But this term, the Supreme Court will finally deal with?among other issues?whether the "equal protection of the laws" clause of the Fourteenth Amendment forbids collective preferences as violating individual rights.

The late Justice William O. Douglas?a fierce opponent of discrimination in any form?wrote: "There is no superior person by constitutional standards. [An applicant] who is white is entitled to no advantage by reason of that fact, nor is he subject to any disability, no matter what his race or color. Whatever his race, [an applicant] has a constitutional right to have his application considered on its individual merits."

And there is a different way to affirmatively take into consideration all individuals who have shown the ability to overcome discrimination, poverty, disability, dysfunctional families, and other obstacles that have resulted in lower grade point averages and SAT scores. These achievers, whatever their color, or mixture of colors, have proved they have the determination and the grit to take on college and graduate school work. Accordingly, admissions committees should give them credit for their ability to overcome obstacles when considering their applications.

This actual multicultural approach is working now. In California, the voters enacted Proposition 209 in 1996, ending affirmative action in college admissions; and in Texas, the 1996 ruling by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ended affirmative action.

As a result, because college admissions directors in those states could no longer give racial and ethnic preferences, they?along with administrators and professors?left their offices and actually went into middle and high schools in low-income areas.

They worked with the teachers to raise their expectations of the students, and they helped make the curriculum more challenging. More of those students are now being admitted to colleges without affirmative action. And, as National Public Radio reported on February 11, "Top universities [are continuing to target] high-poverty schools with outreach, recruitment, and scholarships."

Having been researching affirmative action for years, I came across this epiphany of diversity turned upside down:

In 1996, the University of Washington Law School in Seattle?in a report to the Association of American Law Schools?admitted it had denied admission to a white welfare mother with otherwise acceptable credentials because she was not someone who would contribute "significantly" to the diversity of the class since she was not "a member of a racial or ethnic group subject to discrimination."

Harvard Law School admitted her because of the diversity she added to all those classmates who didn't know any welfare mothers.

That is one of the reasons the civil rights has gotten bogged down to the point where it is virtually nonexistent today. The white supremacist government diluted the movement by slowly but steadily allowing gays, welfare mothers, women, abortion, and every other cause to have the same
weight as the problem of white supremacy.

So we have gotten pushed into the background where we will most likely remain until we decide to empower our race.

She made a choice to be a mother, and to go on welfare. Being white she can still change her life conditions much easier than can most black people can
theirs.

So I think the Seattle Law school made the right decision without question.

I'm sorry but am I missing something...I have to de-lurk on this one and respectfully disagree...

There are Black gay folks...there are Black folks on welfare...there are Black women who are well...WOMEN who should have choices in their reproductive healthcare...and those struggles are directly related to our civil rights...Civil Rights = "The rights belonging to an individual by virtue of citizenship, especially the fundamental freedoms and privileges guaranteed by the 13th and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution and by subsequent acts of Congress, including civil liberties, due process, equal protection of the laws, and freedom from discrimination." Okay so if you don't care for the dictionary version written by said white supremacists how
bout this quote from Dr. King....

"I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits."

or "Liberation is not the private province of one particular group" Audre Lorde.

I am not a woman one day and Black the next...a feminist one day and a socialist the next...(I wish I had a bell hooks quote to throw in here but it escapes me.) Just as a brother is not just a Black man....he may be a working class Black man...an exoffender...a Republican (unfortunately)...a socialist...Our struggle for liberation/civil rights has to involve a holistic approach rather than single issue politics...because we are more than just our skin color...

Also, White supremacy does not exist in a vacuum...we live in a capitalist country where white supremacy serves a means to an end...

And why are we to trust or hold responsible said White supremacist government with our liberation? From where I'm sitting our government isn't in a rush to liberate anyone...gay, straight, on welfare, whatever...so making a the statement that "That is one of the reasons the civil rights has gotten bogged down to the point where it is virtually nonexistent today. The white supremacist government diluted the movement by slowly but steadily allowing gays, welfare mothers, women, abortion, and every other cause to have the same weight as the problem of white supremacy."

what?

A group doesn't have to be defined racially or ethnically to be discriminated against. It just has to be defined. "Welfare mothers" is
about as non-homogenous a group as you can get. The only thing they have in common is they are on welfare, and they are mothers. Oh, and that they are discriminated against.

Now, I'm finding Harvard Law School's belief that she will add diversity amusing. The fact that she want to go to Harvard Law School is a STRONG indicator that she hold the same fundamental values as Mainstream America. More, being white it will not be assumed she is or was on welfare. I don't know if she will tell anyone, but given the snooty nature of the "elite" schools, I doubt it.

On the other hand, I'm kind of pleased for her she got in there. It would be good if she let people know that "welfare mothers" are not limited by the definitions inflicted on them.

See, I don't believe that establishing the rights of someone else has to come at the expense of mine. That's the logical error too many people in this nation makes. And I don't believe we have to line up defined groups and prioritize them, decide whose issues get addressed first. That IS what is being done, frankly--Xxxxx is right in saying the government is consiously moving to obscure Black issues with issues of all other defined groups. By conflating them, Black issues--the existance of which I
am unfortunately convinced are necessary to hold the shape of the national culture together--are diluted. In fact, the issues of all groups are blurred, made more ill-defined. It's the only way "reverse discrimination" could have even been raised as a concept, much less hold any pretense to reality.

That said, everyone has to pick a windmill to tilt at. And being human, we're going to pick the things we feel we are personally affected by. In my case, the issues of the Black middle class community are first, with those of the disenfranchised, "urban," Black "underclass" a near inseperable second.