By Michael Bates, Special to The Kansas City Star
I became involved in the civil rights movement more than 40 years ago when it was easy to identify the “enemy.” It was George Wallace and people who thought and acted like him. As time progressed, we have made great strides, or at least I would like to believe we have.
Yet, as a society, we live in a collective form of denial. The past practice of slavery continues to have very real effects today.
Please do not misunderstand. I am not equating other forms of discriminatory behavior with slavery. Invidious as they may be, they do not compare to more than 400 years of slavery and segregation that were practiced before and during the inception of the United States of America.
But we suffer from a collective amnesia as best described by Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” in “The Republic.” Briefly, we are chained to the wall and we think the shadows are reality. When we are unchained and face the light of reality, it is too painful. If we would just take time for our eyes to adjust, we would see the truth, not just the shadows of truth.
We have come a long way on this journey, but we still have a very long way to go.
Come now to the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court. We have Rush Limbaugh, Tom Tancredo and Newt Gingrich calling her a racist. (Gingrich later retracted that statement.) As the columnist Leonard Pitts wrote, “There is something surreal about hearing those who have historically been the enemies of racial progress define racial progress as looking out for the poor white brother.”
Sotomayor grew up in public housing in the Bronx. She was an outstanding student and a tough-as-nails older sister to her brother. She graduated summa cum laude from Princeton and went to Yale Law School. She has extensive experience as a lawyer (both public and private) and as a judge. She has more varied legal experience than anyone serving on the Supreme Court.
In a recent article in the New York Law Journal, Elkan Abramowitz described her as a “pragmatist and hard worker.” He further stated, “as far as I can see there is no political bias one way or the other.”
Does not she exhibit all of the characteristics of someone we would want on the Supreme Court? Yes. I would hope she brings some balance back to a court that for my taste has swung too far to the conservative side of the political spectrum.
It is a total misnomer that conservative justices are not activists. As the Supreme Court has become more conservative in recent years it has become the most activist court, having rewritten many years of civil rights jurisprudence.
A remedy to decades of discrimination is now called a “preference.” A well-settled principle of procedural employment discrimination (the Lilly Leadbetter case) is now called untimely. And so on.
I, for one, hope she is quickly confirmed and joins the court for the start of its new term. We need her rationality and pragmatism.
Michael Bates is a former director of the Kansas City Human Relations Department. He currently is the Minority and Women Business Enterprises coordinator for the Kansas City School District. He lives in Kansas City.
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Sotomayer’s College Experience
This probably doesn’t need to be said, but Darroby’s diatribe is patently absurd. Whether or not Judge Sotomayor had the test scores to get into college the fact is that she graduated Summa Cum Laude from Princeton. If her test scores were not adequate it would be more an indictment of the test than of Sotomayor.
It is possible (I don’t know and neither does Darroby) that Sotomayor got into Princeton in part because of “racial quotas and preferences.” It is not possible that she obtained the highest honors on that basis. The point of entrance exams is not really to test who gets in—it is to test who will be successful. Sotomayor was. I’ll leave it you to decide whether Darroby was.
I see the Star
Is hard at work deleting posts again. It doesn't suprise me really, after all I was telling the truth.
The truth is that Sotomayor does not have some terrific 'American Dream made it on her own' story. Rather her story is one of being given things that she did not earn or deserve because of her race and sex. She did not earn her degrees. She was handed them on the silver platter of racial quotas and preferences. Had she been white she would never have made it past high school. She didn't have the grades to make it into a state school on merit, and certainly didn't qualify to be admitted to an Ivy League school on merit.
Sotomayor should be ashamed of herself. She has used her race to get preferential treatment all her life, and her 'achievements' aren't something to be proud of, since she did not earn them.
I am a woman who works in a field where there are many more men than women. Like many other people I worked my way thru college and obtained my degree on the basis of my own ability and hard work. I EARNED every bit of the professional reputation that I have, as have most of the women I work with. I would have been insulted had someone even suggested that I should be given admittance to a university that I really didn't qualify for, or a degree or position that I did not earn on my own merit.
People who accept admittance to a college or program, a degree, job, or promotion on the basis of race or sex should be ashamed of themselves. I honestly do not know how Sotomayor looks at herself in the mirror every morning knowing that she did not earn the place she now has. She is a disgrace and an embarrassment to every woman who has achieved their professional goals on their own merit rather than by being given something they did not earn because of their race and sex.
WoodyKC
Someone once said something about the content of ones character. What happened to that?
Hubert Humphrey also said that he would eat his hat if the 1964 Civil Rights Act was ever interpreted to support racial quotas. We started going in the right direction in 1964, but we went off track some time between the 1960s and 2009.
Lyin' Lenny
It's so nice of you to give us your opinion, for what is is worth. Now can you kindly state the reasons for that opinion so that others might judge for themselves if it is valid?
"Come now to the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court. We have Rush Limbaugh, Tom Tancredo and Newt Gingrich calling her a racist. (Gingrich later retracted that statement.) As the columnist Leonard Pitts wrote, 'There is something surreal about hearing those who have historically been the enemies of racial progress define racial progress as looking out for the poor white brother.'"
Limbaugh, Tancredo, and Gingrich have not "historically been the enemies of racial progress." That honor belongs to the Democrat Party and its militant arm, the Ku Klux Klan.
Racial Progress
There will never be racial progress as long as race and gender are used a qualifications. Every society on earth has and continue to have residents who are stupid enough to use race and gender in decision making. For business this will result in not getting the best people and failing. In government it will result in the division of the people eventually fracturing the populace leading to government failure.
Someone once said something about the content of ones character. What happened to that?
Why?
It's so nice of you to give us your opinion, for what is is worth. Now can you kindly state the reasons for that opinion so that others might judge for themselves if it is valid?
Leonard Pitts
This Judge who threw the suit of firefighters who passed the test to be promoted only to be denied because no blacks passed the test is biased to say the least, and racist to say the worst.
Anyone who would quote Lyin' Lenny Pitts cannot be a resident of the real world.
Facts?
Mr Bates,
Could you clarify a few things. If you're saying that in North America slavery was practiced for 400 years before being abolished, I would guess you read a different history book than the rest of us. That would mean we had European colonist slaveowners here in 1463. While Columbus may have visited here in the late 1400s, there were no permanent colonies until more than 100 years later. Also, if you're saying Judge Sotomayor's variety of experiences makes her more qualified than Chief Justice Roberts, then you just presented the case for why the present occupant of the White House shouldn't be there. Lastly, because the current Supreme Court sticks to a more narrow interpretation of the law doesn not make them activist. Please do some research next time.
Liberals Please
We understand that a liberal is going to be going to the supreme court.
Don't worry, you're going to get your liberal constitution hating justice.
Constitution respecting people have already accepted this. What we constitution respecting people want, is for you guys to get a non-racist, non-sexist, non-extremist constitutional hating justice.
That's all we want. Soto-whatever is just an ignorant _bad_ person. She is not a good person. Surely you can find an American hating person who is still a good person at heart.
This woman has no business...
Being a judge at all, much less a Supreme Court Justice. There is no place for discrimination on the Supreme Court of the United States. Sotomayor has proven, by repeating her prejudices over and over, that she cannot be objective. All too often bigotry and racism are ignored or accepted when the person who is a bigot and racist is also a minority. Sotomayor's racist views are wrong and have no place on the Supreme Court.