“Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.”—Thomas Paine
Race peddlers are at the scheme of reparations again. This time, they are playing the game in higher education, hoping to get progressive government agencies to legislate racial preferences in college admissions. Will they succeed?
California Assemblyman Isaac Bryan of Los Angeles promotes educational benefits for descendants of slaves, whom the state lawmaker says should receive admission priority from California’s public and private universities. Asm. Bryan, incoming vice chair of the California Legislative Black Caucus, believes enacting legislation for such preferences is a “moral responsibility,” necessary for addressing racial inequality and systemic injustices. On December 2, Bryan introduced Assembly Bill No. 7 (AB7) in the California State Legislature, which proposes adding the following paragraph to the state’s education code:
[T]he California State University, the University of California, independent institutions of higher education, and private postsecondary educational institutions may consider providing a preference in admissions to an applicant who is a descendant of slavery, as defined, to the extent it does not conflict with federal law.
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A junior state legislator who was not well known by the public until now, Bryan received national press for pushing forward reparations amidst disappointments befallen on the movement. He told the Associated Press that California must “rectify … and heal that harm” from “perpetuating the inequalities that arose from slavery.” In this sense, the effort to provide admissions preferences for descendants of slaves goes beyond cash reparations. It is “a much bigger process” about repairing the inequality. Just to rub it in, Bryan also said his measure is partly a response to Trump’s war on “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) programs.
AB 7 is sponsored by many “A-list” California Democrats, including Assemblywoman Mia Bonta, wife of the State Attorney General Rob Bonta, and State Senator Akilah Weber, daughter of the California Secretary of State Shirley Weber. The entire bill consists of three short paragraphs, two of which merely restate existing state laws. In a move that can be interpreted almost as an insult, the proposal notes that the California Constitution prohibits racial preferences in public education, as spelled out in Proposition 209, approved by over 55 percent of the electorate first in 1996 and defended by 57 percent of California voters in 2020.
To be fair, the measure does not mention race explicitly, other than acknowledging the state bans racial preferences. It is, however, abundantly clear that descendance from slavery is employed as a race proxy in the bill and throughout the entire movement to institutionalize reparations. In an interview with California Black Media on the day he introduced AB 7, Bryan pledged to advocate for Black Californians in his new leadership role at the Black Legislative Caucus. He vows to fight for their “fair access to resources and opportunities in every aspect of life, whether it’s education, jobs, or health.”
The incessant moralizing of reparations leaders becomes even more pronounced in the face of mounting political setbacks and legal hurdles. Framing the issue as a “moral responsibility” is nearly a defense mechanism after California’s progressive governor rejected cash reparations and vetoed a reparations bill on “racially motivated eminent domain.” Prior to the leadership change, the California Legislative Black Caucus also blocked voting on two key reparations bills, which would have established a freedman affairs agency to confirm claims and created a state fund for reparations. ACA 7, another priority reparations measure to introduce “research-based/-informed” exemptions to Prop. 209, died in the State Senate in late summer as Democratic Senators weighed their ideological affiliation for race-preferential policies against the harsh realities of electoral politics.
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Throughout the nation, campaigns for reparations have stalled, with Evanston’s restitution policies being challenged in court and Harvard dragging its feet on delivering reparations promises.
Instead of doing the long, hard work to reduce persistent achievement gaps at the K-12 level and to reverse a cultural apathy to academic excellence, race-obsessed lawmakers like Assemblyman Bryan are again looking for racial fixes. Empirical evidence is yet to be unearthed to show any educational efficacy of racial preferences. Progressive politicians abort the mission the moment when reparations become cost-prohibitive. The Supreme Court has banned race-based college admissions. A growing majority of the American public doesn’t support slavery reparations. But these failures don’t deter racially motivated legislators who are, in essence, fulfilling the definition of “insanity,” doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Image of California State Capitol, Sacramento, California by Ken Lund on Flickr
Visiting in southern California, this seems surreal. The noxious aspects of DEI seem already to be passing. Let’s hope the reparations never get a foothold.
In the meantime, education for wealth building is needed for groups regardless of race.
I think the worst part of this is that the sponsors don’t even know Black history, particularly that of the Jim Crow era when stunts like this were actually tried.
That’s where the term “grandfathering” came from — one had certain rights if ones grandfather had them. Literacy tests and intelligence tests such as “how many bubbles are there in a bar of soap” came in to play — and SCOTUS saw through all of these pretexts for discrimination, identifying them as such.
And I can’t see SCOTUS not citing those cases and ruling the same way on this.
That said, I’d love to see the GAR (Grand Army of the Republic) challenge this.
The GAR is composed of the decedents of Union Army combat veterans, the people who fought to free the slaves, with one of them dying for every ten slaves who were freed. And if there are reparations such as this owed to those who were enslaved, there are equal reparations owed to those who fought and died to free said enslaved persons. Particularly those who died in the effort.
With a few notable exceptions, e.g. the Mass 54th and 55th, the Union Army was all White — either WASP farmers or Irish Catholic immigrants — and this would then wind up being an admissions priority for White students, and I think we all know how well that would go over with the coalitions for all good things.
But….
The claim is made:
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With a few notable exceptions, e.g. the Mass 54th and 55th, the Union Army was all White — either WASP farmers or Irish Catholic immigrants
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Actually, about 10% (200,000 men) were Black in the Union Army and Navy. Google
"number of black soldiers in Union Army" and the helpful AI summary gives:
Roughly 179,000 African American soldiers served in the Union Army during the Civil War, making up about 10% of the Union Army's total forces:
Service: Black soldiers served in infantry and artillery, and performed noncombat support functions such as cooking, nursing, and carpentry.
Mortality: The mortality rate for Black soldiers was 35% higher than other troops, with one in five Black soldiers dying in the war.
Recruitment: Frederick Douglass played a key role in recruiting Black soldiers, and many African Americans were inspired to enlist after hearing his words.
Composition: Both free African Americans and former slaves fought for the Union.
Support: Many more African Americans served in the Union Navy.
Note that the mortality rate was much higher for Black soldiers than white soldiers.
It is important to note that surviving white soldiers returned to their livelihood whereas
surviving Black soldiers returned to racial discrimination (even in the North).
Actually, about 10% (200,000 men) were Black in the Union Army and Navy. Google “number of black soldiers in Union Army” and the helpful AI summary gives:
Roughly 179,000 African American soldiers served in the Union Army during the Civil War, making up about 10% of the Union Army’s total forces:
And you don’t understand racism.
You love Google — Google “Port Chicago” and that was 80 years later…
What you fail to understand is that the military considered Blacks to be nothing more than “beasts of burden”, not to be trusted with actual combat. So doing the back-breaking work of lugging cannons out of the swampy land they got stuck in, fine — but don’t trust them to actually fire them in combat.
And what was unique about the MA 54th is that they WERE trusted with combat and they fought bravely (which the racist White military establishment didn’t think they were capable of doing. Remember that units were segregated until Truman desegregated the Army after WWII
Did some “pass” as White — probably. Women did as well (i.e. as male) — and my guess is that a lot of commanding officers didn’t ask a whole lot questions about people in their command whom they could depend on. But official policy was “beast of burden” and you don’t understand the evils of racism if you don’t realize that.
Blacks were considered “childlike” and hence it would be like trusting 10 year olds to hold the line. Wash the dishes, fine, but not something where you needed to be trusted.
“The mortality rate for Black soldiers was 35% higher than other troops, with one in five Black soldiers dying in the war.”
To understand this, you have to remember that even though the 54th Massachusetts had so many men willing to serve that it’s physical standards were above that of the rest of the Army, it still had people dying before it even left Massachusetts…
You need to remember what life was like before antibiotics, before maternal and child nutrition, and that Presidents Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley would have lived had then been shot today, or even back in 1981 when Reagan was, our medicine is that much better today.
Remember that even of those who died as the result of combat, the vast majority of them died of infection — often a bullet would go through multiple soldiers, infecting the latter ones with the fecal matter of the first. So you have to segregate out the natural deaths from the combat related ones, and in many cases the Blacks were in poorer health — escaped slaves often were.
It is important to note that surviving white soldiers returned to their livelihood whereas surviving Black soldiers returned to racial discrimination (even in the North).
Not true. President US Grant was arrested by a BLACK police officer (Union Vet) in DC for recklessly driving his carriage. QED there were BLACK police officers with the authority to arrest the POTUS, or at least an important-looking White man.
The discrimination you speak of didn’t start until after the end of Reconstruction.
Facts matter and I suggest you look at the composition of the Reconstruction-era Congressional delegations from the South….
And look into the Tuskegee Airmen and the bigotry they were fighting 80 years later…
Apparently I don’t get to reply to Dr. Ed but his responses to my comments are non sequiturs. Unless one has a teleological orientation, I fail to see how racism in the North 80 years past the Civil War affects the composition of the Union’s military forces. Ed’s comment about the 35% higher mortality rate is particularly lacking–mortality rates in the Civil War are given as a percent of those who died when under the colors, _not_ whether they died from combat injuries or disease. They died.
And there is no reason to think that freed blacks had, outside of the military, a higher mortality rate, particularly for men in their 20’s and 30’s, which made up the vast majority of soldiers. Such things as lack of antibiotics affected both whites and blacks equally. And the claim that racism did not start until after Reconstruction is ludicrous–Lincoln himself said
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“I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races.”
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And google "racism and draft riots civil war"
I guess I fail to see the real difference here between admission preference for descendants of slaves and, say, sport preference for biological women. Both are acknowledging provisions must be made for a particular status–descendants due to centuries of, yes, oppression and biological women due to less upper-body strength compared to biological men. Interestingly, this provision excludes those who were not descendants of slaves but have the same skin color–in other words, Obama, Harris, and Claudine Gay would not be eligible (I’m assuming the bill only applies to descendants of US slavery, not slavery in other countries–otherwise, everyone would be eligible–all of us have slaves in our background). Furthermore, the last time the Ivies allowed this type of research (in the aughts), about a third of the blacks were actually immigrants or offspring of immigrants. And since we already allow colleges to offer preferential admission on the basis of their forbearers having attended that college, there is a precedent for this type of affirmative preference (and note that it was nearly impossible for blacks to attend most colleges until the 70’s). This type of program also has precedence in reserving slots in the UC system for the top 4% of graduates in California high schools. And California also offers exclusionary preference for gambling casinos to Indian tribes.
In general, a distinction needs to be made between programs that are based on skin color and those that differentially aid those of a certain skin color. For example, the Medi-caid expansions of the ACA disproportionately helped minorities–and people seem fine with that. Skin color is out (though it will take decades to remove its emphasis in the elite universities). Programs that aid descendants of those who have been damaged by societal customs and governance should be lauded.
” And since we already allow colleges to offer preferential admission on the basis of their forbearers having attended that college, there is a precedent for this type of affirmative preference (and note that it was nearly impossible for blacks to attend most colleges until the 70’s).”
It was also impossible for most Whites to attend a selective college even after the 1970s and you are talking about statistical outliers who are the forebearers.
For example, Harvard awarded 1,438 B.A. and B.S degrees in 1969 — and there were 1,512,169 soldiers in the US Army. The US military had 3,460,162 active duty people in 1969 — and if you include women, the majority of young people weren’t in the military.
” the Medi-caid expansions of the ACA disproportionately helped minorities”
I doubt it because there are more Whites living in poverty than there ARE “minorities.” The NAACP raised this issue back in the mid ’90s when “welfare reform” was becoming a racial issue, emphasizing that there were more poor White families than there were Black families of any income level.
Remember that you are talking headcount here (n) and not percentages — and a much smaller percentage of a much larger population results in a larger headcount. And in 1969, way more White men were drafted than graduating from Harvard…
I stated:
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the Medi-caid expansions of the ACA disproportionately helped minorities”
I doubt it because there are more Whites living in poverty than there ARE “minorities.”
White: 59.3% of the population is non-Hispanic or Latino
Hispanic or Latino: 18.9% of the population
Black or African American: 13.6% of the population
Asian: 5.6% of the population
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) has helped people of all races and ethnicities, but Black and Hispanic adults have seen the largest improvements:
Uninsured rates
Uninsured rates declined for all racial and ethnic groups, but Black and Hispanic adults saw the largest reductions:
Black: The uninsured rate for Black adults dropped from 24.4% in 2013 to 14.4% in 2018.
Hispanic: The uninsured rate for Hispanic adults decreased from 40.2% in 2013 to 24.9% in 2018.
Cost-related access problems
Black and Hispanic adults saw the largest reductions in cost-related access problems:
Enrollment
Enrollment in HealthCare.gov increased for all racial and ethnic groups between 2020 and 2023:
Latino: Enrollment increased from 1.7 million to 3.4 million.
White: Enrollment increased from 4.7 million to 5.9 million.
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Now, the two main parts of the ACA were the medi-cal expansion and the healthcare.gov (subsidies for insurance), but the above makes clear that minorities were helped _disproportionately_ compared to whites. And guess what? No one is complaining about racial preferences.
My central point remains–there will be policies that disproportionately help minorities but are quite justifiable in terms of reducing economic inequality (and invariably, because blacks and hispanics earn less than whites on average). Pretty much all policies people that brag about are of that type–many policies (patents, tax codes, tariffs) help those who are well-off but parties don't like to talk about them in those terms, rather justifying them in terms of "growth"–see NAFTA or corporate tax reductions.
“but the above makes clear that minorities were helped _disproportionately_ compared to whites.”
It does no such thing.
You continue to talk about percentages of subgroups and I am talking about headcounts — actual numbers of actual people.
I dispute your 59% White figure because you have to remember that someone like Barack Obama is *both* Black and White. Notwithstanding that, you continue to fall into the trap of believing that a larger percentage of a smaller population will result in a larger headcount. It won’t.
It seems to me the remedy is to elect different, better legislators.