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  • Turning the Tide in the Civil Rights Revolution: Elbert Tuttle and the Desegregation of the University of Georgia

    Truth is sometimes stranger than fiction. So it was in 1960 when Elbert Tuttle became the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, the federal appellate court with jurisdiction over most of the Deep South. Part of the genius of the Republic lies in the carefully calibrated structure of the federal courts of appeal. One assumption underlying the structure is that judges from a particular state might bear an allegiance to the interests of that state, which would be reflected in their opinions. Forming panels of judges from each of several states is supposed to balance those interests, resulting in a less insular rule of law-one that reflects regional, not merely local, interests.
  • From Tokenism to Emancipatory Politics: The Conferences and Meetings of Law Professors of Color

    In this paper, the author traces the history of the First National Meetings and conferences since 1969. In Part II, this paper explores the range of meetings and conferences which outlined the development of a proactive agenda for minority student and faculty inclusion within mainstream historically White legal institutions and the evolution of this agenda from one of access to an agenda of security, retention, and the advancement of legal theory and scholarship within and without the established academy. Part III chronicles the maturation of this tradition of independent meetings and conferences of professors of color into a network of legal education institutions promoting institutional, as well as ideological, pluralism. Finally, the concluding comments are devoted to an analysis of the two-fold function of this tradition of meetings and conferences: to combat the paradoxical isolation and heightened visibility of professors of color within historically White institutions and to generate legal theory responsive to the experiences of people of color.
  • Expert Report of Kinley Larntz, PH.D.

    While working in this matter, the author undertook the task of analyzing the statistical relationship between law school acceptance and ethnicity. In particular, focusing on the strength of the relationship between law school acceptance and being a member of certain ethnic groups, controlling for qualifications for admission such as undergraduate grade point average, Law School Admission Test score, and selection index, and for other factors such as residency in the State of Michigan, gender, and a measure of economic disadvantage, waiver of the fee for application.
  • Affirmative Action: Where is it Coming from and Where is it Going?

    A review of We Wont Go Back: Making the Case for Affirmative Action by Charles R. Lawrence III & Mari J. Matsuda
    • Article
    • Legal Education
    • By Gabriel J. Chin,Denise C. Morgan
    • Volume 3, Issue 2
    • January, 1998

    Breaking into the Academy: The 1998-2000 Michigan Journal of Race & Law Guide for Aspiring Law Professors

    I was not very far into my law school experience when I realized that my professors had the best job in town-it took me quite a bit longer to discover that I, too, could get in on the deal. Do not misunderstand me-being a law professor is not easy. In fact, when done correctly, the job requires a tremendous amount of intellectual energy, emotional commitment, long hours, and hard work. However, if you enjoy writing, research, public speaking, and developing mentoring relationships, being a law professor could be the career for you. This Article, and the listings of helpful organizations and citations to other articles about law teaching that follow, are intended to help guide the law professor wannabe through the process of applying for a tenuretrack faculty position at a law school.
  • College Admission and Affirmative Action- Consequences and Alternatives

    A review of The Shape of the River: Long Term Consequences of Considering Race in College and University Admissions by Derek Bok & William Bowen
  • Perspectives on Affirmative Action / Rethinking Racial Divides: Asian Pacific Americans and the Law

    Statements on affirmative action followed by the Asian Pacific American Law Students Association Symposium.
  • “Reverse Discrimination” and Higher Education Faculty

    In this Article, the author critiques the use of "reverse discrimination" claims by White plaintiffs to challenge the hiring of Blacks in institutions of higher education. The author argues that "reverse discrimination" is a myth since no such claim is possible when one White candidate is selected over another; assumptions of inferiority are implicit where such a claim is made when a Black candiate is selected over a White candidate. In other words, allowing such a claim, even if ultimately unsuccessful, implies a presumption of superiority on the part of the White candidate. For this reason, the author argues that it is improper to assume that "reverse discrimination" occurs any time a Black candidate is chosen over a White candidate. If both are equally qualifed, no such claim exists. The term "reverse discrimination" is not neutral in tone and therefore should not be treated as f it is neutral in application. The author concludes that institutions of higher education must not allow fears of unfounded "reverse discrimination" claims to prevent them from hiring, promoting, and granting tenure to Black faculty.
  • Who is Black Enough For You? An Analysis of Northwestern University Law School’s Struggle Over Minority Faculty Hiring

    This Article considers the factors that should be used in hiring a person of color to a faculty position and raises the following questions: Apart from potential teaching ability and scholarly productivity, should faculty appointments committees look to other criteria for candidates of color? Provided that we can still consider the race and ethnicity of prospective candidates of color at private institutions, should faculty appointments committees be concerned about how closely identified a candidate is to an essentialized conception, for instance, of Black persons? Should a faculty hiring committee focus its efforts to hire African Americans on a Black person who has ancestral roots in the American South, whose family has endured Jim Crow racism, who is very dark-skinned, whose family background is impoverished, and who grew up in an all-Black segregated environment? Stated conversely, should a faculty appointments committee hire a Black person who does not meet any of these essentialized characteristics? In confronting these issues, this Article calls. into question conceptions of race within mainstream U.S. society and among African Americans and other communities of color
  • An Analysis of the Supreme Court’s Reliance on Racial “Stigma” as a Constitutional Concept in Affirmative Action Cases

    The Article's focus is confined to discussions of race-based affirmative action; it does not consider stigmatization arguments in the context of discrimination involving gender or disabilities, for example. Further, the Article's scope is limited to the stigmatization issue as between Whites and African Americans. Although similar issues exist with respect to other ethnic or racial groups, we view the White/African American paradigm as providing the clearest framework for analysis. Moreover, the cases of Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown v. Board of Education, joint progenitors of stigmatization as a concept having constitutional significance in interpreting the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, arose within that paradigm and discuss the stigma concept in that context.