Taylor on Holder

From this week’s National Journal, my lacrosse book co-author Stuart Taylor has a superbly reasoned column responding to Eric Holder’s “nation of cowards” address.

In his article, Taylor references the pending Ricci v. Destefano case, for which the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in April. The Obama administration filed a middle-of-the-road amicus brief, but the more interesting question is why affirmation action proponents haven’t settled the case, which strikes me as a non-winner for them. (After a promotions exam in which no African-Americans received a high enough score to merit promotion, the city of New Haven simply set aside the entire test.)

The case might also have some indirect bearings on higher education. In justifying the decision to ignore its own objective criteria for promotion, one New Haven representative “mentioned ‘diversity’ as a compelling goal of the promotional process." Obviously, the personnel processes of colleges and universities don’t have the kind of objective criteria at issue in Ricci. But a Supreme Court ruling for the plaintiffs could shake the legal underpinnings of “diversity” plans, at least at public colleges and universities.