When is it fair to favor one person over another because of race? – Orange County Register

When is it fair to favor one person over another because of race?

The U.S. Supreme Court has given puzzling guidance on that question for the past fifty years.

In 1990, a court ruled that the federal government could give priority to minority applicants for radio and television licenses. Five years later, it said the federal government could not favor minority-owned contractors for government construction projects.

In 1987, the court allowed the Santa Clara County transportation agency to prioritize a woman because no woman had previously held such office. However, in 2009, a court prevented New Haven, Connecticut, from favoring Black firefighters for promotion because, of the 21 senior officers, only one was Black.

In 1978, the University of California at Davis School of Medicine banned 16 out of 100 seats for Hispanics, Blacks, and Native Americans. In 2003, the University of Michigan Law School was allowed to refuse admission to white women because it wanted to create more racial diversity in admissions.

In 2013, the University of Texas was informed that it could not disqualify a white woman from applying unless Texas’ desire to create racial diversity could not be achieved in any other way. Three years later, the court ruled against the white woman applicant, saying that Texas had shown its other mechanisms did not produce the number of racially minority students that Texas wanted.

In its most recent rulings, in 2009, the court held that the New Haven fire department could not make promotion decisions based on race unless there was “strong basis to show that conscious actions were taken.” about race is necessary to overcome past racism”.

In New Haven, 40% of the population is black, but only 9% of senior firefighter officers are human; Hispanic figures are 20% and 9%, respectively. However, “thresholds indicate statistically significant disparities and are no more than far from a solid evidence base,” the court ruled.

New Haven removed the list of candidates for promotion because it was devoid of black people. Several people on that list sued, pointing out that they had lost promotion because of their race. The court held that attempting to reflect statistics on racial populations failed to justify the harm caused by those individuals.

The employment clause of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 states: “Nothing in this chapter shall be construed to require any employer. . . accord preferential treatment to any individual or to any group because of that individual or group’s race, color, religion, sex or national origin as a result of an imbalance that may exist for the total number or percentage of people of any race, color, religion, sex or national origin employed by any employer. . . compared with the total or percentage of persons of such race, color, religion, sex or national origin in any given community. “