{"id":7368,"date":"2014-02-27T19:56:44","date_gmt":"2014-02-28T00:56:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/?p=7368"},"modified":"2014-02-27T20:05:54","modified_gmt":"2014-02-28T01:05:54","slug":"affirmative-action-debate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/affirmative-action-debate\/","title":{"rendered":"Affirmative Action Debate"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the midst of rising racial tensions <\/a> at the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law, the controversial figure at the center of the drama has come to Harvard Law School. Richard Sanders, infamously known for his strong stance against affirmative action, visited the law school today to state his case. Sanders, along with three other leading scholars took to Ames Courtroom to debate the following motion: affirmative action on campus does more harm than good. Unsurprisingly, Professor Sanders, with the help of Gail Heriot of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, argued for the motion. Arguing against the motion was Harvard Law\u2019s Randall Kennedy and Columbia Law School\u2019s Ted Shaw. <\/p>\n

Key excerpts from the debate are reproduced below. The debate in its entirety can be found at http:\/\/www.intelligencesquaredus.org\/<\/a>.<\/p>\n

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION CAUSES MORE HARM THAN GOOD.<\/u><\/p>\n

Richard Sanders<\/strong>, Professor at UCLA School of Law
\n\u2022 \u201cWe are not approaching this as an ideological matter. \u201d
\n\u2022 \u201cWhen you use very large racial preferences, you open up a credentials chasm.\u201d
\n\u2022 \u201cIf you reduce social mismatch, if you decrease that gap\u2026 you produce better outcomes.\u201d
\n\u2022 \u201c[Affirmative action] might be beneficial if we provide the institutional support to go with it. That is generally is lacking.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gail Heriot<\/strong>, Member, U.S. Commission on Civil Rights
\n\u2022 “We’re not against outreach, but the preferences that have been practiced have had unintended consequences.”<\/p>\n

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION DOES NOT CAUSE MORE HARM THAN GOOD.<\/u><\/p>\n

Randall Kennedy<\/strong>, Professor at Harvard Law School
\n\u2022 “We’re not supporting stupid affirmative action.”
\n\u2022 \u201cOne speaker says let the chips fall where they may\u2026 and we know where those chips will fall.\u201d
\n\u2022 “All people must contribute to social missions that are worthwhile.\u201d
\n\u2022 “Does affirmative action have consequences? [Yes,] but it\u2019s always a question of compared to what?\u201d<\/p>\n

Ted Shaw<\/strong>, Professor at Columbia Law School
\n\u2022 “Nobody has an absolute right to be admitted to these institutions.”
\n\u2022 \u201cWhat we are talking about is choosing among qualified students [when affirmative action is done correctly].”
\n\u2022 \u201cI am unapologetically a beneficiary of affirmative action\u2026 doesn\u2019t mean that I, or people like me, aren\u2019t qualified.\u201d <\/p>\n

Intelligence Squared US, an organization dedicated to bringing together the world\u2019s leading authorities on the day\u2019s most provocative issues, hosted this debate in collaboration with Harvard\u2019s American Constitution Society and Harvard\u2019s Federalist Society.\u201d<\/p>\n

Art by Thomas James. <\/em> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the midst of rising racial tensions at the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law, the controversial […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":7371,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,46,775],"tags":[],"coauthors":[707],"class_list":["post-7368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-amicus","category-youth-and-education","category-racial-justice"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/80\/2014\/02\/aff-action-by-thomas-james.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peZrWS-1UQ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7368"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7368\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7368"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/crcl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=7368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}