The Contra Costa Times (Calif.) has an article today complaining about the underrepresentation of black lawyers in California, which it blames primarily on the banning of preferences, and praising the ABA’s recent proposal to require “diversity.”
There is nothing much surprising here, except perhaps the greater superficiality of one of the quoted complaints:
“We would like to have a pool of lawyers that reflects our mission and our community,” said [Contra Costa County head public defender David] Coleman, who is African-American. The minority shortage “generates lawyers who don’t look like their clients and who don’t look like the community.”
While they’re at it, perhaps the ABA could also require fat/thin/tall/short/ugly/pretty/disabled/etc. and other appearance-related “diversity” requirements.
The article did, however, contain one very interesting statistic:
Statewide, about 33 percent of the black students who took the California bar examination for the first time in July passed, compared with 69 percent of whites, 61.7 percent of Asians and 48.8 percent of Latinos.
What would be really interesting to see is a breakdown of these numbers that would show what percentage of the minorities who failed were admitted to California or out of state law schools under preferential admissions, and also a comparison of the most recent pass/fail rate with the rate for the last date when all of the California graduates had been admitted before preferences were banned.
Does this mean that we should assign black defendents black public defenders?
Maybe the black defendents would prefer to have the best possible lawyer, not the lawyer who best matches his skin color.
Don’t forget the rich/poor diversity. Haven’t seen too many lawyers who want to be poor for diversity’s sake.
the next demand is going to be that bar exams not apply to blacks in the same way as to other groups or that it not apply at all. the same will happen with the MCAT and all the other qualifying exams.
Anita – Justice William Douglas’ autobiography contains a story where he tried but failed to get the Supreme Court to review the case of a white who was refused admission to the Arizona bar to make room for blacks with lower bar-exam scores. Response from Thurgood Marshall: “You guys have been practicing discrimination for years. Now it is our turn.”
joel —
Yes, I assume it means that we should assign black defendants black public defenders. If, as is often claimed, criminal defendants are disproportionately black, then this means that the group of defense lawyers should be disproportionately black.
If, as is often claimed, corporate leaders are disproportionately white, then this means that the group of corporate lawyers should be disproportionately white.
What bothers me most about AA advocates is their apparent inability to coherently and consistently express exactly what it is that they advocate.
What is this obsession with people looking like other people? Does it go back to Clinton’s cabinet that was supposed to “look like” America?
Suppose that a black family wanted to move into a white neighborhood and the realtor told them that they didn’t look like the people in the other houses? Supppose the realtor steered them toward neighborhoods where the people looked like them? Well, the realtor would have a lawsuit on his hands, and rightly so.
the ills of discrimination can’t be cured with more discrimination.
also, the purpose of these exams is to make sure that the people who enter professions have a certain level of proficiency in their subject and in the kind of thinking that goes along with the subject. if you have lower scores, that means you know less than a person with higher scores. there may be some exceptions to this, but generally I believe it is the case. so if standards are lowered, it means you can no longer assume that a person who has a lawyers or doctors degree has a certain level of knowledge. if standards for passing exams are lowered for blacks, the assumption will be, and rightly so, that black professionals don’t know as much as white or asian professionals. This should not happen.
“Look like me”
Once again, it is SOOOO easy to make the racial bean counters look like utter fools. This time, John Rosenberg notes how The Contra Costa Times (CA) laments the “underrepresentation of black lawyers in California”: “We would like to have…
Addled “Diversity” Logic:
Courtesy of John Rosenberg, here’s an article praising…