InsideHigherEd has an article yesterday on the building resistance, from several directions, against the American Bar Association’s heavy-handed accrediting methods.
Recall, from my posts here, here, here, here, here, and here (most based on revelations by George Mason law professor David Bernstein), that the ABA is considering a proposed regulation that would require law schools to take race into account in admissions and hiring, even where doing so would conflict with state laws or constitutional provisions.
Actually, all you can tell on this score from the InsideHigherEd article is that groups that oppose affirmative action “say” the new regulations would require racial preferences and that ABA officials “say the rules allow but do not require law schools to consider race in admissions.” In short, they said; they said. The author, Doug Lederman, apparently didn’t read the regulations at issue; at least he didn’t report what they contain.
If he had read them, perhaps he could have asked the ABA to explain how law schools could meet the new standards without considering race, inasmuch as the new standards would require law schools to commit “to having a student body that is diverse with respect to gender, race and ethnicity” and to “demonstrate by concrete action a commitment to having a faculty and staff that are diverse with respect to gender, race and ethnicity.”
Nor, apparently, did Mr. Lederman read the letter sent to the Department of Education by the National Association of Scholars, which I quoted here. If he had, he might have asked how the ABA responded to this discussion in the NAS letter about what its new standards would require:
No doubt ABA members will protest that that is not what they meant. They will likely argue that they meant the law schools prohibited by law from engaging in preferential treatment will be required to find other methods of keeping up their minority numbers. But the ABA’s own statements before the Supreme Court belie that argument. In its amicus curiae brief in Grutter v. Bollinger, the ABA complained bitterly about the impossibility of complying with the laws of those jurisdictions that ban what the ABA euphemistically calls “race conscious admissions standards” and its own expansive vision of diversity. It told the Supreme Court that “race conscious admissions are essential to increasing minority representation in the legal system.” “It is unquestionable,” the ABA wrote, “that the improvement in minority participation in our law schools, and thus in our legal system, has been achieved largely by the use of race-conscious admissions policies such as those under attack here.” According to the ABA, prohibiting racially preferential admissions policies nationwide, as California and Washington have done statewide, would cause “a precipitous decline in minority participation in the institutions of our legal system” and “undo much of what has been accomplished in the last several decades.” (Amicus Brief at 18-21.)
If the ABA’s emphasis on “the results achieved” do not require taking race into account, i.e., giving preferences based on race in admissions and hiring, then what do they require?
“Actually, all you can tell on this score from the InsideHigherEd article is that groups that oppose affirmative action “say” the new regulations would require racial preferences and that ABA officials “say the rules allow but do not require law schools to consider race in admissions.” In short, they said; they said. The author, Doug Lederman, apparently didn’t read the regulations at issue; at least he didn’t report what they contain.”
This is a very common problem on that site. If there is clear language that shuts down controversy (e.g., the proposed ABA regulations and the Academic Bill of Rights), IHE will not report it. Further, if those posting comments try to report the germane language, their posts are very often blocked. IHE is every bit as disappointing as the schools themselves in terms of fairly and objectively presenting both sides of controversial issues.