Why Do African-Americans Need Affirmative Action?
The fight against discrimination is crucial and African-Americans have been in this important fight for years. Even today, we see the struggle of discrimination all throughout the United States, which is why many people successfully convinced the government to create this process called affirmative action, and what this did was allow for an effort to improve the employment or educational opportunities of minorities. Today, there are many cases on education and employment that were won and lost simply because of affirmative action was on or against their side.
In the 1954, Brown V. Board case, where the court decided that racial segregation was declared “inherently unequal” in public schools. Moreover, as this case didn’t really accomplish its …show more content…
goal to fully desegregate public school all throughout the United States, it was still able to put a civil rights movement into full effect, while also still being able to put the constitution on the side of racial equality, and that is why the Brown V. board case is extremely important in adding more value to the Affirmative action plan. Furthermore, in 1965, the executive order 11246 by President Johnson was issued, putting forward in to effect government contractors to take “affirmative action” in the hiring process. This allowed for the chances of a minority getting hired to be much greater than before affirmative action. Additionally, there was also the Philadelphia plan created by President Richard Nixon in 1969, was an experiment to guarantee the blacks jobs in construction and craft unions. All in all, these cases, plans and orders were of great importance when it came to affirmative action because these were all moves that allowed for racial inequality to stabilize a bit more than it was during the 1960s. Now these were pretty successful orders and cases of affirmative action, but there was also cases that weren’t.
In lots of cases, we had Supreme Court decisions that ruled against affirmative action called reverse discrimination, claiming that affirmative action was just wasn’t fair enough for the whites. For example, a great a case to demonstrate the court ruling against affirmative action can be the 1978 case, Regents of the University of California V. Bakke, where Allan Bakke, white, applied twice for admission to the University of California Medical School at Davis, where he was rejected two times and although he had the requirements to attend, minorities were given admission to the university because of affirmative action. This eventually went to the Supreme Court where they later stated that due to the “rigid use of racial quotas” the school then violated the Equal Protection Clause. Further demolishing what affirmative action stood for. Another case can be the 1989 case, Croson V. City of Richmond, where the Supreme Court struck an affirmative action program designed to set aside a percentage of government contracts for Asian, African American, Hispanic, and female-owned construction companies, but Of course the court determined that, an affirmative action plan that could not be linked to specific acts of past governmental discrimination in that particular area was unconstitutional.
In present time, we still see affirmative action taking place in some areas of the United States not only helping African Americans, but if not all types of ethnic backgrounds.
According to Lahav Harkov, who wrote the article called, “Affirmative Action Bill for Arabs Goes to a Vote” stated, “a bill that would give Arabs who perform national-civilian service or serve in the IDF preference in government hiring and university acceptance is going to a Ministerial Committee for Legislation vote on Sunday.” This is extremely crucial because it states that Affirmative action is not only taking place in the United States, but also in other countries like Saudi Arabia. Another important Article might be this one called, “Behind the veil: The racism of Princeton’s affirmative action,” and it stated, “There’s no perfectly equitable admissions model. But a need-based, race-blind policy comes closer to leveling the playing fields of the disparate backgrounds of the candidate pools than the current practice. Such a policy would avoid the objectionable use of racial quotas while achieving the University’s goal of promoting socioeconomic equality among its disadvantaged applicants.” This article is extremely crucial since it is against affirmative action since it just want to create a system to forget race and go blind on admission relying only on the academics report sheet, but I must also say that if this is true then every other case fighting for Affirmative Action will be nothing if something like this happens, which is why this is an extremely crucial piece of
information
All in all, affirmative action was a form to fight back for minorities, so that they can push back on inequality and try to push forward to a much more equal world. Former U.S. Representative, Julius Caesar "J. C." Watts Jr., once said, “Affirmative action is a little like the professional football draft. The NFL awards its No. 1 draft choices to the lowest-ranked team in the league. It doesn't do this out of compassion or guilt. It's done for mutual survival. They understand that a league can only be as strong as its weakest team.”
In the 1954, Brown V. Board case, where the court decided that racial segregation was declared “inherently unequal” in public schools. Moreover, as this case didn’t really accomplish its …show more content…
goal to fully desegregate public school all throughout the United States, it was still able to put a civil rights movement into full effect, while also still being able to put the constitution on the side of racial equality, and that is why the Brown V. board case is extremely important in adding more value to the Affirmative action plan. Furthermore, in 1965, the executive order 11246 by President Johnson was issued, putting forward in to effect government contractors to take “affirmative action” in the hiring process. This allowed for the chances of a minority getting hired to be much greater than before affirmative action. Additionally, there was also the Philadelphia plan created by President Richard Nixon in 1969, was an experiment to guarantee the blacks jobs in construction and craft unions. All in all, these cases, plans and orders were of great importance when it came to affirmative action because these were all moves that allowed for racial inequality to stabilize a bit more than it was during the 1960s. Now these were pretty successful orders and cases of affirmative action, but there was also cases that weren’t.
In lots of cases, we had Supreme Court decisions that ruled against affirmative action called reverse discrimination, claiming that affirmative action was just wasn’t fair enough for the whites. For example, a great a case to demonstrate the court ruling against affirmative action can be the 1978 case, Regents of the University of California V. Bakke, where Allan Bakke, white, applied twice for admission to the University of California Medical School at Davis, where he was rejected two times and although he had the requirements to attend, minorities were given admission to the university because of affirmative action. This eventually went to the Supreme Court where they later stated that due to the “rigid use of racial quotas” the school then violated the Equal Protection Clause. Further demolishing what affirmative action stood for. Another case can be the 1989 case, Croson V. City of Richmond, where the Supreme Court struck an affirmative action program designed to set aside a percentage of government contracts for Asian, African American, Hispanic, and female-owned construction companies, but Of course the court determined that, an affirmative action plan that could not be linked to specific acts of past governmental discrimination in that particular area was unconstitutional.
In present time, we still see affirmative action taking place in some areas of the United States not only helping African Americans, but if not all types of ethnic backgrounds.
According to Lahav Harkov, who wrote the article called, “Affirmative Action Bill for Arabs Goes to a Vote” stated, “a bill that would give Arabs who perform national-civilian service or serve in the IDF preference in government hiring and university acceptance is going to a Ministerial Committee for Legislation vote on Sunday.” This is extremely crucial because it states that Affirmative action is not only taking place in the United States, but also in other countries like Saudi Arabia. Another important Article might be this one called, “Behind the veil: The racism of Princeton’s affirmative action,” and it stated, “There’s no perfectly equitable admissions model. But a need-based, race-blind policy comes closer to leveling the playing fields of the disparate backgrounds of the candidate pools than the current practice. Such a policy would avoid the objectionable use of racial quotas while achieving the University’s goal of promoting socioeconomic equality among its disadvantaged applicants.” This article is extremely crucial since it is against affirmative action since it just want to create a system to forget race and go blind on admission relying only on the academics report sheet, but I must also say that if this is true then every other case fighting for Affirmative Action will be nothing if something like this happens, which is why this is an extremely crucial piece of
information
All in all, affirmative action was a form to fight back for minorities, so that they can push back on inequality and try to push forward to a much more equal world. Former U.S. Representative, Julius Caesar "J. C." Watts Jr., once said, “Affirmative action is a little like the professional football draft. The NFL awards its No. 1 draft choices to the lowest-ranked team in the league. It doesn't do this out of compassion or guilt. It's done for mutual survival. They understand that a league can only be as strong as its weakest team.”