Regression to Yesteryear

The recent Supreme Court Affirmative Action decision amounts to a reversal of Brown v. Board of Education and a reversal of decades of civil rights struggle for equity.

Past and recent history has already proven the inpact of the deeply embedded structural and institutional, overt, and covert racism that exists in our society. Our society’s historical stance on race relations, one step forward ten steps back, repeatedly confirms that if there is no compulsion to create equity and no accountability for failing to do so, inequity will abound. Therefore, why would the justices, (lower case intended), of the highest court in the land, be the vehicle to solidify such stagnation?

My perception of the impact of the recent decision was echoed by a commenter who stated, “This decision will close the doors to many students of color who have chosen career paths, particularly in the STEM fields, which require a degree from a top institution, now more difficult for minority students — who are often the first in their family to attend a college — to gain admission.” Sounds like we can look forward to the ‘disparate impact’ that required the Court to have issued the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision and closing off access to equal education, already holding on for life by a hair, in light of recent conservative derision in access and inclusive education curriculum.

Our institutions of public education can presently be said to be largely “separate and unequal.” Minority schools still lack of funding, school supplies and prepared educators. Just look at our communities and community schools and public educational institutions. They are largely “segregated, separate and unequal.” Those that aren’t segregated are suffering the removal of Black/African American historical and current contributions to the American landscape from classrooms for reasons that lack intellectual merit. Even the contributions of the National Youth Poet Laureate is under attack.

Justice Warren must be turning in his grave. His opinion on behalf of a then unanimous SupremeCourt, aptly based on social science research rather than precedent, declared, “today separate but equal” facilities are inherently unequal and violate the protections of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment . . . the segregation of public education based on race instilled a sense of inferiority that had a hugely detrimental effect on the education and personal growth of African American children.”

The June 29, 2023 Affirmative Action decision by a majority conservative bench ruled that colleges and universities can no longer take race into consideration as a specific basis in admissions without, violating the conservative bench’s current interpretation of the Equal Protection Clause, overturning long-standing precedent that has benefited Black and Latino students in higher education. Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, issued a well reasoned dissent that embodies a learned and reality perspective on the true impact of this ill-fated decision on civil rights in America. They attacked the opinion as “rolls back decades of precedent and momentous progress., And in a demonstration of dissent as well as the controversial nature of the case, the Justices read their dissents from the bench for the first time since 2019.

We can expect the ruling to produce further attacks on education curriculum, fewer minority admissions, scholarships, a significant drop in minority college admissions, continued discrimination in employment, housing, and a rise in racial strife in all facets of society. Not to mention, the continued expansion of a Black and Brown underclass. Then what, SCOTUS? Neojimcrowism and neoreconstructionism? This is indeed a dark day for race relations in this country.