Recent News Supports Our Supreme Court Arguments

Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act imposes burdens on some states and not others whenever they want to change practices or procedures related to voting. I explain why Section 5 is bad policy, outdated, unconstitutional, and ought to be struck down by the Supreme Court here and here.

And information released last week by the Census Bureau about voter turnout in 2012 further undermines the constitutionality of the distinctions made by Section 5 between the jurisdictions it covers and those it does not. This discussion here in the Atlantic Wire concludes that “those states [now covered by Section 5] didn’t see lower-than-average black turnout. In fact, averaging both turnout and deviance from the norm in those Voting Rights Act (VRA) states, we see that they outperformed non-VRA ones.” Earlier, the story notes, “Black turnout was highest in Wisconsin, Mississippi, and North Carolina. The lowest percentages — of eligible black voters, not of voters overall — were in Arizona, Washington, and Arkansas.”

Chief Justice Roberts had noted Mississippi’s high black turnout rate at the oral argument in Shelby County v. Holder, the case in which the Center for Equal Opportunity has challenged the constitutionality of Section 5.

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“Latino High-School Graduates Outpace Whites in College Enrollment”: That’s the headline on a Chronicle of Higher Education story last week about the findings of “a new analysis of Census Bureau data by the Pew Research Hispanic Center.” And it’s reason #387 why we should get rid of racial preferences in university admissions.

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The New York Times last week had a front-page story headlined — brace yourself — “In California, Early Push for College Diversity.” But wait! The take-away from this story is that the sky did not fall when racial preferences in university admissions were abolished in California by a voter ballot initiative (supported by CEO, by the way). Not only did skin-color diversity “rebound” but — more importantly — the state was forced to make reforms that helped disadvantaged students of all racial and ethnic groups. The result is that attention is being paid to real diversity in admissions, not the superficial kind.

Normally I cringe whenever I imagine a Supreme Court justice reading a Times article (never mind an editorial) on “diversity,” since the Grey Lady seems never to have met a racial quota she didn’t like. But not this time: In fact, I rather hope that Justice Kennedy takes a look at this piece as he works on his opinion in Fisher v. University of Texas—that’s the case pending before the Court in which the Center for Equal Opportunity is challenging the use of racial and ethnic admissions preferences at the school.

(And speaking of the Grey Lady, what’s happening to her? The Times recently ran a front-page, above-the-fold, lengthy piece on the infamous Pigford litigation — concluding that the “compensation effort” against the U.S. Department of Agriculture for anti-black bias “became a runaway train, driven by racial politics, pressure from influential members of Congress and law firms that stand to gain $130 million in fees.” “The total cost could top $4.4 billion,” the article concluded.)

The Wall Street Journal’s Jason Riley, as noted here by CEO friend John Rosenberg, points out that the California story is even happier than the Times story would indicate: Not only was there the “rebound” effect the Times concedes with regard to ENROLLMENT, but with regard to GRADUATION (the more important number) the number of Latinos and blacks has dramatically increased.

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There’s a front-page story in the current issue of Education Week (available here) about how the broad support for requiring better academic qualifications for teachers is running up against concerns that this might result in fewer black and Latino teachers. It’s yet another variation on the “disparate impact” theme: Perfectly legitimate job qualifications have to give way to politically correct workforce statistics. There’s no mention in the article, by the way, of the potential legal problems — under both the Constitution and Titles VI and VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act — with deliberately choosing selection criteria in order to achieve a predetermined racial and ethnic result.

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A couple of weeks ago I sent to you a special email about President Obama’s disturbing nomination of Thomas Perez to head the Department of Labor (the gist of that email is available here). This week I wanted to mention that opposition to this nomination has been building, and the committee vote has been postponed yet again, to this week.

And I should mention that another dubious nomination by President Obama that I’ve mentioned — of Mel Watt to head the Federal Housing Finance Agency — is also meeting opposition: enough that the president had to devote part of his Saturday radio address last week to defending it.

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