The ‘Handicapper General’ interpretation of the equal protection clause must not stand.
Yesterday, the Supreme Court declined to hear a case against Boston’s School Committee. But the underlying issue will not be going away.
Like many major cities, Boston runs special high schools for high-ability students, known there as “exam schools.” And like their counterparts elsewhere, Boston’s education officials have grown increasingly uncomfortable with the fact that Asian and white kids disproportionately test into these schools while black and Hispanic children are underrepresented.
So they did something about it. They didn’t inject race into the admissions process directly — even before the Supreme Court cracked down on affirmative action in higher ed, it was far more skeptical of the use of race in K–12 schools. Instead, they reshaped the process so that fewer white and Asian kids and more black and Hispanic kids would get in. And they were quite clear about their intentions.
Continue reading the entire piece here at the National Review Online (paywall)
______________________
Robert VerBruggen is a fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Follow him on Twitter here.
Photo by littleny/Getty Images