AA (Which groups benefit?)

[Lynne Henderson]

California is headed this way too and faster. I am very sympathetic to 
Prof. Laycock's argument and to David Bernstein's post.  But 
affirmative action for minorities in a majority-minority state is 
likely to crash into the innuendo O'connor raised in *Crosson,* that it 
would be mere "racial politics," no?  (I disagree strongly, certainly 
as long as the group is not the majority of voters)

Re:  which groups "count?"  Paul Brest and Muriel Oshige argued African 
Americans should be beneficiaries of affirmative action precisely for 
th ereasons David Bernstein, Paul finkelman, and others have stated.  I 
think they also argued that Mexican-Americans were substantially 
similar in terms of legal discrimination.  I remember arguing with Paul 
that Chinese Americans and Japanese Americans had long been 
discriminated against --and by law--and losing the argument for 
purposes of the article, *Affirmative Action for Whom:  . . " published 
in Stanford L Rev. in the early or mid-nineties.

There icertainly s a history of de jure segregation of Mexican 
-American and Asian school children in Calif.--in *Martinez* I believe 
in 1949 the Cal S Ct held "racial" segregation violated the state's 
equal protection clause.  (Prof. Cruz Reynoso, former Calif. S. Ct 
justice, tells of having to attendracially segregated schools and being 
told it was because he didn't know Englsh, which was piffle since his 
family had been in California for generations and spoke English very 
well, thank you).Obviously segregation and discrimination in Calif 
schools did not disappear;  many districts have been under federal 
court supervision.

Cheers
Lynne Henderson
On Nov 11, 2006, at 2:38 PM, Douglas Laycock wrote:

> In 2040, the population of Texas is projected to be 59% Hispanic, 24% 
> white, 9% black, 8% all other.  The Hispanic population will still be, 
> on average, 12 years younger than the white population, so even apart 
> from immigration, the Hispanic population will still be growing faster 
> than the white population.  2040 is as far out as anyone has 
> projected, but there is no reason to think Hispanic population growth 
> will have peaked.
>
> So yes, Texas has a compelling interest in affirmative action for 
> Hispanics.  They are going to be running the state.  If that 
> population continues to be disproportionately poor and undereducated, 
> the whole state will suffer.
>
> Quoting davidebernstein at aol.com:
>
> > I find at least some of the rationales for affirmative action (in
> > terms of preferences) presented on this list  and elsewhere
> > persuasive, both constitutionally and policy-wise in some
> > circumstances.  But many of them are either primarily or exclusively
> > applicable to the experience of African Americans--a population
> > subjected to slavery, Jim Crow, etc., and still highly segregated de
> > facto from the white population.
> >
> > To what extent can these rationales be applied to other groups who
> > are the beneficiaries of preferences, such as Asian Americans (who I
> > b