Redefining Equality

by Devins, Neal; Douglas, Davison M.

• ISBN13: 9780195116656
• ISBN10: 0195116658
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1998-01-29
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

The idea of equality is central to American civic life and one of thefoundations of our national identity. It is also a rather elusive notion, andperhaps has always been so. Charges of unequal treatment continue to be voicednationwide, in both the public discourse and the courts. There is no consensuson the meaning of equality, and competing views on what it consists of haveerupted into a cultural conflict that looms large in contemporary Americanpolitics.LAs a collection of insightful perspectives on this fundamental conceptbehind all issues of civil rights, Redefining Equality presents essays bydistinguished scholars in law, history, and social science. These papers addressspecific cases as found in headlines and abstract arguments as found in legaltexts, looking closely at everything from school busing programs and affirmativeaction to the role of the courts and the politics of equality. Various examplesand definitions of equality, culled from America's past and present, aresummarized and examined in ways that illustrate how and why equality issuesdirectly affect men and women of all races and backgrounds.LThis book, abalanced array of assessments regarding our nations historical and contemporarythoughts on equality, will prove most informative to students of law, politicalscience, and recent American history.

Author Biography

Neal Devins is a Professor of Law and a Lecturer in Government at the College of William and Mary School of Law. He is the author, most recently, of Shaping Constitutional Values (1996).
Davison M. Douglas, also a Professor of Law at the College of William and Mary Law School, is the author of Reading, Writing, and Race (1995).

Table of Contents

Contributors	xi
Introduction: The Pursuit of Equality	3	(10)
Davison M. Douglas
Neal Devins
Equality and Impasse: Mobilizing Group-Based Perspectives in an Era of Group-Blindness	13	(16)
Kathryn Abrams
Civil Rights Reform in Historical Perspective: Regulating Marital Violence	29	(22)
Reva B. Siegel
The Illusory Distinction between Equality of Opportunity and Equality of Result	51	(14)
David A. Strauss
The Word ``American'' Ends in ``I Can'': The Ambiguous Promise of the American Dream	65	(17)
Jennifer L. Hochschild
Racial Divisions and Judicial Obstructions	82	(21)
Jeremy Rabkin
The Politics of Clientele Capture: Civil Rights Policy and the Reagan Administration	103	(17)
Hugh Davis Graham
The Convergence of Black and White Attitudes on School Desegregation Issues	120	(19)
Christine H. Rossell
Brown Blues: Rethinking the Integrative Ideal	139	(15)
Drew S. Days III
The Social Construction of Brown v. Board of Education: Law Reform and the Reconstructive Paradox	154	(18)
Richard Delgado
Jean Stefancic
The Irrelevant Court: The Supreme Court's Inability to Influence Popular Beliefs about Equality (or Anything Else)	172	(19)
Gerald N. Rosenberg
Can Courts Make a Difference?	191	(14)
Erwin Chemerinsky
The Supreme Court's Pursuit of Equality and Liberty and the Burdens of History	205	(13)
David J. Garrow
The Judicial Role in Equality Decisionmaking	218	(15)
Neal Devins
Index	233