| YES, by Bill Jones |
| YES, for now, By Neil Jummonville |
Do we still need affirmative action?
NO.
By Thomas Dye, FSU professor of government and public policy
In 1896, Supreme Court Justice John Harlan opposed segregation.
"Our Constitution is color blind and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens."
Harlan was dissenting from the majority in the infamous Plessy vs. Ferguson case approving the doctrine of "separate but equal."
Unfortunately, the ideal of a color-blind society remains almost as elusive today as it was 100 years ago.
Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream that "children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." What happened to that dream?
The civil rights movement in America is now widely viewed as just another special-interest group. Why? Because it shifted its focus from individual rights to group benefits.
What united "all God's children - black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Catholics and Protestants - to join hands and to sing ... 'free at last'" was the principle that everyone, regardless of race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin, is entitled to equal protection of the laws.
But that principle is lost in a maze of "goals," "guidelines" and "affirmative-action programs."
Racial and gender preferences have become commonplace in employment, hiring and promotion, college and university admissions and faculty recruitment. "New" groups - homosexuals, for example - continually try to be included among the preferred.
Americans are now divided into two classes - those who enjoy legally mandated preferential treatment and those who can lawfully be discriminated against. The result is increased tension and conflict - on the job, in schools, on college campuses and throughout society.
The resentments among those now being discriminated against are leading to renewed levels of racism and sexism.
Moreover, the supposed beneficiaries of preferences are unfairly stigmatized. Stereotypes of group members unable to get ahead on merit alone are reinforced; individual effort, achievement and character are undermined.
Can individual citizens restore the dream of a truly color-blind society? Perhaps.
In California last year, voters approved a constitutional amendment that prohibits preferential treatment on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin.
It inspires new civil-rights movements in the other states and in Washington and pressures Congress and the President to seek to guarantee full civil rights to everyone.
Full civil rights for all Americans remains the nation's most compelling ideal. It must be restored and must rise above group entitlements, benefits and preferences. In the eloquent words of Martin Luther King Jr.:
"I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.' "