I didn’t say I had a brilliant solution. I just said that we need to find one that doesn’t institutionalize racial discrimination, which has been found to be unconstitutional. We can, of course, amend the constitution to allow racial discrimination, but I wouldn’t recommend that. Would you?
So what you’re saying is that we should have racial diversity in public schools without considering the race of the kids that make up the population of these schools? I hope I’m not oversimplifying, but that’s exactly what I got out of these two decisions (Seattle & Louisville).
Both school districts tried various ways to do this without reaching the required diversity. Race was only a consideration as a tiebreaker, and is second or third in priorities for that tiebreaker.
Justice Breyer is absolutely correct in my view: To reach racial equality, race has to play a part, if only to know how many of what color kid is in your school. It’s not separate but equal (because all students in all public schools within that district should have the same opportunities), but a tracking method to get to the as-required-by-law resulting populations.
The thing is, although Brown talks about nondiscrimination, the court orders that went into effect as a direct result of Brown II explicitly discriminated in the manner considered in this case: schools bused students according to race in order to forcibly integrate schools. The fact that this is what schools did in response to the SC decision indicates that Brown II was frowning on segregationist discrimination, not discrimination that resulted in less disparity between the races.
It looks to me as though the current decision deliberately misinterprets the wording of Brown II in order to make a decision whose net effect will be to accelerate the resegregation of public schools.
Daniel
We could neutralize the racial component of the argument by neutralizing the economic component. By and large, the schools that are predominately of one racial grouping are also predominately of one economic grouping. I very much doubt that many black parents will be spoiling to send thier children to a predominately white school if that school is inferior.
But so long as school are funded on property taxes, the comfortable will be inclined to resist, the poor inclined to agitate. Racial justice without economic justice is thin gruel.
That was more or less my thinking, too. It might (I emphasize might) be considered inconsistent with Brown to allow different funding options for schools within a state. That might (again, might) be considered another form of “separate but equal”. I’m dubious of that option though, because it would disallow wealthier people from voluntarily increasing the funding of schools their kids attend.
I will note, however, that one of the justices (Stevens?) said in this court decision that remedies relying solely on economic indeces have been ineffective. I don’t know what facts he cited to back that opinion up.
I define racial justice as color-blind policies: treating everyone under law and policy the same, without regard to race. Do you?
I don’t know what you mean by “economic justice.” Could you offer a definition?
I do not. I would add an addendum: except inasmuch as someone has already experienced injustice based on their race, under which circumstances they may be treated unequally only to the minimum degree necessary to correct past wrongdoings. Justice means treating folks in relevantly similar circumstances in a relevantly similar manner; if someone has suffered the effects of racial injustice in the past, and someone else has benefited from the effects of past racial injustice, treating them in a relevantly similar fashion is itself unjust.
That said, I do think it’s time for a major case equivalent to Brown, in which it’s declared that schools funded at inherently dissimilar levels are inherently unequal (once factors such as cost of living have been accounted for), and therefore unconstitutional.
Daniel
Was that addressed to me? If so, no, that is not what I’m saying. I don’t know that we “should have racial diversity” in public schools. We shouldn’t forbid racial diversity, per Brown, but we shouldn’t require it if we must discriminate by race in order to achieve it.
First answered handily by LeftDork.
As for the second, I have every confidence in you, and am quite sure you can cobble together a pretty good definition without further instruction.
I wonder how SCOTUS would feel about leaving the kids in their neighborhood schools but busing the money itself from the richer neighborhoods to the poorer. Just big bags of money.
Sailboat
I don’t know that they would have anything at all to say about that, constitutionally. If a state wants to fund schools exclusively out of general tax revenues, or spread the revenues from property taxes equally across the state, I don’t see how that would violate the constitution in any way. Did you have something in mind?
But it isn’t just money. The Coleman Report in the late 1960s made that case. Yes, money is a huge part of it. But parental involvement and social capital is potentially equally huge, if not greater.
Take a look at the most affluent, high-achieving suburban schools. See how much assistance the teams, from football to debate, get from parents. There’s often a booster club that supplements the athletic budget. Or the volunteers are college-educated moms who are now staying at home. Or the debate teacher is assisted by a few parents, who happen to be lawyers… and so on. Low-income, majority minority schools don’t typically have that kind of support, because the parents don’t have that level of education, or jobs that allow them time to visit or volunteer in the schools. They also don’t have the personal connection with school board members to get the issues important to their kids front and center.
If you look at census data, you can see quite clearly that their are racial disparities in home ownership, income, life expectancy, and so forth. (It should be noted, though, that the income gap is almost completely closed with four-year college degree attainment.) So we should be trying to make sure as many kids of color get to college, and earn degrees. Let’s do that for a while, and then we can move on to this color-blind dream. We can’t get from A to Z without taking steps B through Y first.
Money helps. But so does parental involvement, political power, and media attention, things that majority minority schools often lack.
We’ll have to agree to disagree, because I don’t believe it’s possible to quanitfy the “minimum degree necessary to correct past wrongdoings,” and the efforts to do so create a cure worse than the disease.
Inasmuch as “economic status” is not a protected class under the Constitution, I don’t agree here either. If this is truly the will of the people, let us vote it into being as a law.
CA moved from a local property tax system to a state-wide system of funding public schools based on a series of court cases. Interesting history-- read about it here..
Do you apply that to the specifics of the court-ordered plans that followed in the wake of Brown II? Were the long bus trips that resulted from race-based integrations worse than segregated schools?
It looks to me like the fourteenth amendment doesn’t restrict those to whom its protections apply, and that race-based protections have been interpreted into the language of the amendment. Why not class-based protections as well?
Daniel
Worse than racism? Heavens, Bricker, advise soonest! What is this dreadful “cure” and in what ways is it “worse than the disease”? I am sure we are all as anxioius as you to forestall such a wretched circumstance!
An unfortunate oversight, easily remedied by a creative interpretation. But somehow, I suspect this will not meet with your approval regardless. Call it a hunch.
I’ve definitely heard about this happening (I first heard about it in Texas, I think, where it was called “Robin Hood” laws, as the rich districts were stolen from to give to the poor), and I think it’s a step in the right direction. As Hippy Hollow points out, it’s only a step, but it would go a very long way toward minimizing disparities.
Daniel
I would. That was not something that brought people together.
How many classes are there and who defines them? Are rich people also protected, or do protections only extend to poor people? What will be the effect of rich people being a protected class? I’m not sure you want to go down that road…
Actually, it quite literally was. Having talked to folks who attended school before, during, and after desegregation here in the South, it absolutely was.
Was it perfect? Of course not. That’s not a criterion for government action, however.
Now, schools are resegregating, and it’s causing a lot of problems. This decision will undoubtedly hasten the process.
Let’s take these one at a time:
- There are the same number of classes as there are races, defined by the same people. Why on earth would defining classes be more difficult than defining races?
- This is a silly question–it’s as if you’re asking, “Did desegregation protect the rights of white students [at superior-funded schools], or just black students?” When there’s an unjust inequality, moving conditions back to equality necessarily means the people in the superior position are no longer in the superior position; that doesn’t mean their rights are being violated.
- Uh, sure, rich people are a protected class, and if rich people are ending up somehow with a publicly funded education worse than that received by poor people, then we’ll need to fix that problem. Why would I be worried about that path?
Daniel
I lived thru those times, and it was ugly. Black parents as well as White parents complained against the more extreme examples. This also lead to considerable white flight, as white families moved out of the cities and into suburbs specifically to get away from busing. It forced people together, but it didn’t bring people together.
OK, so how many economic classes are there?
This is a silly answer because you are forgetting the scope of Brown. That decision had implications well beyond schools, and influenced every aspect of racial laws. Now, it just so happened that racial laws stacked the deck against minorities. But there are laws that affect only rich people (like the inheritance tax) that could easily be jeopardized if rich people become a protected class.
See above.