The traditional liberal arts curriculum had been watered down with overtly political ethnic and feminist authors, a concession to a misguided and trendy pluralism. “Disadvantaged minorities” displaced their sons in the entering classes of Ivy League universities militant feminists demanded integration, disrupting the comfortable esprit de corps of campus men’s clubs. They felt that their cherished family alma maters had succumbed to the cheap thrills of radical chic and caved in to the pressures of black nationalist mau-mauing and feminist hectoring. They had seen their neighborhood schools forcibly integrated through racial busing imposed by liberal judges. Many of the “New Right” became conservatives in reaction to this kind of identity politics. The liberals were using a blatant racial quota-something conservatives vehemently opposed on principle-to push the president to a more liberal nominee.
Marshall’s vacancy should be filled by a person who could understand and express the unique experience of racial minorities in this country.īeltway conservatives must have bristled at this bind. Partisan politics and ideological litmus tests surely should be put aside in this instance. The Bush administration would demonstrate the racial insensitivity-indeed bigotry-that its enemies had long suspected if it appointed a white person to fill this vacancy. It was crucial, they insisted, that the nation’s highest court include a person of color. Bush-who would nominate Marshall’s successor. Liberals and civil rights groups began a predictable campaign directed at the Republican president-George H.
It was widely expected that another African-American would be-indeed, would have to be-appointed. Immediately the speculation and maneuvering concerning Marshall’s replacement began. Board of Education-announced his intention to retire from the bench. Thurgood Marshall-the first black Supreme Court justice, the lead attorney for the NAACP in the historic racial desegregation case Brown v. The year 1991 marked the end of an era in American civil rights. And people of goodwill may make sincere claims that strike others as obviously wrongheaded. Self-serving individuals, rabble-rousers, and political hacks use accusations of racism, sexism, homophobia, and other types of “bias” tactically, in order to advance their own ends. This leads to disagreement and confusion. As a result, it is available to describe an increasingly wide range of disparate policies, attitudes, decisions, and social phenomena. I will argue that the social and legal meaning of “racism” is in a state of crisis: The term now has no single clear and agreed-upon meaning.
The Race Card will examine the prevalence of dubious and questionable accusations of racism and other types of bias. Clarence Thomas, when charges of sex harassment surfaced during his confirmation hearings for the Supreme Court of the United States, compared his critics to a lynch mob. The multimillionaire-who, through untold plastic surgeries, has achieved the Aryan phenotype of Snow White- declared fearlessly, “When you fight for me, you’re fighting for all black people, dead and alive.” (That rumbling you hear is the sound of thousands of former slaves, sharecroppers, and victims of Jim Crow turning in their graves.) Prince, a musician whose contract was not quite as good as Michael Jackson’s but still extraordinarily generous, complained that he was a “slave” to his record label (years later Prince made a deal with Jackson’s old label, Sony, apparently unafraid of the racist conspiracy). Michael Jackson-a musician who enjoyed the most lucrative career in the history of recorded music-teamed up with Brawley’s former handler, Al Sharpton, to accuse his recording label, Sony Music, of a “racist conspiracy” to undermine his popularity after sales of his disappointing latest album are, well, disappointing. We can all think of examples: Tawana Brawley’s claimed assault seemed to have been a staged hoax. But a lot of people also worry that the charge of racism can be abused. Many believe that it remains a serious problem that affects many people on a regular basis. Almost all Americans agree that racism is wrong.
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