threats of violence were an integral part of this strategy. It is to the credit of Virginia leaders at all levels that they recognized this overt threat and refused to yield to extra-legal tactics. One of the most unhappy legacies of the 1960's was the wide-spread notion that questions of …

America And Reconsruction, Thomas B. Grier

IUSTITIA

Reconstruction has variously been termed "repressive. . . uncivilized" and "a sordid time" as well as "a noble experiment." Reflected in those judgments of the era is the dispute over the effects of Reconstruction. To be more correct, one might say that there has been much conjecture in determining what, in fact, Reconstruction was. Questioned also has been the role of the black man during the period; much of what he did, or was responsible for, has, like Reconstruction itself, been subject to many and varied accounts and evaluations. The intent of this paper is to examine several volumes concerned …

Higher Education: The Black Professional, Donald H. Godbold, Andrew Goodrich, William Moore, Jr.,

IUSTITIA

The black professional in the community college is a catalog of contradictions. His or her condition can only be described as tragic; and his or her plight is a travesty on the philosophy of the two-year college. The preliminary findings of one study in progress note that nearly half (409 or 47 per cent) of the 865 two-year institutions included in the sample do not have a single black faculty member or administrator. Eighty-nine of the remaining 456 colleges have only one black staff member. Similarly, there are a number of community colleges located in areas heavily populated by blacks …

Affirmative Action: Quotas And Traditional University Standards With Particular Emphasis On The Role Of The Department Chairman, William D. Wheeler

IUSTITIA

The higher educational institution is often an exclusive citadel. Students are selected after close scrutiny of past achievements. Teachers as merchants of ideas, virtues, and cosmic thoughts are invited to membership only after certain academic passports have been acquired. These eligibility criteria are established by the faculty who, presumably, are the only ones capable of assessing reasonable standards for those seeking admission. Colleges and universities are closed sub-communities. They practice discrimination while giving lip service to liberal thought, knowledge, and enlightenment. It comes, therefore, as little surprise to clear thinkers that the house of intellect leads the parade of culprits …