Posted on 01/11/2003 8:56:30 AM PST by rdf
Karl,
I know that there must be much on your plate these days, and one of the tasty morsels must be the question of what to do about the University of Michigan cases now pending before the Supreme Court. As one who has devoted a considerable amount of his time, particularly in recent years, to the issue at hand, I want to offer my perspective on the matter. I am certain that nothing I say will come as a surprise to you, but I feel obliged to say it nonetheless.
First, there is public speculation that the Bush administration is divided between the lawyers, who want to file an amicus on behalf of the plaintiffs, and the politicos, who either want to support the University of Michigan or not get involved at all. I understand from a Wall Street Journal editorial that Secretary Colin Powell is urging the latter course. There is also much speculation that the recent controversy surrounding Senator Trent Lott may have some direct bearing on the course to be chosen by the president.
I will not presume to give you, of all people, political advice. I leave to others the duty of rendering such counsel. In fact, my appeal to you is not that of a fellow Republican, but that of a fellow American.
There are many who believe-and I am among them-that the one factor which overshadowed all others in the 2000 presidential election was the question of whether our nation would elect a president who would return character and principle to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
As I sat in that muddy field, shivering, with rain drops falling on my scalp, and watched George W. Bush take his Oath of Office, I felt proud to be an American citizen once again. Many of us who had traveled from all across this land to share that moment--total strangers we may have been--smiled at each other with a sense of shared appreciation that we had elected a president who would never subordinate the best interest of the nation to his personal or political whims, as we thought had been the case for the previous eight years. The University of Michigan cases present an opportunity for our president to reaffirm what we thought on that day three years ago.
Throughout our history, there have been many critical moments in which we as a nation have been called upon to answer the following questions: What does America stand for? Was the Declaration of Independence mere rhetoric or did it outline a framework to guide the moral and civic development of our young nation? Is the guarantee of equal treatment to "every person" contained in the Fourteenth Amendment of our Constitution something on which we can rely as we engage in daily transactions with our government? Was it the purpose of the "civil rights" movement to end the morally abhorrent practice of discriminating against black people so that we could discriminate in favor of them? Or, was it the purpose of that tumultuous period in our nation's history to end the practice of discriminating against any American citizen on the basis of their race or skin color or the origin of their ancestors?
There has never been a time when the President of the United States has had the luxury of obtaining a waiver on his responsibility to lead the American people as it confronted these questions.
In 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower-a fellow Republican, I would hasten to add-authorized the Justice Department to file a friend-of-the-court brief that clearly, succinctly and powerfully outlined a principle that has guided our nation for nearly half a century. In that brief, the government said:
"Racial discriminations imposed by law, or having the sanction or support of government, inevitably tend to undermine the foundations of a society dedicated to freedom, justice, and equality. The proposition that all men are created equal is not mere rhetoric. It implies a rule of law--an indispensable condition to a civilized society--under which all men stand equal and alike in the rights and opportunities secured to them by their government.
"Under the Constitution, every agency of government, national and local, legislative, executive, and judicial, must treat each of our people as an American, and not as some member of a particular group classified on the basis of race or some other constitutional irrelevancy. The color of a man's skin---like his religious beliefs, or his political attachments, or the country from which he or his ancestors came to the United States---does not diminish or alter his legal status or constitutional rights. 'Our constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens.' [citing Justice John Harlan in Plessy v. Ferguson.]"
When the United States Supreme Court ratified the above principle in Brown v. Board of Education, it poured the foundation for us to build a culture of equality in our land. The Congress constructed the walls a decade later, when it enacted the Civil Rights Act of 1964. But, it remained for us--the American people--to complete the structure by placing our faith in the principle of equal treatment and dedicating ourselves to making that principle the centerpiece of our lives. Thus, we have, indeed, built a culture of equality, a culture that grants no tolerance to anyone who would countenance a different kind of America. What else accounts for the rapid demotion of Senator Trent Lott for speaking ill-chosen words?
Now, the question is whether this president will see things as clearly as President Eisenhower and President John F. Kennedy, who said, "Race has no place in American life or law"; or whether he will choose to endorse, either by his silence or expressed support, the concept that "diversity" is more important than the principle of equal treatment for every person.
As a Regent of the University of California for nearly ten years, I have come to know a great deal about the practices of higher education with respect to the matter of race. It is my firm belief that the professed value of "diversity" is fraudulently used because no other rationale is allowed by the Court. It is a fig leaf and nothing more than a legally sanctioned excuse to discriminate. More significantly, however, granting any agency of government the authority to use race, color or national ancestry to "create diversity", fundamentally contradicts that precious principle of equal treatment under the law for every person. I submit to you that the "diversity" rationale and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment are incompatible. They cannot coexist. To allow the use of race as "one among many factors" is to renounce all for which our nation stands.
One final observation: As long as our government believes that it can only achieve racial "diversity" by giving special consideration to those who would not otherwise be "represented" because of their race, color or ethnic background, we will suffer what the president rightly calls the "soft bigotry of lower expectations." As long as the diversity rationale is given governmental legitimacy, every black and Hispanic student in college will suffer the presumption of inadequacy that is implicit in that rationale.
I beg of you to view this issue through the lens of principle and our culture of equality and not through the prism of politics.
With my highest regards,
Ward Connerly
Excellent!
Thank you for posting this.
Raise a glass to the day when a government governs with the best interest of America in mind on every decision it makes.
You are most welcome.
Raise a glass to the day when a government governs with the best interest of America in mind on every decision it makes.
I raise my glass to this, too.
Cheers,
Richard F.
What else indeed?
The University of Michigan cases, like the re-nomination of Judge Pickering, now stand as a test of President Bush's willingness to place principle over political pandering, as the good Mr. Connerly points out better than I ever could.
Here is a link to an earlier interview that I did with Ward Connerly. It was a "FR exclusive."
My Conversation with Ward Connerly, by rdf
Cheers,
Richard F.
You can bet that the President will do the right thing for our country, no matter what he decides is best.
He advocates homosexuality?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.