Well, what did you really expect? AA helps some people get into undergrad, it then helps some people get into law school. Then, I know some law school that give preferences to minorities on law review in order to keep the student distribution on LR commisserate with the general LS population.

So, I guess my question is, when was the AA going to stop and allow people to perform on their own? Maybe minority litigators need a guaranteed 2 juror boost as well?

Sersiously, you can't push someone through all the schooling then expect them to do it on their own when their security blanket gets removed - you know, the real world.

I likewise hate "affirmation" action.

I think you should get one try to pass each bar. If you fuck up, then you're thru.
I think generally, whites perform better on bar exams than other races, even Asians.

In "the real world," it's "commensurate," not "commisserate." I hope you had a decent editor on law review.

1. AA exacerbates/creates racism. A minority will be viewed as unqualified. If he/she is a product of AA, then rightly so.
2. AA limits the pool of qualified applicants.
3. AA was originally created to EXCLUDE jews from academic institutions. They were admitted, on merit, in such large numbers that the quota system was used to keep them out. This shows the ever-present other side of the AA coin.
4. AA is paternalistic coddling. If blacks are equal, why do they need special treatment?
5. Asians are a minority group that has been discriminated against in the past. They don't need AA because they are admitted in droves on merit.
6. AA damages the academic environment. By letting in underqualified students, time and resources are wasted.
7. The abysmal social statistics of blacks in America is largely due to cultural factors, NOT racism. For a start, consider why a black man that gets good grades is derided and said to be "acting white". As long as "acting white" means being responsible, civil, and successful, and "being black" means being irresponsible, barbarous, and a social drain, the status quo will continue.
8. AA is using racism to fight racism. Two wrongs do not make a right.

The results of the study are spot on. Affirmative Action is the biggest source of racism in the country today. I will bet anything you won't see the results mentioned on CNN, MSNBC, etc. Only Fox News has the courage to run it on their cover.

I didn't know how I would make it through my four classes today. Now I do.

Where did this come from? You hard-up for page views?

Clusterf**ks to $190k!!

passing the bar exam is not a sign of intelligence

9:48: "I think generally, whites perform better on bar exams than other races, even Asians."

Where do you get that? The stereotypical Asian is a math/science nerd, sure. But the Asians who go to law school are self-selected humanities types.

If we had the data, I bet they'd show that Asians outperform whites (as they generally do at all levels of education).

By graduate school, people are where they are.

The way to bring minority accomplishment up is to fix the outrageous disparities between primary schools. Get more black kids into well funded suburban elementary schools, and I bet THAT would actually make a bigger difference.

By graduate school, people are where they are.

The way to bring minority accomplishment up is to fix the outrageous disparities between primary schools. Get more black kids into well funded suburban elementary schools, and I bet THAT would actually make a bigger difference.

9:49 asks: "Where did this come from?"

From Fox News, of course, that oh so fair and balanced news source...

AA was developed so certain elites could "feel good" about themselves, and give themselves a good pat on the back.

AA was as wrong and unconstitutional when it was developed as Jim Crow was, and it is wrong and unconstitutional now -- notwithstanding whatever Justice O'Conner says.

I don't quite get the argument that getting into a better law school makes students less likely to pass the bar exam. Even if we accept the proposition that AA gets some black students into schools for which they would otherwise not be qualified-- and what's the point of AA if it doesn't do that?-- how does it follow that these students would be *more* likely to pass the bar exam had they gone to a *less* competitive law school?

9:51
Here's a study from the Texas Bar Exam showing Whites performing better than Asians.
http://www.ble.state.tx.us/one/analysis_0704tbe.htm

9:55: It's because they don't graduate from the schools that they get into but aren't qualified from. Sander's study focuses on students from the time of their admission to law school all the way through to taking the bar exam (or not taking it).

I meant "qualified for," not "qualified from."

Whatever you feel about AA, there is no denying that Sander is acting in good faith, without a predetermined agenda, and is a serious social scientist. Thus, there is no good reason for the BA to hide their stats - it's just completely indefensible.

9:55-It doesn't follow if you're a liberal arts major who thinks that everything functions in the real world like it does in your head (in other words, unless it makes logical sense in your head, you don't see how it can be so). However, Sander has these things called "statistics" that tend to support his mismatch theory. I know that statistics probably mean nothing to you, but if you care to read his studies, you'll find there's some quantitative support there.

Mark Twain had it right: lies, damned lies and statistics.

Black students are "below the median"? By definition, half of all students in any law school class have academic creditials that are "below the median." That's what the word "median" means.

Only 1/3 of black students who enter law school pass the bar on the first try? Fine, but what percentage of people entering law school overall graduate and pass it? There were plenty of white people in my law school class who dropped out, who failed it the first time. In many states, 60% of takers fail the test. And there could be a variety of reasons that they're not staying in law school and not going on to become lawyers that might have nothing to do with their academic credentials.

I agree that people who are manifestly unqualified should not be admitted to a school in the name of "affirmative action." It's not good for the students admitted that way, and it's not good for African Americans as a whole for white students to see black students as manifestly unqualified (we had one of those in my law school too, but only one out of many black students). But the most important piece of information is missing from this survey: I'm not seeing the proof that the students who failed or dropped out were manifestly unqualified for the schools they were admitted to.

9:54

Fox News is just reporting on the article from the Stanford Law Review. Are they not "Fair and Balanced" enough at Stanford either? I know those elite California schools are known for their right-wing bias too.... oh wait!

Does the existence of AA allow society to ignore the factors that make AA "necessary" in the first place? It's a bandaid, in other words.

"In many states, 60% of takers fail the test." Name one, you f**king liar.

More AA in WGWAG!!

Hooray for diversity! No, not diversity of opinion. No, not diversity of ideas. No, not diversity even of abilities. True diversity is reflected only on the outside, not the inside silly.

www.ble.state.tx.us/one/analysis_0704tbe.htm
This shows how Whites perform better than others, including Asians

"There were plenty of white people in my law school class who dropped out, who failed it the first time."

The study, if you read it, makes precisely the case that AA's are not at a disadvantages relative to the student body in TTT's, like the one you attended, where *everyone* sucks about the same. The underperformance correlates with the aggressiveness of the AA program at a given school.

The giant assumption here is that failing the bar on the first try means someone was unqualified to attend that law school. That doesn't have to be the case; bar exams test whether you can memorize a huge amount of information and regurgitate it, which isn't what law school is about, or what actual practice is like.

Clarence Thomas' grandfather's son's uncle's turtle's nephew's niece's third cousin twice removed got into HLS on affirmative action.

9:51 - "passing the bar exam is not a sign of intelligence"

Passing the bar is a much better sign of intelligence [and/or work habits] than flunking.

"Whatever you feel about AA, there is no denying that Sander is acting in good faith, without a predetermined agenda, and is a serious social scientist. Thus, there is no good reason for the BA to hide their stats - it's just completely indefensible."

Absolutely and 100% accurate. Next time you're sitting around waiting for a project from a partner read/skim his Stanford L. Rev. article. Stunning. Of course it's obvious why the BA won't release the results; just look at whose ox is being gored.

Finally, FOX news is generally a joke, but they deserve kudos for pursuing this story.

Scroll to page 12 of this website: http://www.nybarexam.org/summary.pdf

enough said...

The proof is in the pudding.

"passing the bar exam is not a sign of intelligence"

But failing the bar exam is a sign of stupidity.

Tracey said "In many states, 60% of takers fail the test." REALLY?

I know the following survey is old (2001), but the results should generally hold year to year:
http://www.abanet.org/legaled/statistics/barchart.html
Your "stats" would require the pass rate for first-time takers and repeaters to average 40%. That didn't happen in ANY state except for the February exam from California. If you want to use the really low number of test takers from Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands from the July 2001 exam, maybe you could add a couple more to your "in many states" statement.

Fairness issues aside, the costs of AA to non minority students are pretty light. Any borderline candidate that would have gotten into Harvard or Yale but for AA, will undoubtedly get into Columbia, NYU or Penn instead. And if they’re that much better than the other students at those marginally less prestigious schools, AA isn’t going to effect their future success or career. Given the enormity of the problem it’s meant to correct, historical discrimination (diversity is the issue presented to the courts, but law school don’t really care about diversity of ideas or experience), it’s a really cheap fix. The biggest issue to me is whether it works. The Sanders theory is so interesting because it goes straight to that problem. For an AA admit to a top 14 school who would otherwise be going to Texas, Emory or Wash U, the boost from AA probably impacts their future in a big and positive way. But if the mismatch ripple effect leads to a substantial number of students at T2 and lower schools taking out huge loans and never passing the bar or gaining meaningful legal employment, it’s worth asking whether AA is doing more harm than good. The CA bar should hand over the info to make those judgments.

I like the fact that the author of the first substantive comment couldn't even properly use the English language, while impugning the academic and legal credentials of the purportedly unqualified.

Maybe the problem isn't affirmative action but the bar exam?

Why bother debating this? Justice O'Connor hath decreed that, roughly 18 years from now, AA will no longer be constitutional. The living constitution -- is there anything it can't do?

http://www.abanet.org/legaled/statistics/barchart.html

While the results are from 2001, only the February 2001 results from California and July 2001 from Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands show a 40% pass rate.

It is simply and patently untrue that "in most states, 60% of takers fail the test."

Ivy AA, don't reduce yourself to grammar snarking. It's the blog comment equivalent of working blue. You concede that, at least, the comment was substantive. Do you disagree with it?

True, O'Connor has decreed that AA will disappear in 2028. But what if some liberal justices intervene? Heaven forbid! Here's an idea: if AA is so damaging to EVERYONE (it seems), then let's pass a constitutional amendment banning it once and for all! See, e.g., Michigan.

Amendment XXVII

Section 1. Neither affirmative action nor any other racial preference, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

The idea/purpose behind AA is illustrated in the following:

Two athletes run 100 yards. One had a lot of great coaching, runs with the perfect stride, and so on. He finishes the 100 yards in 11 seconds. The second runner has never been coached, runs with a terrible stride, but nevertheless finishes the 100 yards in 12 seconds. Who gets the track and field scholarship?

The second runner. Why? He's just missing the first, well-coached runner by a second. With proper coaching, and the right stride, the second runner could really improve - perhaps to a significantly better time than the first runner's.

The idea is that society benefits more by providing the second runner some proper coaching because the result is the fastest runner. The same theory would apply to the kid who hasn't enjoyed good teaching but still shows some academic proficiency. That kid, through AA, could become the best lawyer, or best doctor, etc. AA is supposed to benefit not just the underserved community, but also society in general.

That's what AA is supposed to do.

The problem is that in practice the "second runner" isn't spotted until high school (at the earliest). Usually, the benefit of the "proper coaching" through AA isn't provided until college or graduate school - at which point it is WAY too late to overcome the years of no coaching (or bad coaching). The candidate for best runner is lost by then.

To make AA work as it should, it would have to be applied at the very early stages of education (and continued throughout). By the time these AA students apply to college, they wouldn't need the help. They'd be admitted on merit.

Tracey @ 9:59, you don't quite understand the concepts here.

"Black students are "below the median"? By definition, half of all students in any law school class have academic creditials that are "below the median." That's what the word "median" means."

Right, but the point is that, disproportionately, individuals below a school's median do more poorly than those above, which, as you indicate, is mathematically sensical. But then why are schools consistently admitting an overwhelming percentage of their admitted black students who are below the median, when statistics show that those who enter below the median are more likely to do poorly? Rather than it being 50-50 black students above-below the median, it's more like 20-80. (I'm making up the numbers to show the point.) THEREIN lies the problem.

"Only 1/3 of black students who enter law school pass the bar on the first try? Fine, but what percentage of people entering law school overall graduate and pass it? There were plenty of white people in my law school class who dropped out, who failed it the first time. In many states, 60% of takers fail the test."

First, an overall passage rate for first time bar takers is generally around 80-85%, far, far from 33%. Second, while many white people drop out or fail the first time, the question is whether blacks disproportionately do so. And third, I think once California's bar passage rate from accredited law schools for first-time takers is over 60%, making the failure rate below 40%. Your claim that "In many states, 60% of takers fail the test" is flatly wrong.

Strike that!

Amendment XXVIII

My bad!

AA minorities lag behind their non-coddled academic peers on objective tests of legal knowledge?

WHAAAAA-OOOWWWWWWW

I think I would support AA on the undergrad level (not so much based on race, but based on zipcode, it would probably end up being racial anyway). Schools in inner cities are known to be horrendous. As such, there are probably a lot of people who go to those schools, that could thrive if given the right environment. The bar should be lowered for them to get into college, since their schools probably did not prepare them well enough for the SAT etc...

After 4 years of undergrad, on the other hand, AA should have no place. For 4 years people who got into college under AA, have been on equal footing with everyone else. They should no longer need the bar lowered.

The biggest issue to me is whether it works. The Sanders theory is so interesting because it goes straight to that problem. For an AA admit to a top 14 school who would otherwise be going to Texas, Emory or Wash U, the boost from AA probably impacts their future in a big and positive way.

==========================

You are drastically underestimating the effects of AA preferences. AA applicants aren't getting the equivalent of a 2 or 3 point LSAT boost. They are, in general, WAY below the medians for the schools to which they are admitted.

A black student who could be admitted to Emory on the basis of merit alone would easily get into Columbia or NYU, if not Harvard or Yale. I would venture to say that any black student who cracks the 90th percentile pretty much has his pick of law schools.

look at the charts: http://www.nybarexam.org/summary.pdf

esp page 12.... enough said

Passing the bar exam is a prerequisite to practice law. Anyone who scores really low on the LSAT is awful at multiple choice tests and is going to REALLY struggle on the MBE part of the bar. If AA is causing lower tier law schools to admit a disproportionate number of minority law students with LSAT scores that indicate a really high potential failure rate on the bar, I don’t think they’re doing anyone any favors. Especially if these students are loading up on student loans. At more elite schools it doesn’t really matter to me, but toward the bottom it just seems exploitive.

"www.ble.state.tx.us/one/analysis_0704tbe.htm
This shows how Whites perform better than others, including Asians"

Actually, the samples in this study differ too greatly (1290 White test-takers vs. 75 Asian test-takers) for any meaningful conclusions to be drawn. Moreover, these findings are limited to Texas, when the majority of Asian JD grads take the California or New York exams.

10:22 - It was a vocabulary snark, not a grammar snark. The poster's grammar was actually nearly perfect, except for the lack of subject-verb agreement in the third sentence (although that's probably due to poor proofreading). As they teach us in the firms that pride themselves on the quality of their work product, misusing language has the effect of weakening your argument, by lowering your credibility. But what do I know, I'm a minority.

10:25, Unfortunately, the numbers are more dire than your hypothetical 20-80. According to Sander, it's more like 10-90.

What does law school have to do with the bar exam?

10:24, your hypo has absolutely nothing to do with the reality of AA. If remedying discrimination had anything to do with AA, rich blacks would be excluded from it. But they are not. You could be the son of a black surgeon who went to Harvard undergrad, and still get a racial preference when you apply to Columbia law school. It's absurd.

"But what do I know, I'm a minority."

That is a run-on sentence. Replace the comma with a question mark next time. :)

10:35 - Good point. I didn't find much correlation. On the other hand, the LSAT isn't a good predictor of law school performance, either (after the first year). There might be an LSAT-MBE link, though. At least the reading comprehension sections of the LSAT seem to test one's ability to digest an impossible amount of arcane material in a short period of time - which is more or less what preparing for the MBE does.

10:35 - And what does the bar exam have to do with the practice of law (aside from restricting it)?

Wow, who would've guessed that so many spoiled white brats follow ATL?! Sounds like some of you are still upset at getting snubbed by your first choice law school.

Consider this: the utterly unique and devastating experience of African Americans in this country. Sure the Asians, Jews, Irish, and Italians face(d) discrimination but how can one even begin to compare the experience of those peoples to that of African Americans!? Pure ignorance and, dare I say, racism.

AA is by no means a perfect system, and perhaps this study will show (after obtaining bar data) that it is in fact having a negative impact on African Americans. But to suggest that African Americans are on an equal footing and therefore simply need to try harder is intellectually dishonest. And when you do it with vitriol, it's racism.

"This shows how Whites perform better than others, including Asians"

I have to disagree with that point. I have read on countless occasions that per capita Asians far outperform any group in standardized testing be it in law, medicine, college, etc.

You're kidding right?

"A black student who could be admitted to Emory on the basis of merit alone would easily get into Columbia or NYU, if not Harvard or Yale."

"This shows how Whites perform better than others, including Asians"

"I have to disagree with that point. I have read on countless occasions that per capita Asians far outperform any group in standardized testing be it in law, medicine, college, etc."

According to those certain Harvard sociologists who rose to fame/infamy in the late 80's, Asians outperform every group on standardized tests, with one major exception: Ashkenazi Jews, who are the New England Patriots, (according to the book, which I do not necessarily endorse).

Is that why you have a strong black population at schools like GW, G'Town, Duke, etc. They should've just gone to Harvard, duh.

10:39 - Poetic license? (Touche.)

10:24(2) and 10:26(1) make good points.

Until law school and the discussion surrounding the Sanders article, I was a huge supporter of AA.

But, the students that law school AA helps are not the ones that should need it anymore. At my T14 law school, almost all of the black students went to Ivy league schools for undergrad and a number of them went to private high schools. They've had the best preparation for the last 4-8 years.

10:37, you're just naming another way in which the practice of AA fails to meet its goals/purpose.

Of course children of black surgeons should be excluded. But (1) at the time AA was put into widespread practice, there weren't all that many black surgeons. And (2) the policy makers have let racial politics get in the way of the whole point of AA.

AA should be applied at a much earlier stage and according to factors having little to do with race - though socio-economic realities may result in a higher percentage of minorities benefiting from AA (when compared to the percentage of the minorities in the general population)

10:28
I posted the link to the Texas bar exam study because in my own experience, I've known a bigger percentage of Asians to perform poorly in law school than Whites.
That being said, I'm Asian and those other Asian people I knew were idiots. But that doesn't change the statistics.

This is a blog, not a brief. Lighten up on the comments regarding vocab, spelling, grammer, etc. I find it annoying.

10:42:

I understand that slavery was a horrible thing, but aren't today's African Americans better off because of it? Had slavery never existed, their ancestors would have never come to the US, and the descendants would be living in much worse conditions over in Africa as a consequence.

This is exactly why I refused to annex Hawaii.

Why can't we talk about a real issue, like whether Britney's latest arrest will affect her child custody status?

Two-thirds of the way to an official comments comments clusterf**k!!!

guvy, that's hilarious. Why do you think Africa is the way it is today? Idiot.

I can see a place for AA following the Civil War. Now, however, there's not one minority alive that ever shed a drop of sweat for my benefit.

guvy, please tell me you're being sarcastic?

10:56 = Barbara Bush

What about affirmative action for the rich? I attended two ivy league schools, and I can tell you that for every minority student (AA or not) there was at least one underqualified matriculant who was either a legacy or related to a prominent member of the profession.

If you really want to make the application process fair you couldn't find a better place to start than removing this unjustifiable bias.

Wait - my kids will benefit from this someday? Never mind! Nothing to see here!

What about affirmative action for the rich? I attended two ivy league schools, and I can tell you that for every minority student (AA or not) there was at least one underqualified matriculant who was either a legacy or related to a prominent member of the profession.

If you really want to make the application process fair you couldn't find a better place to start than removing this unjustifiable bias.

Wait - my kids will benefit from this someday? Never mind! Nothing to see here!

What about affirmative action for the rich? I attended two ivy league schools, and I can tell you that for every minority student (AA or not) there was at least one underqualified matriculant who was either a legacy or related to a prominent member of the profession.

If you really want to make the application process fair you couldn't find a better place to start than removing this unjustifiable bias.

Wait - my kids will benefit from this someday? Never mind! Nothing to see here!

10:56 -- I never thought that, you're right. Now you better get going, you don't want to be late for the Klan meeting.

Where my reparations?

guvy = internet badass. That's on old IB shtick.

matriculation in a JD program and bar passage are two separate problems for a would-be lawyer, and thus require two separate solutions. the fact that bar exams disproportionately exclude minority applicants relative to whites does not invalidate the means (AA) that schools have chosen to address minority under-enrollment in law school.

11:02: Preferential admission for legacies and for rich kids (so-called "development cases") is not ideal. But it's a necessary evil.

The huge amounts of money that alumni and other rich people donate to top universities makes possible financial aid for people from less privileged backgrounds - many of whom are minorities.

11:02 - How many times did JFK Junior fail the bar? So sad that he was hurt by affirmative action.

AA is only covering up the faults of the system. As long as primary education is funded by property taxes there will be no equal opportunity. The system favors children from rich neighborhoods (largely Whites and Asians) and children from poorer neighborhoods (minorities) are fundamentally disadvantaged.
Clearly AA is not the solution, rather a complete reform of the education system is necessary. Only if every child received the same resources and quality pedagogy in its education, does a meritocracy make any sense.
A rich child from Westchester, Orange County, Naperville, etc. would not do as well in life it went to school in South Central, Cabrini Green, etc.
As a country we want [and need] the smartest and not the most privileged children to receive the best education. Otherwise, America just becomes like pre-revolution France, were the status of your parents determined your chances and opportunities in life.

10:42 said: "Sure the Asians, Jews, Irish, and Italians face(d) discrimination but how can one even begin to compare the experience of those peoples to that of African Americans!? Pure ignorance and, dare I say, racism."

Um, you know the Holocaust? Ever heard of it? Oh, but I see what you mean: six million Jews in a furnace is really no big deal.

"Fairness issues aside, the costs of AA to non minority students are pretty light. Any borderline candidate that would have gotten into Harvard or Yale but for AA, will undoubtedly get into Columbia, NYU or Penn instead. And if they’re that much better than the other students at those marginally less prestigious schools, AA isn’t going to effect their future success or career."
===========

First of all, what about qualified applicants on the fringes, that get wait-listed to the top 5 schools? Without AA these applicants might have gotten in, and instead are not going those schools. Sure, they would get into a top6-14 school, but the point is there are spots in the top 5 that are being filled by AA admits that don't have the same qualifications as the other students there.

Second of all, who the fuck are you to decide what school someone should get re-directed to simply to unfairly give an AA admit a leg up and take a slot that they would have otherwise not gotten if their skin color was lighter? This is someone's life we're talking about here.

AA is such fucking bull-shit it's scary. If the original purpose of AA was to remedy the discriminatory effects of slavery and Jim Crow, then why is there also AA for hispanic students? Also, why is there no AA category for Middle Easterners?? They are considered "white" according to the application standards, which in and of itself is a farce because if they're truly seeking "diversity" in law shcools, they should have categories that appropriatley distinguish all relevant race characteristics.

@11:09 -- Please, funding and results are not necessarily related. D.C. (if treated as a state) has the highest per-pupil funding in the nation, and their schools suck balls. North Dakota has the highest SAT scores, and is below average at per-pupil funding. Throwing money at the problem does nothing.

"Consider this: the utterly unique and devastating experience of African Americans in this country."

10:42,
I'm not sure I'm clear on what this utterly unique and devastating experience is. Maybe you should clarify. The current African American benefitting from AA is not a former slave, so I don't count "slavery" as an experience that has to be overcome. (I don't deny that some current African Americans suffer vestiges of racism.) I would think that immigrants from Vietnam or 1990's Bosnia or Darfur have a much more devastating experience/former life/background than African Americans currently in this country.

Hell, what about religious diversity in law school?

It's a crock that Carlton Banks and Theo Huxstable are taking admission spots from better qualified poor white kids from rural America just due to the color of their skin.
If there should be AA, it should be based on $$$ class and not skin color.

How big a boost do legacy admits get? I knew a guy who got dinged by Harvard undergrad, even though his father, grandfather, and great grandfather all went there. Given that his numbers were good enough to get into a top school without any legacy preferences, I don’t think the boost is that much. I’m sure it’s different if your family has given millions of dollars to a school. But if letting in one underqualified rich kid means that 10 qualified poor kids get scholarships, it’s a pretty good deal for everyone. It’s not air, but it doesn’t hurt anyone either (anyone who gets bumped from Harvard to let in a legacy, ends up at Columbia, so just like AA there aren’t any real costs to the qualified majority). Moreover, anyone with enough wealth and family connections to win a spot at a law school, isn’t going to be screwed if they fail the bar and have $80k in loans outstanding.

I find comments about "grammer" annoying, too.

"But what do I know, I'm a minority."

That's what everyone thinks when they look at you. Sorry, those are the facts. And I love the entitlement complex you seem to have.

Moreover, if I remember correctly from CT's Grutter dissent, don't preferred minorities get into U Mich w/ a median 155 or 156 LSAT. That's a *horrible* LSAT score! If you're non-preferred you'd get laughed out of most top tier admissions offices.

11:05: "The huge amounts of money that alumni and other rich people donate to top universities makes possible financial aid for people from less privileged backgrounds - many of whom are minorities."

I call bullshit on this. The school is much more interested in building it's $30B endowment than in making financial aid available to minorities. Besides, is there some reason why minorities can't go to school riding on a mountain of debt like the rest of us? This is law school we're talking about.

No amount of money can justify the creation of an dynastic class of elites. It's obscene.

10:56 aka guvy
-"Had slavery never existed," who is to say that Africa would not be a great place to live today? No one knows because history did not play out that way. You might as well ponder what would the world be like if we lost World War 2.
There are many valid arguments against affirmative action, but saying blacks are better off for slavery isn't one of them.

11:10 -- My point centered on the AMERICAN experience of those groups. Jews were established in American society before the holocaust. African Americans were brought here as slaves.

The excerpt we have here leaves a big question about the study....are they comparing black students to white students on a school by school basis or overall? Do we know whether there are more black students in the tier-1 schools in California, or in the tier-3 or 4 schools? That would probably sway the data tremendously. If there are a higher % in the tier-1 schools, that would make the statistics look even worse for AA.

I do think that there is really no need for race-based affirmative action, but instead it should be based on economic background (as Bondurant stated). This would continue to help minority families (as a higher percentage of minorities live in poverty), and just makes more sense. A middle-class black student living down the street from me didn't really have any disadvantage in schooling. A poor student on the other hand, probably didn't have the best of schools. Just look at the LSAT, there are a bunch of courses that middle class/rich people can take that will guarantee a score boost, that option isn't there for poor people. Shouldn't the admissions standards reflect that disparity?

guvy,

Because everyone in Africa is starving and running around naked, right? Blacks are better in the USA, where they can get the following treatment: 1) guaranteed illegal search by police by age 16; 2) parents who went to segregated schools; 3) racists whites blaming AA for the end of the world; 4) old ladies clutching their purses while the blacks have business suits on; 5) public schools where it is a gurantee that you get your first fight by 13. Being black in America is A-OK! Damn, I wish I were black.

Congrats Lat!

10:42/11:21

If the Holocaust could happen even though Jews were "well established in American society" at the time, then what does that say about the relative merits of being a well established minority in American society?

And don't for a minute tell me that Americans didn't know what was going on in Germany until we got to the Death Camps in 1945.

11:21
Basing my response on no facts what so ever, slavery benefited Blacks in terms of selective breeding. Only the strongest slaves survived and slave owners bred the strongest slaves to create "super slaves". Descendants of these "super slaves" now get PAID as pro athletes.

I love how the idiot pro-AA people are still crapping themselves to respond to guvy when I already identified him as the internet badass (or a copycat thereof).

Perhaps AutoAdmit.com needs AA to ensure that self-hating whites (I'm looking in your direction, 11:25) know what "flamebait" is.

100th, you beat me to it - this thread is officially a comment clusterf**k.

Lat, you know your audience well...

To AA Dissers:

I actually socialize with blacks, and most of whom at (fill in name of elite school) were not affluent. In fact, many came from the ghetto. They tried to assimilate with their peers and really did not go into "livin' in the hood." Really, how the hell would you know if someone is "middle-class" or "affluent" unless you are very close friends with them. The idea that all these upper class blacks benefit from AA is a little misleading. If you go to a Black student social function or party and speak to people about their backgrounds, it is clear that a lot of students are far from privileged.

Furthermore, Sanders is an uber-conservative whose personal mission is to end AA. There are many flaws in his study, and I have to hear him address them. When there is an empirical analysis that is unbiased, and genuinely interested in analyzing the impact of AA, not providing ideological fodder, I will pay attention. Until then, we are left with right-wing and left-wing banter that is largely supported by unsupported or dervived from personal experiences.

AA is not about restitution for past racism AT ALL. It's about gaming the system in order to, among other things, get people, communities, and institutions used to thinking of underrepresented ethnicities/races/etc. as potential professionals/self-made richies and not just likely criminals.

It probably just can't work though because all people everywhere are selfish racist assholes.

100!

Sounds to me mate that you have quite a few bitter people on this board. For the chap who spoke about the Black Surgeon and his underachieving children being admitted, pray tell how often does this occur?

Also, Lat's obsession with Clarence Thomas is most unfortunate. I'm sure AA played no small role in getting him to where he is now. He is a classic case of drawing up the ladder once you have reached.

Systematic racism cannot be overcome in a single generation. African-Americans have faced a system which, up until 40 odd years ago, purposefully excluded them from positions of meaningful power. Further, they have had to face negative stereotypes proffered by a white society which has had a negative consequence that cannot be easily shaken off.

Asian-Americans and children of 1st and 2nd Generation immigrants to the USA have always performed better than native children. A whole variety of social factors are at place and to continue the disingenous attacks on African-Americans as being molly coddled is most unfortunate.

11:40 - Go back to England, douche.

11:19 - I'm not sure where you're getting the "entitlement complex." I don't mind ad hominem attacks; they're fun. I just don't see how noting the poor writing skills of someone who is criticizing the "unqualified" betrays a sense of entitlement. I actually wonder at times if a lot of the outrage over AA comes from the "entitlement complex" of those who are right on the cusp of making the cut at the institutions they feel they deserve to study at, but which they cannot attend due to AA set-asides.

Oh, also, people don't actually think I'm a minority when they look at me. They're usually stunned when they discover my surname, and members of my ethnic group are similarly surprised when I address them in their native language without an accent. So I'm in the somewhat unique position of minority group membership (which I'm sure got my application looked at more closely) as well as a good undergraduate transcript from a highly ranked institution and a kick-ass LSAT, to boot. And, I'll probably be interviewing you some day. Please don't make any typos on your resume! ;-)

Preferential treatment in undergrad.

Preferential treatment in law school.

Preferential treatment in hiring.

At some point one must take a step back and say, "Goddamn, this isn't working at all."

11:19 - I'm not sure where you're getting the "entitlement complex." I don't mind ad hominem attacks; they're fun. I just don't see how noting the poor writing skills of someone who is criticizing the "unqualified" betrays a sense of entitlement. I actually wonder at times if a lot of the outrage over AA comes from the "entitlement complex" of those who are right on the cusp of making the cut at the institutions they feel they deserve to study at, but which they cannot attend due to AA set-asides.

Oh, also, people don't actually think I'm a minority when they look at me. They're usually stunned when they discover my surname, and members of my ethnic group are similarly surprised when I address them in their native language without an accent. So I'm in the somewhat unique position of minority group membership (which I'm sure got my application looked at more closely) as well as a good undergraduate transcript from a highly ranked institution and a kick-ass LSAT, to boot. And, I'll probably be interviewing you some day. Please don't make any typos on your resume! ;-)

really. who gives a fat crap? i know this blackguy, and there's a story he tells and retells, with misty eyes. and everyone makes believed their moved, mortified, mobilized ... anyway, after a lot of build-up, dramatic pauses, and that lip-biting thing people do that seems to be the signal for "serious political topic," the guy finally gets around to a pretty simple story: one night, he started out to cross the street and forced a car to stop abruptly. The driver hit the horn, yelled "n-word," and drove away. whatever. if people want to send him to stanford instead of georgetown as compensation ... again, who cares. the white slobs who get all lathered up about AA shouldn't cut it so close. if you're brilliant, you'll get in; if you're not, you're expendable. someone will be the last mediocre white guy admitted. so you're not it, and you would have been next, but they took a black guy who answered two fewer reading comprehension questions than you and didn't bother to go to that professor and kiss his butt to get the B+ changed to an A-. you're angry. you go for a drive. you call someone a "n-word" and here we go. you call someone else a ch*nk. now there's a crying chinaman. you hire the chick with big tits instead of the Mexican. you laugh harder at a joke a good looking athlete tells; you ignore the frail guy or fat chick when they tell the same joke, tell it better. there's some sadness to it all. so be sad. but get over it. i got called a bad bad name: who cares.

Ivy AA, are you Borat from Kazakhstan?

I'm actually Aussie mate. Want a Foster's?

“First of all, what about qualified applicants on the fringes, that get wait-listed to the top 5 schools? Without AA these applicants might have gotten in, and instead are not going those schools. Sure, they would get into a top6-14 school, but the point is there are spots in the top 5 that are being filled by AA admits that don't have the same qualifications as the other students there.”
It’s just not a big deal to me. 85 to 90% of students get into law school without any preferences at all. The 10 to 15% of students that end up displaced end up at schools that are only marginally less awesome. If the 10-15% of displaced students that end up at Columbia and NYU instead of Harvard are that much better than their classmates, they’ll finish in the top third and have the opportunity to transfer up, end up editing the law review, ect. If they don’t do any of those things, we’ll maybe that’s why they were in the group that got cut. But either way, their future is set. In fact, they might even get a scholarship to the lesser school and end up better off.
Never mind the fact that without AA, Harvard might just have a smaller class size. Law schools class sizes have generally expanded by more than 10% over the past 30 years. For all I know nobody is getting displaced at all.
“Second of all, who the fuck are you to decide what school someone should get re-directed to simply to unfairly give an AA admit a leg up and take a slot that they would have otherwise not gotten if their skin color was lighter? This is someone's life we're talking about here.”
Calm down. I’m not deciding anything. Admissions committees are. They’re not turning down Rhodes scholars to make way for AA admits, they’re turning away borderline candidates. That’s what admissions committees do. It’s what they’ve always done.

As for the life of the unfortunate waitlist candidate, see above. If there are employers out there who only consider Yale and Harvard grads but not NYU and Columbia grads, they probably aren’t looking for the students that barely got admitted.

I'm actually Aussie mate. Want a Foster's?

Hey Dundee, did Queensland run out of commas?

11:29 -- I fail to see how your point is relevant to mine. I never degraded the Jewish experience, rather I distinguished it (and that of Asians, Irish, etc.) from the black American experience.

11:40 -- How dare you insult my Irish heritage by being British.

Australian...even worse.

Aussie...even worse. Unless you're of Hibernian stock, of course.

Why are Asian people such horrendous drivers?

At my top 20 school, a great majority of the AA admits came from wealthy families or were faux minorities that laid claim to being hispanic, even though that was on their mother's side, and they looked white. I am all for AA if it is given to those who deserve it, not, for example, the child of a federal judge.

Ladies and Gentlemen, please join me in welcoming John Rocker to the discussion.

Wise up. You can not take a simple statistic and extrapolate like that. Isn't it more likely that blacks in America are more likely to be lower middle class or poor and/or go to crappy schools and get bad scholastic advice and not go to law school until many years after undergrad and therefore more likely to go to a tier 5 law school and therefore more likely to flunk the bar just like their classmates.

The only way to legitimize this discusion would be to see the pass rates of blacks at top 50 lawschools compared to their classmates.

The fact that everyone is so happy to jump on and say that all blacks need AA and will likely flunk the bar exam is an example of why more diversity is needed.

Lat, lighting fires merely to get a lot of comments is cheap and easy.

Why does Sanders get so much press when all of his studies are fatally flawed?

Oh, wait, it's because law students and journalists majored in Poli Sci.

If the man really wants to shoot his mouth off about AA, he should at least hire a few good math students. As far as I can tell, he's more incompetent than the students he studies.

11:56:

You said only an ignorant racist would equate the experiences of Jews, Asians, and the Irish with those (presumably more iniquitous) experiences of African Americans.

That's degrading because it denies a long history of viol