Supreme Court is (Still) Anti-Black

The United States Supreme Court’s termination last week of affirmative action in college admissions is another reminder that Black people cannot count on the legal system to support or ensure our freedom. 

Make no mistake – the affirmative action lawsuit and the Supreme Court’s decision are anti-Black in their assumptions and effect. The idea that affirmative action allows unqualified Black students to ‘steal seats’ from qualified white students has been proven false many times over. In spite of the best efforts of the most powerful of white people, the very Black people whose enslaved African and Caribbean ancestors were once forbidden to learn to read and write have long been ‘qualified’ to attend these predominantly white institutions (PWI). They just have been systematically excluded – which is what affirmative action was designed to address. Ending affirmative action in college admissions will bring a sharp decline in Black students’ enrollment, particularly in predominantly white public colleges and universities. Anti-Black racism continues to exist, and the notion that a society can address that racism with so-called ‘race-blind’ policies is dumb and dangerous.

It is critical to center the challenges African Americans will face in light of this SCOTUS decision, and it should be noted that Black migrants will also be negatively impacted by this decision. There will be rhetoric on both sides that try to divide our Diaspora on this issue, but we must be clear that fewer African Americans attending colleges and universities because of a lack of affirmative action is not good for Black migrants, and won’t give Black migrants a greater advantage. Any such delusions must end – Black migrants are Black people in this country. We are not leapfrogging over African Americans into the “American Dream”. We must all join our African American siblings in denouncing this decision and pushing PWI colleges and universities to accept and enroll more Black students in spite of this Supreme Court Decision.