Segregation And Discrimination Of Black Minorities example essay topic

Affirmative action has assisted many members of minority groups in creating equal opportunities in education and employment. Who could object to assisting these minorities, who suffered years of discrimination, in getting the equal opportunity they deserve? The problem is, affirmative action promotes racial preferences and quotas which cause mixed emotions. One time supporters of affirmative action are now calling out "reverse discrimination'. If we want a stronger support for affirmative action we need to get rid of the preferential treatments.

The back bone of affirmative action began with the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment on December 18, 1865. The amendment abolished slavery and any involuntary labor ("Federal laws,' 1998). This showed there was a calling for equal opportunity for all Americans. When the Thirteenth Amendment was ratified, there were opponents who were skeptical of the amendment.

Because of this they came up with two separate bills of their own: the civil rights bill, and an amendment to the Freedmen's Bureau Act. The bills covered all citizens, not just blacks. The civil rights bill moved on to become the Civil Rights Act of 1866 (Dorsen, 1994). The Act states that "all persons shall have the same rights to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, give evidence, and to the full and equal benefit of all laws ' ("Federal laws,' 1998). The turn of the century saw a minimal amount of legislation regarding discrimination. However, come the mid part of the century, an upheaval of civil disobedience and violent protests would spark what would come to be known as The Civil Rights Movement (Dorsen, 1994).

This was an all out effort, made by many, to abolish the segregation and discrimination of black minorities. In 1961, President Kennedy enacted Executive Order 10925 (Lugg, 1997, p. 11). The order directed employers to take affirmative action to ensure a "color blind' method of hiring and promotion in government contracts. This began a concerted effort to abolish discrimination.

With Executive Order of 10925 came the President's Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity (PC EEO). The Committee was given the authority to enforce affirmative action mandates by being able to cancel or suspend government contractors. Kennedy, mostly endorsing a "race conscious affirmative action,' kept away from racial preferences and quotas (Lugg, 1997, p. 11). On July 2, 1964, President Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ("Federal laws,' 1998).

Title VII of the act prohibits employment discrimination based on race, sex, national origin, or religion. Title VI prohibits public access discrimination, leading to school desegregation. Title V is the original "federal fair housing law,' later amended in 1988. However, even after this and other legislation, blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans were still underrepresented in employment and education (Dorsen, 1994). President Johnson also put through Executive Order 11246 which ended coerced non-specific minority hiring and adopted "hard and fast' quotas (Lugg, 1997, p 13).

Under this order came the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP). The OFCCP was required to make annual reports on the progress of the goals and time tables obligatory of the federal contractors for hiring women and minorities (Burns, 1996, p. 3). Under the democratic congress of Nixon came a firm support of civil rights. However, Lugg (1997) suggests it was a "camouflage support of racial preferences' (p. 14). This meant Nixon merely enforced, and gave support to the existing laws rather than expanding on Johnson's "hard and fast' quotas.

Nixon, as many presidents had, shied away from supporting the preferential treatment of racial preferences and quotas. Johnson was the exception. Through Nixon and the following presidencies, anti-discrimination legislation slowed down. Most of the attention went to refining the existing laws. As Lugg (1997) mentions, "the Reagan administration did little more than rationalize the use of affirmative action, thereby legitimizing and strengthening the underlying policy' (p. 16). While in office, Reagan also condemned the idea of quotas and racial preferences, although it was in his power to abolish Johnson's Executive Order 11246.

The order used a de facto system in racial hiring, meaning that while there was no official approval of using quotas, they were actually in existence (Dorsen, 1994). The Bush Administration added to the provisions of Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, establishing the 1991 Civil Rights Act which created new remedies and rights for plaintiffs in discrimination cases by authorizing compensatory and punitive damages ("Federal Laws,' 1998). This was a major move in acquiring equal opportunity in education. It would also lead to "reverse discrimination' law suits and an unjustified number of people claiming discrimination. However, during the 70's racial preference and group proportional equality emerged in addition to other types of affirmative action. Some of these included special minority training, special financial aid and admittance requirements, and other similar actions.

This idea of preferential treatment split the idea of anti-discrimination into two different directions (Lugg, 1997, p. 12). On one end was compensatory justice and on the other what would later be called "reverse discrimination', meaning that the discrimination was against non-minorities. These preferential treatments would also play a role in developing the idea of "reverse discrimination'. According to Lugg (1997), during the Kennedy Administration, "the government [was] forced to strengthen [the] efforts at equalizing opportunity, and aimed not solely at ending discrimination but remedying the effects of past discrimination' (p. 11). This is when affirmative action makes the mistake of trying to correct past wrongs instead of focusing on equal opportunity for all.

Besides the court hearings stemming from "reverse discrimination's suits, the first bill to ban racial preferences and quotas was passed in California by a 54 to 46 vote. The bill is called the California Civil Rights Initiative which decrees the state of California cannot discriminate (notice the choice of words) against anyone, or grant preferences to any individual or group on the basis of race, gender, or natural origin in public housing, public school admissions; including colleges, or public contracting. (Williams, 1997). A similar bill, in 1995, was brought up by Senate Majority leader Robert J. Dole, and Rep Charles T. Canada. The bill would have banned programs that used goals or timetables to remedy discrimination (Lugg, 1997, p. 3). However, this bill was unsuccessful.

Many people believe that bills like these, if passed, will keep black and other minorities from gaining admittance to colleges. However as the table shows below, not much has changed since The California Civil Rights Initiative bill was passed last year. Black Enrollments at University Of California Medical Schools 1996 1997 UC- San Diego 3 0 UC- Irvine 2 0 UC- Los Angeles 10 10 UC- San Francisco 11 12 UC- Davis 0 5 Total 26 27 Source: (Zinsmeister, 1997, p. 18) Efforts, like the bills mentioned before, have become hot on the agendas of many people. According to Lugg (1997), while some anti-discrimination methods are "viewed by some as more aggressive yet legitimate methods to increase minority participation' others believed "such seemingly preferential policies [stifle] competition and [commit] what was to be known as ' reverse discrimination' against non-minorities. ' (p. 12) Many tend to agree with the "others'. Here are just a few: Lugg (1997), "Is it socially justifiable to provide federal and / or state legislation preferences ?' (p. 16) Altman & Prom is, "It is against American principles of justice to sacrifice the rights of individuals for the benefit of some group' (Noel, 1997, p. 3). Lamar Alexander, "We made a big mistake when we fell into the trap of supporting ' reverse discrimination' rather than discouraging discrimination.

It doesn't work; and if we want to be one country, we should enforce the civil rights laws. But we should never let the government make distinctions based on race. ' (Landrigan, 1997). Are these not legitimate concerns?

In schools and in the job market, non-minorities are essentially being punished for something they had no part of. For example, in Boston a white female student was denied admittance at Boston Latin High School even though she tested higher than eleven minority students who did get in. Is this right? Three judges from the 1st U. S Circuit Court of Appeals didn't think so. They agreed that denying admission to one student in favor of other students, who tested lower, on the basis of skin color was unconstitutional.

The judges remarked that, "while we appreciate the difficulty of the school committee's task, and admire the values that it seeks to nourish, noble ends cannot justify the deployment of constitutionally impermissible means' (Bayles, 1998, p. 19 A). This is just one of the many court suits regarding "reverse discrimination'. With "reverse discrimination' aside, the question is whether the minorities, subject to the affirmative action laws, are ready to benefit from them. General Powell states", The choice before us is either getting back to the task of building all children or just keep building more jails,' and "there is no point in creating [affirmative action] opportunities if we bring up children who can't use the English language.

If this generation of youth doesn't take advantage of those opportunities, what's the point?' (Shepard, 1998). General Powell's concern is that minorities, getting into elite colleges by way of racial preferences, don't have the educational background needed to be successful in those colleges. For an example of his concern; all students who enroll at the nation's twenty-five top-rated universities, must score a 1291 or above on the SAT's. An average of 650 on both math and verbal would have to be scored. Yet in the entire country, only 1523 black students scored above a 650 on math and only 603 scored above 650 on the verbal section.

This is compared to 74,000 whites who scored above 650 on math and 23,000 that scored above 650 on the verbal (Noel, 1997 p. 5). Is this worth General Powell's concern? However, some minority students might not need to worry about their academic achievements since a study done by the Brookings Institute found that being black or Hispanic counted in your favor by several hundred points on the SAT or a grade point higher in your GPA. The study done with 5,000 recent students found that a white student needed a 3.8 GPA to have the same chance as Black or Hispanic student with a 2.8 GPA in gaining admittance to an elite college (Zinsmeister, 1997, p. 18). Isn't this discrimination, or are minority students considered higher achievers in academics then non-minorities?

My GPA was around a 2.8 in high school, however I doubt I would have been able to tackle Harvard. I wish not to take the opportunity away from minorities to gain a higher education, however if they do not have the educational background, and are most likely to drop out because of that, what is the point? It is not just in the schools that concerns about preferential treatment and "reverse discrimination' arise, but in the job market as well. For example, in the beginning of the preferential actions, 25% of employed white male mangers lost their jobs due to restrictions affirmative action had on them. Another example, The Northern Natural Gas Company of Omaha, Nebraska, was forced by the government to release sixty-five white male workers to make room for minority employees (Williams, 1997). Now what kind of equal opportunity is this?

Granted, the percent of mangers would fall to incoming minorities, but to fire someone because of his or her skin color? Is this not the act we " re trying to ban? Besides the charges of "reverse discrimination', it has come to a point that anti-discrimination legislation has become so broad and powerful that people are taking advantage of the programs. In Buffalo, NY ten police officers were investigated for attempting to pose as Hispanics to qualify for minority hiring quotas (Michel, 1998). One man who was one-eighth Hispanic, was granted minority status. This allowed him to move ahead of 200 white applicants.

Is this not discrimination? There needs to be some kind of qualifications to qualify for minority status, and it doesn't mean being one-eighth (Hispanic), having a surname, or being able to speak Spanish. To understand the scope of people trying to take advantage of these laws, the EEOC received 91,189 complaints in 1994 of alleged victims of discrimination. Out of the 91,189, they were left with approximately 4% of the original number after dismissing complaints that did not have substantial evidence of discrimination (Burns, 1996, p. 3). With America's attitude that we must " [aim] not solely at ending discrimination but remedying the effects of past discrimination,' we will always have the problem of discrimination and endless numbers of people crying "discrimination'. We must never judge anyone on the color of there skin no matter how noble the cause.

Anything otherwise is discrimination. For example, in a Recent letter sent out by the Assistant Director of Personnel, Judy Krok, from Greenwich, Connecticut Public School System, to all the Deans of the Schools of Education, Ms. Krok specifically asks for minority job applicants for positions as teachers or teacher internships (Krok, 1998). I along with Dr. Carolyn Hollman, who received the letter, questioned weather it was in adherence to any laws governing racial preferences and quotas. With a few double clicks of my mouse, I found that a similar case was deemed unconstitutional; n April of this year (1998) a US Court of Appeals voided a federal requirement that radio and television stations engage in recruitment and outreach efforts -but not quotas- to seek minority Job applicants. The case was Lutheran Church- Missouri Synod vs. FCC (Loury, 1998, p. 12). Judge Laurence Smith, writing for a three Judge panel responded " We do not think it matters whether a government hiring program imposes hard quotas, soft quotas or goals.

Any one of these techniques induces an employer to hire with an eye toward meeting the numerical target. As such, they can and surely will result in individuals being granted a preference because of their race' (Loury, 1998, p. 12). I couldn't have summed it up better myself. Hiring anyone or giving admittance to anyone on the basis of their race constitutes as discrimination, even if it's in good faith. Racial preferences and quotas do just that, and that is why affirmative action has so many opponents.

While affirmative action is trying to amend past wrongs, many Americans are trying move forward to a nation of equality. We should use affirmative action as an insurance policy in acquiring equal opportunity, not as a trump card for a particular race. If we want a firmer support for affirmative action we need to get rid of the preferential treatment of quotas and racial preferences. Bibliography

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