Question - in this zero sum game, why is it more just to lockbox the benefits that whites today continue to reap from their forefathers past racist policies, than to provide some relief to the descendants of the victims of those policies - simply because they happen, not coincidentally, to be defined by race.
One standard answer to this question is that our remedies will almost invariably be inexact. We will be taking from some whose forefathers only reaped modest benefits and transfer those benefits to minorities who might not be in need. I think this answer is inadequate. While precision in this area would be beneficial, we should require precision only when a wrong is minor. In cases like American apartheid, requiring precision is a recipe for inaction, and morally, in my view, that can't be right. Precision can't disable a majority from collectively rectifying a wrong perpetuated by the community on people of color. Can it? If so, I renew a question I asked a while back: If affirmative action is morally or constitutionally unacceptable, or both, then what sort of remedy is acceptable. What I cannot fathom is the answer that only market solutions are acceptable, that is, minorities should just work harder. In my view, that means minorities pay twice, once for the original discrimination against them, and then for the cost of remedying the effects of that discrimination.
Bobby Lipkin
Widener University School of law
Delaware
