Reflections From a Murky Pond

US Supreme Court Justice is rarely right about things, hence why her opinions are based upon perceived or hoped for outcomes rather than the law. She can, however, be right about the fact from time to time. A case in point being her tirade during an interview with the The National Law Journal. She was and is right about this.

“What’s amazing is how things have changed,” Ginsburg said, recalling the landmark 1971 decision of Griggs v. Duke Power Co., in which the Supreme Court unanimously held that employer policies that look neutral on paper can still constitute discrimination if they disproportionately harm minorities in practice. “It was a very influential decision and it was picked up in England. That’s where the court was heading in the ’70s.”

— Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg

And, to our nation’s shame, that was exactly where the court was heading in the ’70s. It was heading at a headlong pace towards enabling special race-based privileges for non-Whites and forcing everyone to make race as the overriding factor in all decisions due to “disparate impact.”

NOTE: The singular exception to this is the progressive income tax which has a very disparate impact upon Whites but is never considered be discriminatory or a violation of their civil rights.

What most aside from Blacktivists don’t know is that the employer policy being lambasted in Griggs v. Duke Power Co. was Duke Power’s requirement that employees in more demanding positions had to either have a high school diploma or scores on standardized IQ tests equal to those of the average high school graduate. As Blacks have a long-standing history, which hasn’t changed to this day, of graduating from high school far less often than Whites, this was considered by the Burger Court to be both discriminatory and a violation of Blacks’ civil rights.

And following along with that High Court ruling and creation of the “disparate impact” framework is exactly the path to Hell that America was taking until the Roberts Court finally started to make inroads against this race-based legal framework.

So, as she so often is, Ginsburg has her facts in order but draws the wrong conclusion. Hardly shocking since she’s SCOTUS justice in the first place only due to Affirmative Action.

Tags: Affirmative Action | America | Blacks | Civil Rights | Ginsburg | History | Law | Politics | Prejudice | Racial Activism | Racial Politics | US Supreme Court

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 26th, 2014 at 12:30 pm and is filed under Politics. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.