Really? When did you change the constitution in this regard?

“The Supreme Court decision in the school desegregation cases is appalling. …………the Constitution requires racially mixed schools………….If this isn’t judicial activism, I don’t know what is.” – Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

p.s. well, let’s never accuse Harry of being in the strict contructionist camp

Ironically, the programs struck down basically did what Jason wants. It grouped a bunch of districts together and let people choose which schools to go to. The question becomes what to do when one school has 125% demand and another school has 75% demand. We could just randomly pick the ‘winners’ and give them their choice, throwing the rest into the other school.

This is fair, but a more intelligent way to do it is to say. “We know we want to provide for integrated schools because we believe it to be a fundamental good for all of us” (which is the major finding of Brown) so we will force our ‘randomness’ to balance for race within a wide margin. Both situations produce nearly identical %’s of choice. The only thing the school must change now is it’s use of race, not any of it’s other practices. I suspect they will simply move to a random lottery system, which will lead to the same situation 95% of the time, and those other 5% will have identical levels of choice, but lower levels of integration. That seems like a tie vs loose situation to me. Indeed, I don’t think greater levels of choice are even possible. You can’t make everyone happy all of the time; 80% is probably just about as good as your going to get.

Vouchers are a separate issue. We probably shouldn’t get into it, but I like charter schools more than vouchers because vouchers usually can’t cover the entire cost of education, leading to class segregation.

Back to the main point: If you agree that “education is an essential component in opportunity.” Then why can’t legislation mandate equal education. Again from Brown:

Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.

Unless you try and refute Brown and say that separate can be equal, which no-one has been willing to do directly, then it follows to that ensure equal education-based opportunity we must ensure integrated schools.

Ironically, here is one of President Bush’s ideas, which has been hammered repeatedly. No Child Left Behind is an attempt to do what you are talking about – give every child, at every school, a quality education. It isn’t working. But I feel that this is at least a preferable attempt to fix the problem than government mandated racially based school integration.

Personally, I think Jason Steck has a good point. Let’s be a bit more flexible about school district boundaries, and let parents figure out where they want their children to go. Let’s try to get better teachers, better books and materials into the schools. But let’s also consider breaking the public school monopoly. Vouchers look good to me. Now, I am a graduate of public schools, and public universities. I think I got as good an education there as my friend who went to a Catholic school, or a friend who wen to a private liberal arts college. I think I got a better value for my money and my parents money than my friends. But the decision was each family’s to make, not the government. Which brings me back to my earlier post a few minutes ago. Culturally, some groups are very supportive of education, and instill a strong work ethic. Others seem to have a larger number of people who feel that this is an attack on their culture. I repeat – I do not want to tell you or anyone else what to value culturally. But persons who choose to avoid obtaining the educational background to successfully compete in the larger economy, will be doomed to poverty. I think we have an obligation to give people an opportunity to obtain a good education. That will also require improving discipline in the schools. That’s its own subject, and I don’t want to take the thread off in that direction.

But just to reiterate, I agree we should not try and legislate outcomes, but rather opportunity. However, I guess where we differ is that I want to legislate adult opportunity. That is why I think education is a special case.

But just to reiterate, I agree we should try and legislate outcomes, but rather opportunity. However, I guess where we differ is that I want to legislate adult opportunity. That is why I think education is a special case.

Q:

how do we encourage all individuals to participate and succeed in society?

A: education

MvdG: It takes a special type of arrogance to tell me that Courts are striking against activism by overturning precedent to strike down laws passed through the democratic process with the overwhelming support of both Black and White parents. Progressives won through the democratic process–and now you turn around and say “let the Courts decide” while still lecturing about judicial restraint? It’s mind-boggling.

Orson: Racial diversity is not the paramount value (I don’t believe in paramount values). It is a very important value which exercises significant weight against other, competing values. It can be outweighed (as I’d agreed that forced re-settlement would be a case of). But cutting it out of the equation entirely is severely inappropriate. I’ve read the constitution, cases, and commentary, and I feel very comfortable about my interpretation here. And I reject the notion that saying something is racist ends discussion. I specifically said that one can make the argument that “I’m willing to allow racist hierarchy to remain, because other things are more important”, so long as you’re explicit about it. That’s an interesting discussion. But what you want is a free pass–you want to be able to take any position on race you want with a guarantee that I’ll never think its racist. It’s discursive gerrymandering, and I can’t do it. If I have a colorable argument for why a given position is racist, then you have to either a) beat it b) concede it but outweigh it, or c) change the position. But trying to narrow the definitional boundaries of racism just because you’re embarrassed to find yourself within them is absurdism. Change the position, not the word.

Lots of people: Choice is not a factor. We force people to go to schools. We don’t force them to become Christian. We force people to pay taxes. We don’t force them to give to charity. And in this case, its primarily about mediating between competing choices, one of which has to be deprived. The question isn’t about who is pro-choice or not. Each of us agrees that there are things that the government can force us to do, and things it can’t, and the only question is which side of the line this falls on.

This is my massive pet peeve. You can’t tell me “you reject choice on integration so ergo you want to eliminate choice in every aspect of life GAAAH!!!” when you also agree that there are things people shouldn’t be allowed to choose. I’m going to jump out my window if another person makes such blatantly non-unique arguments.

Maybe that is part of why we are having this discussion. Those of us who believe that we are speaking of equal opportunity, rather than equal results in life, are obviously at odds with those who believe that equal outcomes are attainable and enforcible. The right to pursue happiness is not the same as the guarantee of happiness.

So far, I have seen few real-life examples of absolute equality in the world. It is not the natural state of affairs. Some of us are talented on one way, some in others. Some of us are more ambitious and work harder than others. All of us make choices which will have a bearing on how well we succeed at anything – sports, employment, family relations, and yes, making a living. Some of us are willing to work harder, and defer personal gratification. They tend to make more money than those of us who play more and work less.

I think this comes back to David’s earlier outrage at segregated communities. About this time last year, (summer) there was quite a bit of discussion about the former UN ambassador who was a spokesman for Walmart. He said (paraphrase) that he hoped the big store would put little Korean-immigrant owned stores in African American neighborhoods out of business, because the little stores over-charged Blacks. Now here’s the thing: Why aren’t more African Americans willing to be entrepreneurs and start small stores? The Koreans just want to make money, and are willing to work hard to do it. Not having enough money to start a big store in a rich neighborhood, they scrape up enough to start a small store in a poor neighborhood. Is the difference racial? I doubt it. I think culture may have a lot more to do with why the Koreans are succeeding. I don’t believe that I have a right, or an obligation to force someone else to adopt my culture. But I will say this – if material success is the desired end, then hard work, willingness to defer personal gratification, and a long-range view is going to have to be a central element in one’s life. Those who chose to do that may succeed. There is no guarantee, of course, but the probability is greater. Those who wait for success to come to them will fail.

The challenge I would offer is not how do we racially integrate neighborhoods and schools, but how do we encourage all individuals to participate and succeed in society? How can we encourage more Blacks and American Indians to find ways to succeed in the larger economy the way Asians are succeeding? I think that is a much more compelling need than worrying about what school in Seattle has what percentage of Asian vs. African Americans vs. Hispanics vs Anglos. My opinion and a buck buys you a cup of coffee (but not at Seattle’s imperial force, aka Starbucks).

I agree with you in principal, but I think that unless distance related costs are neutralized, this still encourages de facto segregation, and if they are neutralized, things quickly become unreasonable. What if I wanted my child to attend a public school 400 miles away? Would the district need to provide free housing for the child? This is another example of how choice, while important, cannot trump everything else.

The challenged system seemed like a fairly reasonable compromise between all of these compelling extremes. I think in this ruling the SCOTUS has shown a preference of ideology over practicality.

I’ve been thinking about the differences in my reaction to this ruling and that of the “fairness doctrine”.

Education IS our opportunity. The choices that are made for us from our earliest age to a large extent dictate the choices available to us when we are adults.

If someone were to suggest that we solve discrimination by giving money and jobs to blacks and other minorities until they were equal with whites I would disagree heavily. That is trying to legislate outcomes.

What I want is that once a child develops the ability to choose for themselves, that they are on roughly equal footing with their peers.

Segregated schools do not allow for this type of equality.

Imagine if a black family wanted to send their child to a white school miles away because they thought it was better. They would get the kid there, they just want them educated. However the family lives just outside the district line.

If you bothered to read what I wrote before commenting on it, Kevin, you would have noticed that I advocate a public school choice system that in effect abolishes district lines entirely.

And to you there is only one thing that matters: race. You look at people as members of a race, of a community, while Jason looks at people as individuals.

Your not talking about this case. From Beyer’s disent:

In fact, the defining feature of both plans is greater emphasis upon student choice. In Seattle, for example, in more than 80% of all cases, that choice alone determines which high schools Seattle’Â’s ninth graders will attend.

The fact is that any other program that attempts to integrate will have to rely on LESS individualized menes. Randomization, or treating people as simply a member of a neighborhood lead to a reduction in individual choice, not it’s triumph.

In addition, the whole difference between de jeur and de facto segregation is specious in this context. Imagine if a black family wanted to send their child to a white school miles away because they thought it was better. They would get the kid there, they just want them educated. However the family lives just outside the district line. Now you have a de jeur factor, the forcing of the school to contain only children from a geographical area, supporting a de facto segregation. This shows how you can’t draw neat little lines around problems caused by the state and those caused by individual choice.

If you claim that in the above situation the practical must trump an individual’s choice in the above situation, why is individual choice paramount in Seattle?

the Democratic presidential candidates were in front of a crowd at Howard University says: Social Engineering today, Social Engineering Tomorrow, Social Engineering Forever (as long as it does not affect my children).

They exposed themselves shamelessly and have moved very, very far in doing so to disqualify themselves as acceptable candidates for the Presidency among decent, normal, intelligent, moral, higher-quality voters.

Personal choice – when should the government interfere? You think that mandating racial integration is desirable. So why not start by requiring all the historically black colleges to have a minimum 50 percent white enrollment or lose their federal funds? That would certainly guarantee racial diversity.

How about abortion? If the government has a right to decree racial diversity as a value that trumps personal choices about where to live and who to associate with, then what would prevent a radically conservative administration from decreeing a societal interest in ending abortion?

Gary rights? Should society decide what people do in the privacy of their own lives? A radically conservative administration might revamp the old sodomy laws.

Personally, I would prefer that the government keep itself out of these decisions, just as it should stay out of decisions about where I live, or where I send my children to school. What that means, David, is that some people will make decisions you agree with, and some will make decisions you do not agree with. And that both will be equally protected under the law, to enjoy their inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, as called for in the Declaration of Independence.

Let me cut to the chase. Legislating morality has seldom been effective. People do what they want to do, regardless of legality. My reading of our constitution is that it guarantees individual rights over collective rights for the most part. This includes the right to live where they want. The issue here is who is deciding where to live. It is racist for the government to decree that only whites may attend a certain school. It is not the government’s business to mandate where people may live. If you want to live in a poor neighborhood, that is legal. Forcing me to move to a poor neighborhood against my will is, and should be illegal. Forcing my children to attend a school other than the one my family selects, simply to facilitate your view of racial diversity is wrong, David. There is no other word for it. Read the constitution. You are the one who wants to go to law school. So are you going to be a lawyer who supports the constitution, or a Michael Nifgong, who uses the law to bulldoze those he disagrees with, and forces his view of the ideal society on those who disagree with him?

My only regret is that Justice Kennedy didn’t go all the way and recognize that there is no justification for forcing people to adhere to someone else’s concept of diversity.

who, as individuals, ought (need?) to experience education in a desegregated, diverse environment.

Says who? You?

I believe that it would be best if everyone would be a Christian, but I do not force anyone to go to Church do I?

Without efforts to combat segregation in schools, what happens is an invigorated segregation.
Even now, shcools are increasingly ‘black’ schools and ‘white’ schools

We are watching our country crumble, while some even applaud the sight.

umh, that’s what happens if certain neighborhoods are black, and other ones are white. What’s next, you’re going to force neighborhoods to ‘desegregate’ by telling people where they can and where they can’t live, based on their color?

Maybe the government needs a program directed at only subsidizing home loans for minority families.

How about not discriminating at all?

Shaun, I don’t know what your social contract is, but I never would sign on to a social contract that treated individual students as nothing more than depersonalized members of a racial classification.

It’s simple: progressives decided that such a social contract should exist, then they took over the US Supreme Court and change the law of America through their judges (instead of through the legislative process) and now they cry foul when conservatives realize that it’s incredibly important to ‘own’ the court and strike back against certain rulings that were revolutionary and not based on any precedent.

Jason, I really can’t fathom why you’re trying to make this into an issue of choice, when that’s so blatantly a non-unique argument. In cases where a) the school is oversubscribed and b) the school is racially segregated (the only conditions where the Seattle program kicks in), we must either deprive kid X of the choice to attend her closest school or kid Y of the choice to attend a racially desegregated school. Either way someone isn’t getting their choice (and, just to kill this zombie-like repetition of “individual” once and for all, it’s a choice that is being made individually with reference to a characteristic that each individual individually possesses. We’re both individually White. Other people are individually Black. Deal with it. Good grief.). The question isn’t about whether we like choice, its about which value is more important. This is unbelievably facile.

And to you there is only one thing that matters: race. You look at people as members of a race, of a community, while Jason looks at people as individuals. If everyone would think like Jason does, there would be no racism. If everyone would think like you do, there would be a lot of racism.

David (19): given that you went to Whitman, a bright star of enlightened learning, I would have thought you would know the difference between state-mandated segregation and segregation that occurs if individuals exercise their rights of free association to hang out with those they wish, to live next to those they want and so on. Do you really think that Brown outlawed all forms of segregation?

In essence that is exactly what David is saying. David seems to believe that people should be forced to mix, even when no one prevents them based on racism, etc. from mixing, and doing so is their own choice. In essence, David argues that the government (schools, etc.) should decide for people where to live, what school to attend, etc.

An attack on freedom of choice, that’s all it is, the court was quite right in this decision.