A Tangled Webb Bobs, And Weaves Affirmative Action Crazy Quilt

Former Republican, former Reagan Navy Secretary but now Virginia Democratic Senate candidate James Webb continues to ignore that wise old adage: when you’re standing in a hole, stop digging.

I can almost sympathize with him, caught as he is in a no-man’s land between his old criticisms of affirmative action (“state-sponsored racism”) and the fact that the modern Democratic party requires fealty to affirmative action, with no room for deviation, not to mention that in the upcoming election he must appeal to independents and Republicans in Virginia who do not share the Democrats’ blind devotion to race preferences.

Webb’s attempt to dodge all the incoming fire coming at him on this question if creative if nothing else. (I think what else it is is inconsistent and unpersuasive, but that’s just me.) It’s that affirmative action should be available only to blacks, or to everybody (so long as they’re poor. Thus the Washington Times quotes him from Friday press conference arguing that “affirmative action programs should apply only for blacks or be opened to include ‘disadvantaged white folks.’”

The WashTimes continued:

According to exit polls, the majority of black voters supported Mr. Miller, whose campaign portrayed Mr. Webb as a skeptic of affirmative action programs.

Mr. Webb yesterday sought to clarify his position, saying affirmative action was established to remove the “badge of slavery.”

“When they expanded it beyond that to any ethnic group other than Caucasian, it became a different sort of thing,” he said. “Particularly with the immigration patterns in the country, where we all of a sudden had such a large number of Latinos and Asians … it essentially became unmanageable in my view.

“I think we either need to revert affirmative action back to African Americans — 25 percent of African Americans are still in poverty — or we need to make it totally race neutral and open it up to disadvantaged white folks.”

Webb has yet to explain why he thinks the courts would not continue to reject racial preferences predicated on a need to overcome generalized, society-wide past discrimination, as even Justice O’Connor did in the important Croson case from Richmond. She wrote:

The District Court accorded great weight to the fact that the city council designated the Plan as “remedial.” But the mere recitation of a “benign” or legitimate purpose for a racial classification is entitled to little or no weight…. Racial classifications are suspect, and that means that simple legislative assurances of good intention cannot suffice.

….

JUSTICE MARSHALL apparently views the requirement that Richmond identify the discrimination it seeks to remedy in its own jurisdiction as a mere administrative headache, an [p505] “onerous documentary obligatio[n].” We cannot agree….

The “evidence” relied upon by the dissent, the history of school desegregation in Richmond and numerous congressional reports, does little to define the scope of any injury to minority contractors in Richmond or the necessary remedy. The factors relied upon by the dissent could justify a preference of any size or duration.

In short, Webb’s proposal to limit preferences to blacks and justify them by the need to overcome the legacy of slavery is rather clearly a legal non-starter. But his desire to limit preferences to blacks at least has the merit of recognizing that the “diversity” justification for preferences is a crock. However, I doubt that it will please Hispanics, or women. Indeed, I wonder what he thinks of the rabid defense of preferences now going on in Michigan, virtually all of which is scripted to emphasize the alleged need of women for special treatment.

And his alternative — making affirmative action into an anti-poverty program — might appease some Hispanics but is unlikely to win over the women, at least not if the Michigan anti-MCRI campaign really does represent their views.

I am still waiting in vain for some journalist to ask Webb — indeed, I think all candidates for every office should be asked — whether or not he agrees with the principle that every American has a right to be treated “without regard” to race, creed, or color.

Based on Webb’s comments to date, if he were asked I think I know what he’d do: change the subject.