Drop whatever you’re doing (except for finishing this post) and rush to read David Bernstein’s remarkable essay in the Wall Street Journal on the American Bar Association’s plan to force law schools to implement racial preferences “regardless of any federal, state or local laws that prohibit of such policies.”
The new Standard 211, styled “Equal Opportunity and Diversity,” would govern admissions and faculty hiring policies. It says nothing about treating people from different groups equally, and lots about “diversity” — a code word for affirmative action preferences. “Consistent with sound legal education policy and the Standards,” part (a) says that a law school must provide “full opportunities for the study of law and entry into the profession by members of underrepresented groups, particularly racial and ethnic minorities,” and it must also commit “to having a student body that is diverse with respect to gender, race and ethnicity.”
Part (b) says, “Consistent with sound educational policy and the Standards, a law school shall demonstrate by concrete action a commitment to having a faculty and staff that are diverse with respect to gender, race and ethnicity.”
….
… [T]he “interpretations” of Standard 211 … have “equal weight” to the rules themselves. Interpretation 211-1 states that “the requirements of a constitutional provision or statute that purports to prohibit consideration of gender, race, ethnicity or national origin in admissions or employment decisions is not a justification for a school’s non-compliance with Standard 211.”
Racial preferences will thus generally be necessary to comply with Standard 211 — despite the fact that several states, including California and Florida, ban race as a factor in law school admissions or hiring or both.
The ABA, like so many diversiphiles, is concerned with “diversity” only regarding “gender, race, and ethnicity.” Religion is presumably irrelevant, or perhaps for some undisclosed reason it takes the constitutional prohibition against religious preferences seriously.
Remember all those law schools and law professors who objected to the Solomon Amendment because it interfered with “academic freedom”? (If you don’t, just search this site for “Solomon”; I’ve discussed it too many times to cite.) Don’t hold your breath waiting for them to come forward objecting to the ABA’s proposed trampling of academic freedom.
