Gonzales, Analysa M

United States Government AP

1st Period

Johnson

Affirmative Action is Reverse Discrimination.

 Gonzales, Analysa Marie

One would think that the passing of laws providing equal rights would amount to

equality. Even with the addition of amendments to the constitution giving freedoms to those

previously deprived of civil liberties, equality continued to allude them well into the late 20th

century. President Lyndon B. Johnson once stated, “freedom is not enough.” An end result, the

American Dream, might have glowed ever clearly in the distance, but what hope would any have

in achieving it without any path to it illuminated? In 1965, President Johnson provided the

answer in the form of an executive order that required that contractors “take affirmative action to

ensure that applicants… and employees [would be] treated… without regard to their race,

religion, or sex.” The purpose of affirmative action was, then, to correct the social injustices that

marred the country’s history. By the vast improvements made since then, however, many would

argue that its goals have already been met. In a country largely performance based today, the

continuity of such practice is not only viewed as impractical but demeaning and nonsensical as

affirmative action makes the constitution a barrier to the very legislation that took over 200 years

to accomplish in the first place.

On the night of November 4, 2008, history was forever changed as Barack Obama

celebrated his victory in the 44th presidential election as the first African American to ever be

named chief executive of the United States. At the end of his speech he stated, “Change has

[finally] come to America.” For a country, who, less than two centuries ago, had enslaved and

barred these same people from every form of freedom, to have elected a minority to the highest

position in government; it becomes blatantly obvious that the laws passed in their favor have

been successful. Before and during the peak of the Civil Rights Movement from 1955 to 1965,

the idea of having equality in occupational opportunities in the workplace was merely an idea,

and the numbers of African Americans holding jobs above menial manual labor jobs (for those
 Gonzales, Analysa Marie

who found jobs) lingered at abysmal levels. Yet, while the country experienced a great rise in its

number of employed minorities, the number of complaints filed with the Equal Employment

Opportunities Commission increased. In 1989, Sharon Taxman, a white high school teacher,

filed a complaint against the School Board of Piscataway for violating the Civil Rights Act of

1964 that forbids firing someone on the basis of race. Taxman believed the school board had

discriminated against her when it voted to keep another teacher, Debra Williams, over her

because they believed “it was in the school’s best interest to have an African American in the

business department.” Though the case never reached the Supreme Court (Taxman settled out of

court), it became clear why affirmative action might pose a threat to its initial purpose; providing

a means of discrimination against those who did not qualify as “previously disadvantaged.”

While minorities before the Civil Rights Movement had experienced great hardship in the

discrimination in employment opportunities, the greatest force holding them back was often not

the lack of job access, but lack of access to the education necessary to get the good jobs. The

1970’s were marked by a rapid increase in the number of affirmative action programs existing in

the country. Colleges, especially, were increasingly using race as a factor in the admission of

freshmen students to their campuses. The number of minorities being accepted dramatically

increased. Surely, those previously disadvantaged, would be enabled to better their standings

elsewhere, both in their careers and their financial standings. Yet, once again, a case of

discrimination evolved from affirmative action. Allan Bakke, a student at the University of

California who had been rejected twice as a medical school applicant, had come to believe that

the sixteen positions reserved for minorities, were of students who received favoritism on the

basis of their race over merit. Though the decision of the Supreme Court in the landmark case of

Regents of the University of California v. Bakke resulted in a victory for Bakke and his
 Gonzales, Analysa Marie

supporters, both sides of the debate were left disappointed to some degree. Justice Lewis Powell,

though ultimately declaring racial quotas illegal, did not declare acceptance based on the

consideration of race was not unconstitutional. In other words, discrimination was very much

still possible since minority students could still take precedence over others by race rather than

merit.

Education availability, however, is often affected by the availability of financial means to

fund it. Today, especially, receiving further education in college has become increasingly

expensive. Scholarships, for example, can often mean the difference for a student wishing to

pursue a higher education. Yet scholarships for specific groups often apply only to minorities,

the National Hispanic Scholarship Fund being a great example. While this scholarship can be

helpful to Hispanics who apply for it, the minority is not always the one in greater need. In 2003,

while over half of blacks and Hispanics earned less than $35,000 each year, so did more than

one-third of whites. That data, however, can be misleading as it doesn’t show circumstances or

other feasible information such as which group received the lowest average income. Therefore, it

is simply unfair to assume that any particular white person is better off than any individual

minority group member.

For people half a century ago, affirmative action was both a necessary step towards

equality and a temporary solution for those areas that had yet to incorporate equality within their

institutions. Yet, affirmative action still exists today, though circumstances have greatly changed.

While racism might never be truly and fully extinguished, occurrences such as Barack Obama’s

election should be proof enough that America has made a great change for the better. If the goal

was to eliminate racial discrimination, then distinguishing between races and helping only those

who were once discriminated against no longer serves to solve the problem but only furthers it.
 Gonzales, Analysa Marie

Works Cited

Edwards III, George C; Lineberry, Robert L; Wattenberg, Martin P. (2002). Government in

America: People, Politics, and Policy (10th Edition). New York: Pearson Longman.

Gutierrez-Jones, Carl. (2008). The Affirmative Action and Diversity Project: A Web Page for
Research. Retrieved October 09, 2009, from AAD Project Web Site: http://aad.english.ucsb.edu/

Kowalski, Kathiann M. (2007). Open for Debate: Affirmative Action. New York: Marshall

Canvendish

McPherson, Stephanie Sammartino. (2005). The Bakke Case and the Affirmative Action Debate.

New Jersey: Enslow Publishers, Inc.

Sykes, Marquita (1995). The Origins of Affirmative Action. Retrieved October 09, 2009, from

National Organization for Women Web Site: http://www.now.org/nnt/08-95/affirmhs.html