Plessy, Racism, Idiocy, and related fun
So...
I was in my American Legal History class today listening to Professor Papke trying to get conversation on a dead point. I use the term "dead point" because it is a subject about which my generation has been expressly trained to never discuss without the utmost compassion and PC-ness.
Race Relations... more specifically, Plessy v. Ferguson (163 U.S. 537)(Famous "separate but equal" Supreme Court case from 1896). It was later overruled... kinda... by the famous Brown v. Board of Education (1954). Prof Papke stated that his students from Taiwan, when he taught abroad one year, all thought that Plessy was a well-reasoned and logical decision. No one was going to touch that with a ten foot pole.
In Plessy, the Supreme Court refused to require a private company, railroad I believe, to seat equally Plessy (a man who was 7/8s white but considered black by law) in the white section of the segregated accommodations. The Court said two major things in an infamous couple of paragraphs.. part of which I quote for you here...
"We consider the underlying fallacy of the plaintiff's argument to consist in the assumption that the enforced separation of the two races stamps the colored race with a badge of inferiority. If this be so, it is not by reason of anything found in the act, but solely because the colored race chooses to put that construction upon it."
The Court said basically: 1) That the law cannot force two men together in harmony and 2) If the law is separate and equal then any "badge of inferiority" related to the segregation is self-imposed by the separated group and not done by the law itself.
Brown v. Board of Education attacked the second presumption primarily with sociological data in elementary schools.
Anyway... that aside is to bring everyone else up to speed. No one wants to touch this subject or even discuss it in any meaningful way because of the history involved, the emotional response of many, and the ease of being accused racist for saying anything that appears sympathetic to Plessy's position. A student rationalized the Taiwanese students' response by saying something to the effect of "It could be understood why they don't understand America's situation because many asian nations have only one race or nationality within them and haven't had the history of racial conflict we had."
I was half waiting for "Well, I think this because they all look the same to me." It was an uneducated remark making a broad statement about the views of another based upon assumptions of racial composition. A student in the class, who was born in Hong Kong, hesitantly raised his hand to set the factual matter of asian diversity (literal meaning) straight.
One problem with learning history in this country is we are afraid to get our hands dirty and actually understand how people actually did things and thought without cutting short our analysis by the knee-jerk desire to reaffirm our own modern enlightened principles. The Court in Plessy had some valid points.
First, no law or set of laws can change a person's mind or make him want to sit next to another person on the railroad. It just can't happen. In that respect, at least, there is a futility issue with the Supreme Court wagging its finger at certain people.
Second, "separate but equal" as a broad concept, is logical and can work in some circumstances. It is the approach we try to take in many matters of gender. We have separate bathrooms and we men don't complain that women;s bathrooms are better so it works. Moreover, separate but equal is how we handle the relations between nations.
Where the Plessy Court tripped up was in its presumption against or ignorance to the idea of "separate but equal" being a guise for intentional harm. Separate but inequal wouldn't pass constitutional muster and the Supreme Court recognized that to an extent. To laud any portion of Plessy or denounce any portion of Brown, in any way, is an original sin that can only be cured by therapy and being ostracized nowadays. We all may agree that as a normative choice society should embrace certain values and disclaim others. That fact does not necessitate failing to fully learn abut the past and it certainly should not lead us to make intellectual shortcuts in order to achieve our preferred policy objectives.
I was in my American Legal History class today listening to Professor Papke trying to get conversation on a dead point. I use the term "dead point" because it is a subject about which my generation has been expressly trained to never discuss without the utmost compassion and PC-ness.
Race Relations... more specifically, Plessy v. Ferguson (163 U.S. 537)(Famous "separate but equal" Supreme Court case from 1896). It was later overruled... kinda... by the famous Brown v. Board of Education (1954). Prof Papke stated that his students from Taiwan, when he taught abroad one year, all thought that Plessy was a well-reasoned and logical decision. No one was going to touch that with a ten foot pole.
In Plessy, the Supreme Court refused to require a private company, railroad I believe, to seat equally Plessy (a man who was 7/8s white but considered black by law) in the white section of the segregated accommodations. The Court said two major things in an infamous couple of paragraphs.. part of which I quote for you here...
"We consider the underlying fallacy of the plaintiff's argument to consist in the assumption that the enforced separation of the two races stamps the colored race with a badge of inferiority. If this be so, it is not by reason of anything found in the act, but solely because the colored race chooses to put that construction upon it."
The Court said basically: 1) That the law cannot force two men together in harmony and 2) If the law is separate and equal then any "badge of inferiority" related to the segregation is self-imposed by the separated group and not done by the law itself.
Brown v. Board of Education attacked the second presumption primarily with sociological data in elementary schools.
Anyway... that aside is to bring everyone else up to speed. No one wants to touch this subject or even discuss it in any meaningful way because of the history involved, the emotional response of many, and the ease of being accused racist for saying anything that appears sympathetic to Plessy's position. A student rationalized the Taiwanese students' response by saying something to the effect of "It could be understood why they don't understand America's situation because many asian nations have only one race or nationality within them and haven't had the history of racial conflict we had."
I was half waiting for "Well, I think this because they all look the same to me." It was an uneducated remark making a broad statement about the views of another based upon assumptions of racial composition. A student in the class, who was born in Hong Kong, hesitantly raised his hand to set the factual matter of asian diversity (literal meaning) straight.
One problem with learning history in this country is we are afraid to get our hands dirty and actually understand how people actually did things and thought without cutting short our analysis by the knee-jerk desire to reaffirm our own modern enlightened principles. The Court in Plessy had some valid points.
First, no law or set of laws can change a person's mind or make him want to sit next to another person on the railroad. It just can't happen. In that respect, at least, there is a futility issue with the Supreme Court wagging its finger at certain people.
Second, "separate but equal" as a broad concept, is logical and can work in some circumstances. It is the approach we try to take in many matters of gender. We have separate bathrooms and we men don't complain that women;s bathrooms are better so it works. Moreover, separate but equal is how we handle the relations between nations.
Where the Plessy Court tripped up was in its presumption against or ignorance to the idea of "separate but equal" being a guise for intentional harm. Separate but inequal wouldn't pass constitutional muster and the Supreme Court recognized that to an extent. To laud any portion of Plessy or denounce any portion of Brown, in any way, is an original sin that can only be cured by therapy and being ostracized nowadays. We all may agree that as a normative choice society should embrace certain values and disclaim others. That fact does not necessitate failing to fully learn abut the past and it certainly should not lead us to make intellectual shortcuts in order to achieve our preferred policy objectives.