Bush says race-based school policy flawed
Posted on 01/16/2003 6:08:34 AM PST by MeekOneGOP
Bush says race-based school policy flawed
Stand on landmark Michigan case may not please friends, foes
01/16/2003
WASHINGTON - President Bush weighed in on a landmark Supreme Court case Wednesday, saying he supports racial diversity but opposes racial quotas, a middle-ground approach that may anger both sides in the debate over affirmative action.
"As we work to address the wrong of racial prejudice, we must not use means that create another wrong, and thus perpetuate our divisions," Mr. Bush said as his lawyers prepared a legal brief asking the high court to declare the University of Michigan's affirmative action admissions policies unconstitutional.
Supporters of Michigan said Mr. Bush's proposal that colleges use race-neutral means to promote racial diversity is unrealistic and would deny opportunities to black and Hispanic students.
Conservatives, meanwhile, criticized the president for declining to call for an end to any use of race in the admissions process.
Mr. Bush's aides said the brief will not take up what many lawyers called a key element in the case: whether the Supreme Court should keep the so-called Bakke standard, the 1978 ruling that schools can use race as one of several factors to advance the goal of having a diverse student body.
 President Bush discusses affirmative action Wednesday at the White House. (AP) |
"If the brief doesn't address the central question before the court, then I'm afraid politics has completely trumped principles," said Edward Blum, general counsel for the American Civil Rights Institute, a conservative legal foundation. "Anyone who follows these issues will understand this is an artful dodge."
Theodore Shaw, an associate director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, said that Mr. Bush's statement may have been "politically adroit" but does nothing to advance civil rights and opportunity.
"To say you support diversity but then say you can't be conscious of race in trying to reach that diversity - that's a position that really boggles the mind," he said.
The president made his case in a relatively rare televised address from the White House, underscoring the political sensitivity of the moment for Mr. Bush and his fellow Republicans.
Less than a month ago, Trent Lott of Mississippi lost his post as Senate GOP leader over his praise of former South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond's segregationist presidential campaign of 1948.
In the weeks since, some Democrats have said Mr. Lott simply reflected a Republican Party insensitive to civil rights, and Republicans have pledged to work harder to attract black voters.
During his seven-minute speech, Mr. Bush said: "I strongly support diversity of all kinds, including racial diversity in higher education. But the method used by the University of Michigan to achieve this important goal is fundamentally flawed."
Michigan used a point system to assess applicants. Mr. Bush protested that the school awarded 20 points to black, Hispanic and American Indian students, noting that the system gave only 12 points for perfect SAT scores. The program also set targets for minority admissions to the university's law school, passing over white applicants in the process, he said.
"At their core," Mr. Bush said, "the Michigan policies amount to a quota system that unfairly rewards or penalizes prospective students based solely on their race."
Supporters of the Michigan plan disputed that, calling the system a good-faith effort to attract a broad range of students. They said the school also awarded points for extracurricular activities as well as to applicants with financial disadvantages, a group that would include poor white students.
Mr. Bush said he realized that "racial prejudice is a reality in America," and "it hurts many of our citizens," but he said "quota systems that use race to include or exclude people from higher education and the opportunities it offers are divisive, unfair and impossible to square with the Constitution."
Don't rely on race
Instead, colleges should pursue diversity through programs that do not rely on race, Mr. Bush said, citing a program he backed as Texas governor to give the top 10 percent of all high school graduating classes automatic admission to state universities.
"University officials have the responsibility and the obligation to make a serious, effective effort to reach out to students from all walks of life, without falling back on unconstitutional quotas," Mr. Bush said. "Schools should seek diversity by considering a broad range of factors in admissions, including a student's potential and life experiences."
A spokesman for the legal group representing white students who sued the University of Michigan, saying they were discriminated against when they were denied admission, said he is pleased with Mr. Bush's decision.
"He came as close to saying, 'You can't use race,' as you can without actually using those words," said Curt Levey, spokesman for the Center for Individual Rights.
Administration officials said Mr. Bush based his decision on law, not politics.
They acknowledged that recent White House discussions included Karl Rove, the president's political guru. But they said Mr. Bush also consulted people such as White House Counsel Al Gonzales and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, who is black and whose job is typically limited to foreign affairs.
Diversity questions
Mr. Bush's political opponents said that although the president talked up diversity, his opposition to the Michigan plan would make it harder to achieve.
"I am still looking for evidence that the administration truly means what it says," said Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., on the floor of the chamber minutes after Mr. Bush's remarks.
Democrats who are planning to seek Mr. Bush's job - Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri, and Gov. Howard Dean of Vermont - expressed their dismay.
"This was an opportunity for the president to demonstrate his commitment to achieving real equality in education," Mr. Lieberman said. "Instead, he sided with the right wing of his party and sent a signal that equal opportunity in higher education is a low priority for his administration."
Some Republican lawmakers backed Mr. Bush, saying schools can achieve diversity without resorting to quotas.
"I think race, ethnicity, family income and background are all parts of a whole package, and all should be at least relevant for consideration if a university decides to do that," said Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas.
Hispanics represent a group the Bush political team wants to attract; some Hispanic leaders criticized the president's speech.
"Affirmative action is the biggest test of this administration so far as whether it supports the Latino community," said Antonia Hernandez, president and general counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund. "It would be a grave mistake for this administration to come out against a policy that allows the Latino community to make the American dream come true."
Some conservative legal groups, however, said civil rights groups should applaud the president's position, saying his emphasis on diversity leaves the concept of affirmative action in place.
"I hope that this brief doesn't discourage the court from answering the core question in the case: whether discrimination on the basis of race can be justified by an appeal to 'diversity,' " said Roger Clegg, general counsel for the Center for Equal Opportunity.
The final decision belongs to the Supreme Court. A ruling is expected by the end of June.
Bush aides also rejected conservative criticism that they ignored the most important part of the case, the question of whether the Bakke ruling should remain a guiding standard.
"I wouldn't characterize this as a punt," said a presidential adviser. "What I'd say we are doing is articulating a very principled and realistic position for how to promote diversity in America, encourage opportunity without violating the Constitution, without setting up racial quotas."
E-mail djackson@dallasnews.com
Less than a month ago, Trent Lott of Mississippi lost his post as Senate GOP leader over his praise of former South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond's segregationist presidential campaign of 1948.
Memo to David Jackson and the Dallas Mourning News: Your Liberal bias is showing again !
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Wait a minute, now I'm totally confused.I flick on the tube yesterday afternoon, and -- Lo and Behold! -- there was President Bush, speaking from the ornate Roosevelt Room of the White House, stepping into the most momentous "affirmative action" case to surface in a generation or more, denouncing as "fundamentally flawed" a program of racial favoritism for minority applicants at the University of Michigan, calling it "divisive, unfair and impossible to square with the Constitution," a program that "amounts to a quota system that unfairly rewards or penalizes prospective students solely on their race."
"Our Constitution," the President asserted, "makes it clear that people of all races must be treated equally under the law," and the end result of the Michigan program is "discrimination, and discrimination is wrong."
The University, the target of a law suit now before the High Court, uses a quota system based on race and ethnicity whereby minority applicants are awarded extra points for, well, being minority applicants. Under the school's formula, a perfect SAT score gets you only 12 points on a 150-point scale. But members of 'politically correct' races and ethnic groups get a 20-point bonus.
Quota system, right? No way, say liberals, this quota system isn't a quota system even if quotas are used and, anyway, it has nothing to do with race even if race gets you extra/bonus points because we say so and, besides, Bush and Lott and Republicans and the GOP are racists and discrimination is always wrong except when it isn't, i.e., when whites are the target. So there! End of argument!
Now, here's where I'm all confused:
Weren't we told elections don't really matter? That there ain't a dime's worth of difference between the two Parties? Republican, Democrat, what the heck is the difference, right? That Bush and Gore were clones, ideologically -- one and the same, two phony sides of the same phony coin? That Bush is a pusillanimous coward who would never do anything this bold, this daring, this defiant? That the White House, "traumatized" by the brouhaha over Lott's racially 'tinged' remarks, on this one would duck and equivocate, swere and maneuver, shirk and evade?
For weeks, the punditocracy -- you know, the haut monde elites who get paid to know nothing (the more *nothing* they know, the more the pay) -- predicted Bush would take a pass. Yesterday would never happen. No-can-do, they said, too controversial, wouldn't be prudent, he's wooing hispanics, he's wooing blacks, he's wooing Soccer Moms, he's wooing the burbs, he's following the polls, he's doing focus groups and, besides, right now, if anything, he needs to reassure voters he ain't no cross-burner a la Lott.
Besides, Karl Rove won't let him take a position on Michigan.
Question: Will these pundits ever get anything right? Even once? When will it finally dawn on these time-warps that Clinton's in Chappaqua -- not the White House? Bush is a man of integrity, a man of principle who doesn't govern by polls nor focus groups, who doesn't need pricey political consultants to tell him what to think, what to say or when to say it.
Now, for the race-hustlers, let me make this clear: I am a full-blood latino. In other words, hispanic. In other words, minority. Or, as libs might say, a fully accredited member of a "brutally"/"savagely" "oppressed" group.
The idea behind the Michigan plan is simple: Liberals divide minorities into two broad categories -- dumb and dumber.
Oh, they won't come out and say it, but, deep down, that's precisely how they think.
And whites? Caucasians, according to libs, also fall into two distinct groups: White-sheet-wearing-racists with pointed hats who burn wooden crosses versus white-sheet-wearing racists with pointed hats who burn wooden crosses WANNABES.
In other words, all whites are racists. The only difference is, some wear 'the sheets', others can't -- the latter don't have the "luxury." But all whites are Klansmen at heart.
So, according to liberals, all blacks are stupid and all whites are racists.
Again, Lefties won't come out and say that, but, deep down, that's precisely how they think.
Now, since liberals believe all minorities are stupid and all whites are racists, what's their solution? Ah, that's where racial quotas which liberals say aren't racial quotas come in.
Point being? This: Ain't it peculiar how liberals, who say they hate racism and are all for "diversity", basically embrace all -- or virtually all -- the basic tenets of Ku Klux Klanism, namely, whites are superior, minorities are stupid, uncompetitive, etc., etc.
Both Klansmen and liberals, moreover, agree on "affirmative action" as their favored "solution": The Klan, which believes the "system" is 'skewed' towards blacks, wants quotas for whites. Liberals, who believe minorities don't have *the smarts* to compete, call for "affirmative action.*
Scratch a liberal and you'll find a Klansman underneath.
Anyway, that's...
My two cents..
"JohnHuang2"
ABSOLUTELY! If it's illegal for me NOT to hire someone because of the color of their skin......why then should you reward them FOR THAT VERY SAME REASON?? I have asked this of some of my liberal friends, and of course....I get no answer. Just the usual name calling, etc.
Here's the problem - the current approach by the University of Michigan does not factor in economic disadvantage, just race. There are plenty of dirt-poor whites and plenty of middle-class blacks. But the U of M policy does NOTHING to address economic disadvantage, which was the initial rationale for affirmative action - instead, it blandly seeks diversity for its own sake, but in the end only achieves diversity of appearance, not diversity of thought or experience. If advocates are truly concerned about students with potential who suffered academically because of economic disadvantage, then they should devise a system where prep schools are made available for these students, to give them a chance to compete on a level playing field in the admissions process, and it would help them be fully prepared for the rigors they are facing. After all, my grandfather, who was a dirt-poor Missouri farm boy, went to prep school for a year to become academically ready to attend the Naval Academy. If such a system worked for him, it can work for others.
Not likely. They have a world-view that counters logic and rationality. The only way for them to "get anything right" is to change the truth to fit their desired lies.
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