Posted by Eugene Volokh:
Minority Political Success Stories:
Here's the question for today: Who are now the highest-ranked, and who
have been the highest-ranked
1. Atheist or Agnostic, expressly self-described (it's not enough
that the person have no known religious sensibilities; he has to
have openly described himself as such, much as people of other
religious groups often openly describe themselves as such)
2. Baha'i
3. Buddhists
4. Hindus
5. Muslims
6. Sikhs
7. Armenian-Americans
8. Filipino-Americans
9. Iranian-Americans
10. Korean-Americans
11. Thai-Americans and
12. Vietnamese-Americans
in U.S. government positions, federal or state, appointed or elected.
For our purposes, though, let's say that the rank of an office is
generally inversely proportional to the number of people who hold that
sort of office, so the President (1) beats U.S. Supreme Court Justices
(9) who beat Cabinet officials ([1]15) who beat Governors (50) who
beat U.S. Senators (100) who beat state Supreme Court Justices
(roughly 350, I think) who beat U.S. Representatives (435) and so on.
On the other hand, I reserve the right to downgrade un-influential
offices -- there are fewer state Secretaries of State than state
Supreme Court Justices, but I say the latter beat the former, and I'll
brook no argument on that. Also, the list above was chosen rather
arbitrarily (though one guiding principle was that I tried to choose
relatively tough ones; Greek Orthodox and Mormons, for instance, are
pretty easy).
I give a few answers that I think I know below; please post your own
answers in Comments. (I won't alter my original answers, so please
note that a commenter may have bettered them.) Each answer should (1)
include the person's name and position, (2) in cases where there might
be any controversy, proof, preferably a link to a site that confirms
this, and (3) say whether he's the current highest or the all-time
highest. Also, please check all previous comments, as well as my
answers, to make sure that yours (4) isn't a duplicate, and (5) hasn't
been trumped by a clearly higher-ranked official that has already been
named. More broadly, (6) please read the question and the rules
carefully, and (7) please don't post arguments about why the rules are
sound or unsound or how they should be amended.
([2]show)
Baha'i: Current and all-time -- Judge Dorothy W. Nelson, a federal
appellate judge.
Sikh: All-time -- Congressman [3]Dalip Saund, who served in the late
1950s and early 1960s.
Armenian-American: All-time -- California Governor George Deukmejian.
Korean-American: All-time -- Congressman Jay Kim, who served in the
mid- to late 1990s (who I'm sorry to say lost his office after being
convicted of misdemeanor campaign finance violations).
Vietnamese-American: All-time -- Viet Dinh, former Assistant Attorney
General for the Office of Legal Policy.
([4]hide)
References
1. http://www.whitehouse.gov/government/cabinet.html
2. file://localhost/var/www/powerblogs/volokh/posts/1114713665.html
3. http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2004_10_31-2004_11_06.shtml#1099671864
4. file://localhost/var/www/powerblogs/volokh/posts/1114713665.html
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