By Seymour Martin Lipset

Ideas

Despite the great civil-rights triumphs of the 1960s, the politics of race once again occupies center stage in American life. Yet what appears to be a conflict between blacks and whites, Seymour Mar- tin Lipset argues, is more a struggle between the American public and the nation's political elite over the true meaning of equality.

by Seymour Martin Lipset

o achievement of 20th-cen- Affirmative action was born in 1965 in tury American politics sur- the spirit of the first civil-rights revolution. passes the creation of an Soon thereafter it was transformed into a enduring national consen- system of racial preferences, and today af- sus on civil rights. This firmative action is rapidly polarizing the consensus was forged dur- politics of race in America. The editorial ing the past quarter century by a civil-rights and op-ed pages bristle with affirmative ac- movement that compelled Americans fi- tion polemics and analyses. In the 1990 nally to confront the wide gap between contest for the governorship of California, their treatment of blacks and the egalitar- Republican Pete Wilson focused on the ian values of their own cherished national "quota" issue in defeating Diane Feinstein. creed. In the same year, Senator Jesse Helms won In recent years, however, the leaders of reelection in North Carolina with the help the civil-rights movement have shifted the of the quota issue, and in Louisiana ex- focus from the pursuit of equal opportunity Klansman David Duke exploited it to gain a to the pursuit of substantive equality majority of white votes while losing his bid through policies of preferential treatment. for a Senate seat. His failed campaign for This has brought matters to a difficult pass, the governorship last fall became a national because most Americans, including many drama. When Congress began its 199 1 ses- blacks, have not shifted with the leaders of sion, the first bill introduced by the Demo- the movement. The reason is not hard to cratic leadership in the House of Represen- find. While the civil-rights movement of the tatives was a civil-rights bill described by its 1960s asked Americans to live up to a sin- opponents as "quota" legislation. Even af- gle unassailable ideal, today it sets up a con- ter a version of that bill became law in No- flict between two core American values: vember, controversy over its meaning and egalitarianism and individualism. import continued.

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Ugly political campaigns and even uglier racial incidents everywhere from Bensonhurst to Los Angeles sometimes make it appear that there has been a resurgence of racism in America. But the old consensus in favor of civil rights and equality of opportunity remains intact. Americans, including many southern whites, categori- - cally reject the kind of racial discrimination that was common in this country only a few decades ago. A 1991 Gallup-Newsweek poll reported that "72 percent of blacks and 52 percent of whites said that they would prefer to live in a neighborhood that was ra- cially 'half and half-more on both sides than felt that way three years ago." Over two-thirds of whites and four-fifths of blacks claim to "know many members of another race well." Almost no whites (six percent) report that they would feel "uncomfortable working with members of another race" or "for a boss of another race." At the same time, most Americans endorse some forms of compensatory action to help blacks and other disadvantaged groups per- form at the levels of competition set by the larger society: Head Start and other special educational programs, federal aid for college students, job training, and community development. But a large majority of whites and roughly half of all blacks draw the line at preferential treatment, at suspend- ing standards and adopting quotas or other devices that favor citizens on the basis of their membership in groups. If most Americans oppose such preferential treatment, who backs it? As it turns out, the support comes largely from a segment of the national leadership class. Indeed, the policy was conceived and is still promoted almost entirely by political and social elites, Republi- cans as well as Democrats, against the wishes of a majority of the American public. The struggle over preferential treatment is in reality less a conflict between whites and blacks than between people and their leaders. ore than 150 years ago, Alexis de Tocqueville observed that the American version of egalitarianism emphasized equality of opportunity and of respect, rather than equality of result or condition. This version of equality is one of five related ele- ments in the American Creed, including liberty, individualism, populism (the rule of the people), and laissez faire. In the Europe of Tocqueville's day, with its heritage of feudalism, societies were structured in strict social classes. The emerging working class of 19th-century Europe therefore viewed the class system as immutable and sought equality of results

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as a group, through socialism. But in Amer- the common American experience. They ica-or at least in white America-the pur- spent their first two-and-a-half centuries in est bourgeois and classically liberal society this country as slaves and another 100 years in the world. class has been treated as an after the Civil War serving as a strictly seg- economic construct, and the solution to in- regated lower-caste group-social arrange- equality has been seen as economic oppor- ments that were, in both cases, much more tunity: explicitly hierarchical and hereditary than During the late 1820s, when the first anything in European feudalism. White stirrings of socialism were barely being felt America's treatment of blacks focused on in Europe, Workingmen's parties emerged group characteristics, on defining and treat- in New York, Philadelphia, and other Amer- ing people not according to their personal ican cities. But the Workingmen were not merits but according to their ancestry, their socialists; they believed in private property race, and their ethnic identification. and wanted people to strive to get ahead. Stressing group characteristics encour- The New York party rejected as inadequate ages group solutions. In Europe, the impor- the idea of common (i.e. public) schools tance of one's station promoted class con- then favored by many egalitarian refonn- sciousness among the lower strata and, to ers, proposing instead the creation of state- some extent, a sense of noblesse oblige financed boarding schools. The only way to among the privileged. Both the lower- create the proverbial level playing field, the class-based social democratic Left and up- Workingmen reasoned, was by raising the per-class conservative leaders, such as Dis- young of all classes in a common atmo- raeli in Great Britain and Bismarck in sphere 24 hours a day. Germany, favored government efforts to The American emphasis on individual- improve the lot of the less affluent without ism was reinforced early on by the coun- necessarily changing their position in the try's religious commitment to the "noncon- social order: welfare, public housing, pub- formist" Protestant sects that stress lic employment, state medical care. Eu- voluntarism with respect to the state and a rope's social democrats have frequently personal relationship to God, one not medi- held power since the 1930s, and they have ated by hierarchically organized churches, done much to improve the lives of workers. as in Eurone and elsewhere. The American But in most countries they have neither dis- embrace of liberalism and the market also mantled the elite high schools nor signifi- favored a different approach to equality. cantly expanded opportunities for working- The market calls for meritocracy and the class youths to gain a university education. rejection of nepotism and other forms of Americans, by contrast, have always put favoritism. Hiring the best qualified person, more emphasis on expanding individual whether he or she be black or white, Jew- opportunity through education. From early ish or Gentile, native or foreign born, is the in the 19th century the United States has best way to maximize economic return. led the world in the proportion of its popu- The implications of the differences be- lation completing elementary and high- tween ~uro~eand America were concisely school educations. Horace Mann and other put by political scientist Walter Dean education reformers of the 1830s and '40s Burnham: "No feudalism, no socialism: who proselytized for the concept of the With these four words one can summarize common school insisted that the schools the basic sociocultural realities that under- should be open to all, rich and poor, chil- lie American electoral politics in the indus- dren of immigrants and of natives-though trial era."-. not blacks. Such reformers rejected the Eu- But another reality, too, is undeniable: ropean class-differentiated education sys- Blacks represent the terrible exception to tem, scorning the German gymnasia, the

Seymour Martin Lipset, a Wilson Center Senior Scholar, is Hazel Professor of Public Policy at George Mason University and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover I?1.stitution. Currently president-elect of the American Sociological Association, lie has also sewed as president of the American Political Science Association, ainone, other posts. His most recent book is Continental Divide: The Values and Institu- tions of the United States and Canada (1990). Copyright @ 1992 by Seymour Martin Lipset.

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French lyckes, and the English "public" only 55 percent of Britons and 31 percent schools, which educated at most only the of Germans feel this way. - top 10 percent of the population. Most white Americans now believe that The transatlantic differences, today are the nation's success ethic applies to blacks most striking in higher education. As of and women as well. And while understand- 198'7,-65 percent of all Americans 20-24 ably ambivalent about the promise of . . years old had been exposed to some form America, most blacks are also committed of postsecondary education. No West Euro- to the belief that hard work and educa- pean country was close. Only 31 percent of tional attainment will enable them to get the French and 30 percent of West Ger- ahead. A Gallup poll conducted in 1991 mans, for example, had any experience in a found that "69 percent of whites and 68 college, university, or other educational in- percent of blacks say that African-Ameri- stitution after high school. cans should focus most of their energy on The United States spends proportion- improving [their] education." ately much more public money on education than does any European nation, while Europe spends more on welfare. In 1985, American educational outlays amounted to he black condition has challenged the 6.7 percent of gross domestic product T nation's values from the very begin- (GDP). The average figure for 17 West Eu- ning. "I tremble for my country when I re- ropean countries was 5.1 percent. As of flect that God is just," Thomas Jefferson 1981 about one-fifth of the American GDP wrote in 1781. If the country broke up over was devoted to social expenditures (includ- the question of slavery, a friend of George ing education), as compared with over one- Washington's reported in 179 1, Washington quarter in the 24 industrialized countries of "had made up his mind to move and be of the Organization for Economic Coopera- the northern." Jefferson foresaw that the tion and Development. promise in his ringing phrase, "all men are It would be hard to overstate the con- created equal," would have a continuing ef- tinuing importance of the American cul- fect on American politics and would ulti- tural emphasis on achievement. Most mately undermine slavery. Americans believe that hard work, rather In 1944, following the logic of Jeffer- than "lucky breaks or help from other peo- son's observation, Swedish sociologist Gun- ple," is what enables people to move up. nar Myrdal noted in An American Dilemma Surveys by the National Opinion Research that white Americans, including most Center (NORC) from 1983 through 1990 southerners, deeply believed in the Creed, found that around two-thirds of respon- even as they grossly violated it with "Jim dents consistently agreed that "people get Crow" and other segregationist practices. ahead by hard work." Eighty-eight percent The Creed was so strong, he concluded, said "ambition" is essential or very impor- that if blacks were to organize to defend tant "for getting ahead in life." The vast ma- their rights, whites would have to yield. The jority of Americans, including most blacks, political successes of the civil-rights move- believe that the United States is still a land ment in the 1960s showed Myrdal to be of opportunity, a meritocracy in practice as right. But in yielding politically, the white well as in theory. Asked in 1988 whether male political elite agreed not only to the they have a good chance of improving their extension of individual rights to blacks but standard of living, 7 1 percent of Americans to unprecedented group rights. told NORC that they did. By contrast, 43 Affirmative action has had two incarna- percent of Italians, 36 percent of Germans tions in America, and in its first, during the and Britons, and only 23 percent of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, it Dutch thought so. And although Americans reflected a more or less traditional Ameri- are already much more likely to go to col- can approach to the problem of inequality. lege than are people in any other country, Perhaps the best statement of the logic of close to two-thirds (65 percent) believe that this variety of affirmative action was offered opportunities for higher education ought to by President Lyndon Johnson in a speech at be increased still further. By comparison, Howard University in 1965:

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You do not take a person who, for years, tifying the Philadelphia Plan under the Fifth has been hobbled by chains and liberate Amendment's due-process clause, recalled - him, bring him up to the starting line of a that he and his colleagues were disturbed race and then say, "you are free to com- by the ambiguity surrounding the Johnson pete with all the others," and still justly administration's affirmative-action order. believe that you have been completely fair .: :. Men and women of all races are And because they were "uncomfortable born with the same range of abilities. But with the image the party of Abraham Lin- ability is not just the product of birth. Abil- coln had developed," Silberrnan, later a ity is stretched or stunted by the family Reagan judicial appointee, wrote, "and . that you live with, and the neighborhood most of all because the GOP was anxious to you live in-by the school you go to and expand employment opportunities for the poverty or the richness of your sur- blacks, we launched what I have come to roundings. It is the product of a hundred see as a fundamentally unsound policy." unseen forces playing upon the little in- The new affirmative action was strongly fant, the child, and finally the man. opposed by Comptroller General of the United States Elmer Staats (a Johnson ap- LBJ's solution was the War on Poverty, pointee), the national trade union leader- which included heavier spending on educa- ship, and most congressional Democrats. tion through such programs as Head Start, Clarence Mitchell of the National Associa- expansion of Aid to Families with Depen- tion for the Advancement of Colored Peo- dent Children, and a host of other initia- ple denounced it as a "calculated attempt tives. These efforts were reinforced by legis- coming right from the President's desk to lation designed to eliminate discrimination break up the coalition between Negroes in the workplace, housing, the schools, and and labor unions. Most of the social eventually in such areas as club member- progress in this country has resulted from ships, which affected social relationships. this alliance." Speaking for the administra- The extension of full political citizenship to tion, George Schultz criticized civil-rights blacks through the Voting Rights Act of leaders for not backing the quota plan. 1965 and later legislation and judicial deci- Opponents objected that the anti- sions meant that blacks, like whites, could discrimination clause of the 1964 Civil press for their legal rights as individuals in Rights Act, Title VII, explicitly outlawed the courts and administrative tribunals. "affirmative discrimination." Staats quoted Affirmative action underwent a major Senator Hubert Humphrey's pledge that transformation-one whose consequences nothing in the Act "will give any power to we are grappling with today-when na- the [Equal Employment Opportunity] Com- tional leaders became convinced that the mission or to any court to require hiring, first approach was working too slowly. firing, or promotion of employees in order Ironically, the change was made by the to meet a racial 'quota' or to achieve a ra- conservative Nixon administration. It was cial balance," and the agreement by its lib- not a reaction to specific demands made by eral Senate floor managers that there blacks or the American Left but seemed to would be no "consideration of color. . . [in] represent an innovative effort by parts of the decision to hire or promote." In De- the white elite to fulfill the goals of the civil- cember 1969, however, Congress rejected a rights movement. rider to an appropriations bill that would In October 1969, Nixon's secretary of la- have explicitly banned quotas. Republicans bor, George Schultz, issued an adminis- voted against the ban, 124 to 41, while trative order imposing a quota for the hir- Democrats voted for it, 115 to 84. "The ing of black apprentices on federal Democrats are token oriented-we are job contractors in the Philadelphia construc- oriented," Nixon said. The parties were tion industry, whose employers and unions soon to reverse roles. were cooperating to deny jobs to blacks. Nixon and his successors, Republicans The policy was soon extended to other cit- and Democrats alike, gradually extended ies and ultimately to other fields. Looking "communal rights" to other minorities, as back, Laurence Silberman, who as well as to women. Yet such gestures were Schultz's solicitor had written the brief jus- hardly appreciated by the American public.

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Opinion polls have repeatedly shown that ships and fellowships limited to applicants overwhelming majorities of whites-both from particular regional, gender, ethnic, or men and women-and often more than 50 religious backgrounds-though some of percent of blacks oppose them. these practices are now outlawed. To a Many American elites seem to feel that large extent, blacks have been excluded the individualistic emphasis of the Ameri- from these networks of privilege. can Creed needs to be amended. Of the Women and most other minorities have many arguments for preferences during the required only genuine equality of opportu- 1960s, the most notable was made by a nity, not special help, in order to make a black scholar, Harold Cruse, in The Crisis of place for themselves in American society. the Negro Intellectual (1967). Given the op- Indeed, the Jews, the "Confucian" Asians, pression of the past and continuing and the East Indians have done better on discrimination in the present, he argued, average than old-stock white Americans blacks require recognition as a unique na- with similar skills and education. Roughly tional minority. They also merit group 40 percent of Mexican-Americans hold rights over and beyond those sought by white-collar or other high-level positions to- other minorities and the non-black poor. day, even though most of them were not Cruse compared the black situation to that born in the United States. In any case, im- of the Jews, arguing that although Jews had migrants generally have no claim on Amer- faced great discrimination, all they needed ican society. Whatever handicaps they to prosper was an end to discrimination have-inadequate education, lack of skills, and the application of meritocratic policies inexperience with the ways of the cities- to themselves. Having won that, Jewish are not the fault of American society. organizations made a fetish of the Ameri- Blacks clearly do have a claim on this can Creed, insisting that all minorities and society. As I wrote in 1963 in The First New immigrants needed only similar treatment. Nation: "Perhaps the most important fact to Black leaders came to argue that they recognize about the current situation of the could rightfully claim group rights, in part American Negro is that equality is not as reparations for 350 years of unparalleled enough to assure his movement into the exploitation by white society. After all, they larger society." The question is, what will? now say, Congress has compensated Japa- One of the more novel proposals is ad- nese-American~for their incarceration dur- vanced by Brandeis University's Lawrence ing World War I1 and the West German Fuchs in The American Kaleidoscope government paid reparations to Jews and (1990). He argues for a system of preferen- Israel. tial treatment in employment that varies ac- Furthermore, long before affirmative cording to the type of job. Fuchs points out action, Americans deviated from the merit- that in many, if not most, occupations em- ocratic principle in the treatment of war ployers chiefly require competence, not su- veterans. As compensation for their service, perior performance. Seniority rights, legis- veterans received preference in the civil- lation outlawing compulsory retirement service hiring process as well as special as- ages, and tenure for school teachers are all sistance in financing higher education and justified by the assumption that general home mortgages. competence is a sufficient qualification for employment. Thus, Fuchs contends, efforts n many ways, of course, the United to increase the number of minority work- I States has never been a perfect meritoc- ers among the less-skilled-"fire fighters, racy. In the job market and other fields, machinists, computer operators, and candi- people tend to favor relatives, friends, and dates for dental schoolH-can reasonably members of their own ethnic, religious, include numerical goals, permitting "race communal, or cultural groups. And univer- to be counted as one of many factors. . . ." sities, though meritocratic and universalis- in filling jobs. But he argues that fields in tic in their explicit values, have always fa- which high achievement matters a great vored the children of alumni and faculty, deal-scholarship, medicine, sports, airline not to mention athletes, in their admissions pilots, and management-should not be policies. They also award special scholar- subject to quotas and special preference

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policies, apart from special recruitment were against preferences, so were two- and training efforts. thirds of the Democrats. A relatively high Whatever the merits of Fuchs's distinc- proportion of those who identified them- tion, people who work in these less-exalted selves as "strong liberals," 43 percent, en- fields do not accept such disparaging esti- dorse preferential treatment, but they con- mates of their worth. Poll after poll finds stituted only 10 percent of the total sample. that white workers see no reason that mer- Last spring, a Newsweek-Gallup poll itocratic standards and universalistic rules posed the issue in terms of persons of equal should not apply to them. In fact, more qualifications: "Do you believe that because support (or at least acceptance) of special of past discrimination against black people, preferences is found among elite whites, qualified blacks should receive preference who begin with much more economic and over equally qualified whites in such mat- status security. ters as getting into college or getting jobs?" Mass opinion remains invariably op- Only 19 percent of whites responded posi- posed to preferential treatment for de- tively, 72 percent said no. But preference prived groups. The Gallup Organization re- secured a plurality of 48 percent among peated the same question five times blacks, with 42 percent opposed. between 1977 and 1989: Preferential treatment does somewhat better when it is justified as making up for Some people say that to make up for past specific past discrimination, when ability is discrimination, women and minorities not posed as an alternative, and when it is should be given preferential treatment in limited to blacks and applies only to em- getting jobs and places in college. Others say that ability, as determined by test ployers that have actually discriminated. scores, should be the main consideration. The New York Times national poll asked in Which point of view comes close to how May and December of 1990: "Do you be- you feel on the subject? lieve that where there has been job discrimination against blacks in the past, In each survey, 10 or 11 percent said that preference in hiring or promotion should minorities should be given preferential be given to blacks today?" Both times, treatment, while 81, 83, or 84 percent re- roughly one-third of those polled said yes. plied that ability should be the determining But small majorities, 51-52 percent, re- factor. When the 1989 answers were bro- jected preferential treatment even under ken down by the respondents' race, blacks these conditions. were only somewhat more supportive of By June 1991, during the debate on the preferential treatment than whites (14 per- new civil-rights bill that Republicans at- cent to 7 percent); a majority of the blacks tacked as quota legislation, support for (56 percent) favored "ability, as determined preferences dropped to 24 percent, while in test scores." Women, it should be noted, opposition rose to 61 percent. One month had the same response as men; 10 percent later, a poll of blacks taken by USA Today to supported preferential treatment, and 85 test their reaction to Clarence Thomas's percent ability. nomination to the Supreme Court found Gallup, working for the Times Mirror that they rejected quotas. They were asked, Corporation, presented the issue somewhat "Thomas has said that racial hiring quotas differently in 1987 and 1990: "We should and other race-conscious legal measures make every effort to improve the position damage blacks' efforts to advance. He em- of blacks and other minorities even if it phasizes self-help instead. Agree or dis- means giving them preferential treatment." agree?" More blacks agreed with Thomas, This formulation was supported more 47 percent, than disagreed, 39 percent, strongly. Twenty-four percent agreed in while 14 percent replied "don't know." both years, while 71 to 72 percent dis- Both whites and blacks, however, will agreed. Blacks were more favorable than support a policy described as "affirmative whites by 32 to 18 percent, but again it is action" if it explicitly does not involve quo- notable that over two-thirds of the blacks tas, as an NBC News-Wall Street Journal rejected preferential treatment. And while poll found in July 1990. Two-thirds of over four-fifths of the Republicans surveyed whites (66 percent) and 84 percent of

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blacks responded favorably to the question: creased steadily since the 1960s. "All in all, do you favor or oppose affirma- Democratic leaders are increasingly out tive action programs in business for blacks, of step with public opinion, and it is hurting provided there are no rigid quotas?" them. The Republicans, their creation of quotas long forgotten, now vigorously em- phasize meritocratic standards. Democrats are faced with a dilemma: how to respond mericans make a critical distinction to pressure from civil-rights groups and the A between compensatory action and intelligentsia on the one hand, and on the preferential treatment. To return to Lyndon other, how to prevent the party's identifica- Johnson's image of the shackled runner, tion with quotas from alienating its tradi- they are willing to do more than remove tional base of support among whites in the the chains. They will go along with special working class and the South. Lyndon John- training programs and financial assistance, son anticipated the problem in 1965, when enabling the previously shackled to catch he said in private White House discussions up with those who are ahead because of about civil rights, "We have to press for earlier unfair advantages. But they draw the them as a matter of right, but we also have line at predetermining the results of the to recognize that by doing so we will de- competition. stroy the Democratic Party." In some measure, the distinction be- This is precisely what is happening. A tween "compensatory action" and "pref- New York Times-CBS News poll conducted erential treatment" parallels the distinction in mid-year 1991 found that 56 percent of drawn between "equality of opportunity" Americans said the Democratic Party and "equality of results." Compensatory ac- "cares more about the needs and problems tion is probably seen as a way to enhance of blacks," while only 15 percent believed equality of opportunity. Because blacks the Republicans do. More significant may have been discriminated against in the past, be the finding that, when asked the same it is fair to give them special consideration question about "the needs and problems of so that they will have a better chance in the whites," 45 percent answered that the GOP future. Preferential treatment, on the other cares more, only 19 percent said the Demo- hand, probably sounds to most whites like crats do, and 14 percent said both parties an effort to predetermine the outcome of care equally about both races. the competitive process. Affirmative action is widely seen as re- The heaviest support for preferential verse discrimination. Many less-affluent treatment seems to come from the liberal whites believe that the number of jobs intelligentsia, the well-educated, the five to available for them has declined as a result six percent of the population who have of preferences for blacks. Two studies un- gone to graduate school, plus those who dertaken in 1985 and 1987 by Stanley have majored in the liberal arts in college.* Greenberg of the Analysis Group for the Support is also strong among the political Michigan Democratic Party indicate that elite, particularly Democrats but including negative reaction to affirmative action has many Republicans (though not many played a major role in the defection of prominent officeholders). The Democrats white male blue-collar voters from the in Congress increasingly support these poli- party. "Much to the surprise and dismay of cies, a change which may flow from the both Greenberg and his sponsors," one fact that the proportion of Democratic writer noted, "white fury over affirmative members who can be classified as liberal action emerged as a top voter concern in on the basis of their voting record has in- both of his reports. Democratic campaign themes such as 'fairness,' 'equity,' and 'justice' were perceived-not without justifica- "Â¥liniversitie.-theimelves cuntin~ieto press for numerical goals or special prelei~ences,reflecting the greater sti~ci~gthof tion-as code words for quotas." liberalism in acadenie than in other realms ol American lite. National polls indicate the same con- And not suiprisingly, [he i~iuste.\tcn.sive apphcatioti ut nu- cern. Two surveys, one conducted by the nerical targets in higher education can be IULIIICI in the h~i- inanities and "suit" social sciences, the most left-leaning ciis- University of Michigan's Institute for Social ciplir~cs. Research in 1986 and the other by NORC

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in 1990, found large majorities of whites re- were "making progress." (Support for the plying that it is "very likely" (28 percent in optimistic view declined somewhat in the both) or "somewhat likely" (48 and 42 per- latter years of the Reagan era. In early July cent) "that a white person won't get a job 1990, an NBC News-Wall Street Journal or promotion while an equally or less quali- poll reported that 60 percent of all blacks fied black person gets one instead." Two- said that, compared to 10 years ago, blacks fifths of the whites in the 1986 study be- in America are "better off," while 29 per- lieved that they or someone in their family cent said "worse off.") would experience job discrimination. A The refusal of some black leaders to ad- 1991 report on a poll sponsored by the mit improvement is understandable. The Leadership Conference on Civil Rights con- worse things appear, and the greater the cludes that "civil-rights laws are seen by a gulf seems between themselves and others, substantial number of voters as creating the more they can demand. Yet the re- unfair advantages, setting up rank or class peated emphasis on how little progress has privilege in the labor market." been made also helps sustain the argument "White Americans. . . do not see them- that government efforts to benefit blacks selves as racists, or as opponents of equal simply do not work, that there are factors opportunity and fundamental fairness," ob- inherent in the black situation that prevent serves columnist William Raspberry. "What blacks from getting ahead. And many they oppose are efforts to provide preferen- blacks as well as whites tend to swallow tial benefits for minorities. . . . How could that argument. NORC found that during we expect them to buy a product we 1985-89, an average of 62 percent of whites [blacks] have spent 400 years trying to have and 36 percent of blacks agreed that the recalled: race-based advantages enshrined reason blacks on average have worse jobs, in law?" incomes, and housing than white people is Misperceptions have much to do with that "most blacks just don't have the moti- the polarization of racial politics. The best vation or will power to pull themselves out research shows, for example, that there is of poverty." An ABC News-Washington Post in reality little reverse discrimination in the poll in October 1989 found that 60 percent competition for lower-skill jobs. Recently, of both whites and blacks agreed with the Urban Institute researchers sent equally statement: "If blacks would try harder, they qualified whites and blacks to apply for could be just as well off as whites." general labor, service, retail, and clerical Such beliefs feed racist stereotypes and positions in Chicago and Washington, D.C. black self-hatred. In early January 1991, Whites were treated better in job interviews NORC released the results of a survev taken in 20 percent of the cases; blacks were in 1990. They indicate that most whites be- treated better seven percent of the time. lieve that blacks are less intelligent, lazier, Whites were more likely to be hired. One more violence-prone, and more inclined to finding is heartening: There was no prefer to stay on welfare than whites and discrimination in three-quarters of the in- several other ethnic groups. terview situations. But blacks are still more The damage is compounded by the likely to suffer from racism in working- news media's relentless focus on the social class job markets than whites are to experi- pathologies of the ghettos, which creates ence reverse discrimination. the impression that most blacks live If whites overestimate the extent of re- wretched existences. Yet social scientists verse discrimination, whites and blacks estimate that the underclass, both black alike badly underestimate the extent of and white, is actually fairly small. William black economic progress during the past Julius Wilson, the social scientist most re- several decades. The general ignorance of sponsible for focusing attention on the black success is due in part to the reluc- question, now identifies one-sixth of the na- tance of black leaders to admit it. In opin- tion's 30 million blacks as ghetto poor, a ion polls during the mid-1980s, three-fifths term he prefers. (These are people who live of the black leaders told pollsters that in "areas of extreme poverty, that is, those blacks were "going backward," while two- in which 40 percent of the people are thirds of a national black sample said they poor.") An Urban Institute group arrives at

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a lower estimate of the underclass: two or their black peers had not even finished high three million people in 1980, about two- school and were thus condemned to lives thirds of them black, one-fifth Hispanic. at the margins of society. Meanwhile the total proportion of The two largest groups in the black blacks living in poverty-many not afflicted class structure, the authors say, are now "a by the pathologies of the underclass-has lower class dominated by female-headed declined radically. While there is a great families and a middle class largely com- deal of debate about the definition of pov- posed of families headed by a husband and erty, census data indicate that the percent- wife." The problem is that most black age of blacks living in poverty declined adults live in stable family and economic from 55 percent in 1959 to 33.5 percent in situations, but most black children do not. 1970. In 1990, a recession year, it was 31.9 They are the offspring of the large number percent. of black women who are single mothers. The "invisible man" of the 1990s, to The proportion of black children born in borrow Ralph Ellison's phrase, is the suc- female-headed households was 23 percent cessful black working- and middle-class in 1960, 28 percent in 1969, 45 percent in suburbanite. Living in stable families out- 1980, and is 62 percent today. Living in side traditional black areas, the new "invisi- such a household frequently guarantees be- ble man" is removed from the experience ing poor. The poverty rate for black single- of ghetto blacks and largely ignored by parent families with children was 56.3 per- whites. The black suburban population cent in 1988. That for two-parent black grew by 70 percent during the 1970s, fed families with children was 12.5 percent. primarily by an exodus from central cities. The popular impression is that an explo- During the 1980s the number of black sub- sion of illegitimacy among blacks is to urbanites swelled from 5.4 million to 8.2 blame for the growing impoverishment of million. Between 1986 and 1990, 73 per- black children. But Christopher Jencks of cent of black population growth occurred Northwestern University calculates that if in the suburbs. married black women had borne as many Economists James P. Smith and Finis R. babies in 1987 as they did in 1960, the pro- Welch, analyzing the changes in the situa- portion of black babies born out of wed- tion of blacks since World War 11, con- lock would have risen only from 23 percent cluded in 1986 that "the real story of the to 29 percent during those years. The pro- last forty years has been the emergence of portion is much higher because married the black middle class," which "as a blacks now have fewer children. group. . . outnumbers the black poor." Whatever the causes of childhood pov- The majority of blacks have steady jobs erty, affirmative action is no remedy. Prefer- and are either middle class or members of ence policies or quotas are not much help what may be called the yeoman regularly to the illegitimate black ghetto youth who employed working class. They are married grows up in poverty and receives an infe- or in stable long-term relationships. The in- rior education. As William Julius Wilson come of married blacks is 77 percent that writes, they are more likely to benefit "mi- of comparable whites, up from below 60 nority individuals from the most advan- percent two decades ago. The proportion of taged families. . . [who are] most qualified blacks who are high school dropouts has for preferred positions-such as higher- fallen, from 31 percent in 1970 to 18 per- paying jobs, college admissions, promo- cent in 1988, while that of whites (14 per- tions and so forth. Accordingly, if policies of cent) has not changed. preferential treatment for such positions These drastic social and economic are conceived not in terms of the actual dis- changes have led to growing differentiation advantages suffered by individuals but within the black community. By the early rather in terms of race or ethnic group 1980s, a 1989 National Academy of Sci- membership, then these policies will fur- ences panel found, black men aged 25 to ther enhance the opportunities of the more 34 with at least some college earned 80 to advantaged without addressing the prob- 85 percent as much as their white counter- lems of the truly disadvantaged." parts. At the other extreme, one-quarter of The conflict between different versions

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of equality, between an emphasis on the in- Humphrey, the American Left has stood for dividual and on the group, will continue making equality of opportunity a reality. By here and abroad. Societies long organized a supreme irony, the man most vigorously along group lines of caste or language- reviled by Democrats, Richard Nixon, cre- India, Pakistan, and Canada-have deeply ated a situation that has placed them on the entrenched group-quota systems that are wrong side of the issue. unlikely to change much. But the failure of different varieties of socialism and the o rebuild the national consensus on growing acceptance of the market as the T civil rights and racial justice, firma- source of economic growth, not only in Eu- tive action should be refocused, not dis- rope but in Latin America and Africa as carded. Quotas and special preferences will well, suggests that much of the world will not help the poorly educated and unskilled see a new emphasis on competitive meri- secure good jobs. Success in postindustrial tocracy and individualism. society requires a good education. Extend- Civil-rights leaders, liberals, and Demo- ing and vastly improving education in the crats are swimming against a strong tide. At ghettos, establishing very early Head Start home, white opinion and, as we have seen, programs as well as financial incentives for even much black sentiment are against students, teachers, and successful schools, them. Shelby Steele, a black writer once ac- and expanding apprentice programs, are tive in Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition, the directions to be followed. Such pro- concludes that "affirmative action has grams should be offered to all less-privi- shown itself to be more bad than good and leged people, regardless of racial and eth- that blacks. . . now stand to lose more from nic origins. it than they gain." He rejects it because it The whole society can also learn from leaps "over the hard business of developing the experience of blacks in the military, a formerly oppressed people to the point which has offered blacks career training where they can achieve proportionate and a chance for stable employment and representation on their own. . . ." He fears upward mobility. That record argues in fa- that affirmative-action quotas undermine vor of a large-scale national-service effort. black morale, contributing to "an enlarge- If all American youth are encouraged to ment of self-doubt" by raising the implica- volunteer for national service. those with tion that successful blacks have not earned inadequate education and skills can receive their positions. More than a century ago, in job training while they and their peers help 187 1, the celebrated black abolitionist rebuild the nation's infrastructure and de- Frederick Douglass made some of the same liver social services. points. He ridiculed the idea of racial quo- Moving away from policies that empha- tas as "absurd as a matter of practice," not- size special preferences need not-indeed, ing that it implied blacks "should constitute must not-mean abandoning the nation's one-eighth of the poets, statesmen, schol- commitment to guaranteeing equal oppor- ars, authors and philosophers." Douglass tunity for disadvantaged citizens. The con- emphasized that "natural equality is a very cept of individual rights remains integral to different thing from practical equality; the American Creed, and racial injustice and. . . though men may be potentially and caste-like divisions blatantly contradict equal, circumstances may for a time cause it. The American dilemma is still with us, the most striking inequalities." On another and it imposes upon us a moral obligation occasion, in opposing "special efforts" for to ensure that race is neither a handicap black freedmen, Douglass argued that they nor an advantage. Until black Americans might "serve to keep up the very preju- are absorbed folly into our nation's econ- dices, which it is su desirable to banish." omy and society, we should, in Jefferson's From Thomas Jefferson to Hubert words, continue to fear a just God.

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