平权法案的终结

“宪法第十四修正案的平等原则将会为我们这个社会中最贫穷、最卑微、最被鄙视的族群和社会上最富有、最有影响力、最傲慢的群体提供同样的权利和法律的保障。如果做不到这条公平的原则, 那么所谓的共和政府就没有存在的必要。” Jacob Howard 密歇根州参议员 作者 | 吕劼 部分配图来源网络

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平权法案 Affimative Action 与宪法第十四修正案平等原则 Equal Protection Clause

关于平权法案相信最近关注美国新闻的朋友们大概有所了解了。它最初的目的是一方面促进在高等教育、就业市场当中的种族、民族、文化的多元性, 另一方面由于历史原因美国境内的多个少数族裔曾经或多或少的收到过歧视或者不公正地对待, 而通过平权法案, 推动者们希望能够通过给予这些少数族裔更多的特殊的优待政策来弥补他们曾经在历史上收到过的不公正的待遇。因为平权法案的实质就是用一种歧视来替代掉另外一种歧视, 例如在大学招生的过程中种族和肤色成为了能够被录取的关键因素, 相反学术能力、工作经验、社会经验等方面却不那么重要。此前在民间和立法机构中已经有许多呼声希望废除平权法案。最高法院终于在今天, 6月29日在哈佛大学招生歧视一案中以平权法案违反宪法第十四修正案中平等原则将平权法案废除。此后种族和民族这些因素将不能够被作为大学录取的参考因素。

而平等原则是宪法第十四修正案中最核心的条款。原文说的是任何一个州政府不能剥夺任何一个个人其他人所拥有的法律权利的保障。对于修正案的推动者来说, 平等原则是宪政体制下最为核心的一条基本准则“全体美国的公民在法律面前人人平等。” 因此宪法不能够允许任何由于肤色和族群原因而带来的歧视, 另外能够适用于一个个人的法律也必须要能够适用于除了这个人之外的其他任何人。

今天我正好不用工作, 看完了最高法院的决策意见, 有感而发表达一下我个人的看法。

虽然第十四修正案是内战之后就通过参众两院的决议生效并成为法案的, 但在将近半个世纪的时间里, 美国有许多州依然以各种理由坚持着原有的种族歧视政策, 例如在教育领域的种族隔离、黑人和其他少数族裔在相当长的时间里不能够和白人共同用餐、各种娱乐场所、商业公司招聘员工、政府公职人员的录取等等诸多方面都存在过赤裸裸的歧视行为。甚至二战后在战场上为美国流血牺牲的黑人战士们回国之后由于种族肤色, 都不能够享有和他们俘虏的纳粹战俘同样的待遇。但是从上世纪六十年代开始, 在如马丁路德金等一系列民权运动的推动下, 美国最高法院逐渐开始以违反第十四修正案平等原则, 强制性废除了在公共领域和民间普遍存在的各类种族歧视政策。 

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不论以哪种形式的种族歧视都是错的

聊了历史, 我来谈谈我个人的看法: 种族歧视行为或者政策不管以哪种形式、哪种方向、谁是收益人都是错的。

宪法十四修正案平等原则背后真正的核心理念在我看来是我华夏族人可能最熟悉不过的一句话了, 那就是“己所不欲、勿施于人”: 试问决策的制定者们自己愿意由于他们根本无法控制的因素而受到他人的歧视对待么? 很显然是不愿意的。既然不愿意又为什么用他们自己不愿意接受的痛苦去施加到别人的身上呢? 从前的种族歧视是由于你是黑人、拉丁裔、或者亚洲人收到种族歧视。而现在除了亚裔之外, 倒是反过来了: 白人、犹太人、亚洲人受到种族歧视和不公平的对待。我生在哪里、是什么族属、什么肤色, 这些东西不是我能够控制的, 而如果仅仅是因为这些我压根控制不了的因素导致我在申请学校、就业、等方面无法享有其他族裔所享有的机会, 这很显然是不公平的。 

哈佛自己也承认高等教育的目的是为了选取最为优秀、最为有潜力的青年人, 给他们机会将他们培养成为未来美国社会各个领域中的领袖和精英; 同时哈佛在上诉过程中给出之所以采用种族、民族的因素作为录取的考量是为了促进文化多元、使得不同的思想、理念在校园里能够自由表达互相交流; 再有就是降低民间对部分少数族裔的固有的负面印象, 弥补这些少数族裔在历史上说收到过的不公正对待。

在我看来, 另外最高法院意见书中也明确指出了, 通过将种族、民族、肤色等浅层面的因素纳入招生的考量因素中的招生政策, 不论从事实上还是逻辑上不仅不能够达成以上三个目标中的任何一个, 还会带来极其恶劣的逻辑后果。 

首先由于种族、肤色这些因素就被录取了, 因为每个学校招生名额有限, 招生的实质就是一场零和博弈, 那就意味着有更优秀、更具有潜力、学术和工作能力更强的候选人因为种族、肤色这些原因被哈佛给拒掉了。既然这样那哈佛怎么能够做到将“最有潜力的青年培养成为未来美国各界的领袖”这一目标呢?

另外民族、种族这些概念本就没有明确定义, 将没有明确定义的概念使用于具体的个案这个事情本身就是很离谱的一件事。比如说那什么是亚洲人? 东亚诸国出生的人肤色较浅, 而南亚和东南亚的人肤色较深, 面对这种情况该如何区分? 不同族裔互相通婚之后的后代身上会有多个族裔的印记, 面对这种情况又该如何区分? 华夏族、犹太人, 这些概念从来就是文明的概念, 跟血缘和族属压根就没有关系, 那面对一个跟大多数人不同肤色的华夏族或者犹太人, 又该如何区分?

再有将思想多元、文化多元这些理念与民族和种族混在一起这是一种错的离谱且会导致严重逻辑后果的思维误区。 哈佛的原话是说: 不同的肤色和族裔经常会带来不同的理念和思想。那言下之意就是说只要是同一族属就必然会拥有同样的思想、理念和价值观, 而不同肤色和族裔在思想、理念、和价值观方面就必然不同? 稍微有点脑子的人就应该能判断出这条理由根本就不符合逻辑, 更与事实相悖。如果真的同一个族裔、同一个肤色、同一个民族就必须只能有一种思想、一种价值观、一种理念, 那这太可怕了吧, 这还是人么? 恐怕就是在动物世界里, 他们的脑子也不会如此的整齐划一吧。除非在哈佛招生官的眼里, 他们招的不是人而是一个一个通过模子扣出来的泥像, 或者一台台在工厂里统一定做的机器。 

再说到哈佛给出的第三个理由, 即通过平权法案来弥补少数族裔历史上受过的不公正对待。 最高法院很精确的指出了一个问题, 那就是这种补救措施要施行到什么时候呢? 人类历史发展至今已经有几万年了, 不论任何民族、任何地区, 大家的发展都是从无知到拥有知识、从野蛮到文明、从不讲道理到明白事理, 如果一个游戏规则的设置使得后来已经文明、懂道理、有知识并且对祖先们犯过的错误有深刻认识的后人要为先祖们在历史上犯过的错不停地付出代价, 那么请问在没有开化之前谁的祖上没有过野蛮的行径? 坚持这样观点的人们难道认为人类社会是永远不会向前推进的么? 

最后结合我自身的体会谈一下哈佛所提出的对于消除少数族裔固有负面影响的看法：这种“以肤色论英雄的做法”与其初衷完全背道而驰, 这类行为相反只会加深人们对于这类少数族裔的固有负面印象: 

法学院第二学期作为法律博士一年级必修课程, 我们所有人都必须修地产法。而教我们的黑人女教授就毕业于哈佛法学院, 整个学期下来, 从教学的质量、数量、教授的学术能力、整体水平、课堂气氛、互动效果等各个方面这位教授跟其他的大教授们根本不在一个量级上。作为律考必考课程, 也是一年级的必修主课, 面对这个情况同学们可以说是怨声载道, 甚至有些美国同学直接把这个情况捅到了法学院院长那了。

初来乍到, 我作为外国人没必要惹不必要的麻烦, 另外老师其实对我不错, 但这个学期过后我自己不由得会有几个疑问: 哈佛法学院到底把“以肤色论英雄”这事做到了什么地步? 以后在工作环境中我如果遇到一个情况需要用一位哈佛法学院的黑人律师, 那我是否应该先质疑他(她)的个人能力和素养? 如果我不额外的做考察就用了这个人, 那我是不是会因为用了一个能力素养不够的人而将信任我的人置于风险之中?

所以说到底, 这不是我在歧视黑人, 是哈佛法学院在歧视黑人, 因为正是他们的这种招生原则逼的我们在实际工作中为了保护自身利益不得不多一分考量。   

最后借用马丁路德金博士的一句名言, 也是我上大学时最喜欢的一篇演讲之一:“我有一个梦想, 有一天我的孩子们可以生活在一个不以肤色被人评价、而以他们的内在品质而去被别人评价的社会。”

盼好

6月29日

写于堪萨斯家中

6月29日最高法院决策意见书节选(内容非常精彩, 推荐能读的朋友仔细阅读一下, 200多页的意见书, 我没法儿去一一翻译):

"In the wake of the Civil War, Congress proposed and the States ratified the Fourteenth Amendment, providing that no State shall “deny to any person . . . the equal protection of the laws.” Amdt. 14, §1. To its proponents, the Equal Protection Clause represented a “foundation[al] principle”—“the absolute equality of all citizens of the United States politically and civilly before their own laws.” Cong.Globe, 39th Cong., 1st Sess., 431 (1866) (statement of Rep.Bingham) (Cong. Globe). The Constitution, they were determined, “should not permit any distinctions of law basedon race or color,” Supp. Brief for United States on Reargument in 

Brown 

v. 

Board of Education

, O. T. 1953, No. 1 etc., p. 41 (detailing the history of the adoption of the Equal Protection Clause), because any “law which operates upon one man [should] operate 

equally 

upon all,” Cong. Globe 2459 (statement of Rep. Stevens). As soon-to-be President James Garfield observed, the Fourteenth Amendment would hold “over every American citizen, without regard to color, the protecting shield of law.” 

Id.

, at 2462. And in doing so, said Senator Jacob Howard of Michigan, the Amendment would give “to the humblest, the poorest, the most despised of the race the same rights and the same protection before the law as it gives to the most powerful, the most wealthy, or themost haughty.” 

Id.

, at 2766. For “[w]ithout this principleof equal justice,” Howard continued, “there is no republicangovernment and none that is really worth maintaining.” 

Ibid."

"In 

Gayle 

v. 

Browder

, for example, we summarily affirmed a decision invalidating state and local laws that required segregation in busing. 352 U. S. 903 (1956) (

per curiam

). As the lower court explained, “[t]he equal protection clause requires equality of treatment before the law for all persons withoutregard to race or color.” 

Browder 

v. 

Gayle

, 142 F. Supp. 707, 715 (MD Ala. 1956). And in 

Mayor and City Council of Baltimore 

v. 

Dawson

, we summarily affirmed a decision striking down racial segregation at public beaches and bathhouses maintained by the State of Maryland and the city of Baltimore. 350 U. S. 877 (1955) (

per curiam

). “It is obvious that racial segregation in recreational activities can nolonger be sustained,” the lower court observed. 

Dawson 

v. 

Mayor and City Council of Baltimore

, 220 F. 2d 386, 387 (CA4 1955) (

per curiam

). “[T]he ideal of equality before the law which characterizes our institutions” demanded as much. 

Ibid. 

In the decades that followed, this Court continued to vindicate the Constitution’s pledge of racial equality. Laws dividing parks and golf courses; neighborhoods and businesses; buses and trains; schools and juries were undone, all by a transformative promise “stemming from our American ideal of fairness”: “‘the Constitution . . . forbids . . . discrimination by the General Government, or by the States, against any citizen because of his race.’” 

Eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating allof it. And the Equal Protection Clause, we have accordinglyheld, applies “without regard to any differences of race, of color, or of nationality”—it is “universal in [its] application.” 

Yick Wo

, 118 U. S., at 369. For “[t]he guarantee of equal protection cannot mean one thing when applied to one individual and something else when applied to a person of another color.” 

Regents of Univ. of Cal. 

v. 

Bakke

, 438 U. S. 265, 289–290 (1978) (opinion of Powell, J.). “If both are not accorded the same protection, then it is not equal.” 

Id.

, at 290. 

U. S., at 306–307 (internal quotation marks omitted). Yet that was “discrimination for its own sake,” which “the Constitution forbids.” 

Id.

, at 307 (citing, 

inter alia

, 

Loving

, 388  U. S., at 11). Justice Powell next observed that the goal of “remedying . . . the effects of ‘societal discrimination’” was also insufficient because it was “an amorphous concept of injury that may be ageless in its reach into the past.” 

Bakke

, 438 U. S., at 307. Finally, Justice Powell found there was “virtually no evidence in the record indicatingthat [the school’s] special admissions program” would, asthe school had argued, increase the number of doctors working in underserved areas. 

Id.

, at 310. 

These limits, 

Grutter 

explained, were intended to guard against two dangers that all race-based government action portends. The first is the risk that the use of race will devolve into “illegitimate . . . stereotyp[ing].” 

Richmond 

v. 

J. 

A. Croson Co.

, 488 U. S. 469, 493 (1989) (plurality opinion).Universities were thus not permitted to operate their admissions programs on the “belief that minority students always (or even consistently) express some characteristic minority viewpoint on any issue.” 

Grutter

, 539 U. S., at 333 (internal quotation marks omitted). The second risk is that race would be used not as a plus, but as a negative—to discriminate 

against 

those racial groups that were not the beneficiaries of the race-based preference. A university’s use of race, accordingly, could not occur in a manner that “unduly harm[ed] nonminority applicants.” 

Id.

, at 341. 

To manage these concerns, 

Grutter 

imposed one finallimit on race-based admissions programs. At some point,the Court held, they must end. 

Id.

, at 342. This requirement was critical, and 

Grutter 

emphasized it repeatedly. “[A]ll race-conscious admissions programs [must] have a termination point”; they “must have reasonable durational limits”; they “must be limited in time”; they must have“sunset provisions”; they “must have a logical end point”;their “deviation from the norm of equal treatment” must be “a temporary matter.”

Ibid. 

(internal quotation marksomitted). The importance of an end point was not just a matter of repetition. It was the reason the Court was willing to dispense temporarily with the Constitution’s unambiguous guarantee of equal protection. The Court recognized as much: “[e]nshrining a permanent justification for racial preferences,” the Court explained, “would offend this fundamental equal protection principle.” 

Ibid.

; see also 

id., 

at 342–343 (quoting N. Nathanson & C. Bartnik, The Constitutionality of Preferential Treatment for Minority Applicants to Professional Schools, 58 Chi. Bar Rec. 282, 293 (May–June 1977), for the proposition that “[i]t would be a sad day indeed, were America to become a quota-ridden society, with each identifiable minority assigned proportional representation in every desirable walk of life”). 

Second, respondents’ admissions programs fail to articulate a meaningful connection between the means they employ and the goals they pursue. To achieve the educational benefits of diversity, UNC works to avoid the underrepresentation of minority groups, 567 F. Supp. 3d, at 591–592,and n. 7, while Harvard likewise “guard[s] against inadvertent drop-offs in representation” of certain minoritygroups from year to year, Brief for Respondent in No. 20–1199, at 16. To accomplish both of those goals, in turn, theuniversities measure the racial composition of their classesusing the following categories: (1) Asian; (2) Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander; (3) Hispanic; (4) White; (5) African-American; and (6) Native American. See, 

e.g.

, 397  F. Supp. 3d, at 137, 178; 3 App. in No. 20–1199, at 1278,1280–1283; 3 App. in No. 21–707, at 1234–1241. It is far from evident, though, how assigning students to these racial categories and making admissions decisions based onthem furthers the educational benefits that the universities claim to pursue.

For starters, the categories are themselves imprecise in many ways. Some of them are plainly overbroad: by grouping together all Asian students, for instance, respondentsare apparently uninterested in whether 

South 

Asian or 

East 

Asian students are adequately represented, so long asthere is enough of one to compensate for a lack of the other. Meanwhile other racial categories, such as “Hispanic,” arearbitrary or undefined. See, 

e.g.

, M. Lopez, J. Krogstad, & J. Passel, Pew Research Center, Who is Hispanic? (Sept. 15,2022) (referencing the “long history of changing labels [and] shifting categories . . . reflect[ing] evolving cultural normsabout what it means to be Hispanic or Latino in the U. S.today”). And still other categories are underinclusive.When asked at oral argument “how are applicants fromMiddle Eastern countries classified, [such as] Jordan, Iraq,Iran, [and] Egypt,” UNC’s counsel responded, “[I] do not know the answer to that question.” Tr. of Oral Arg. in No. 21–707, p. 107; cf. 

post

, at 6–7 (GORSUCH, J., concurring) (detailing the “incoherent” and “irrational stereotypes” that these racial categories further).

Respondents’ admissions programs are infirm for a second reason as well. We have long held that universities may not operate their admissions programs on the “belief that minority students always (or even consistently) express some characteristic minority viewpoint on any issue.” 

Grutter

, 539 U. S., at 333 (internal quotation marks omitted). That requirement is found throughout our Equal Protection Clause jurisprudence more generally. See, 

e.g.

, 

Schuette 

v. 

BAMN

, 572 U. S. 291, 308 (2014) (plurality opinion) (“In cautioning against ‘impermissible racial stereotypes,’ this Court has rejected the assumption that ‘members of the same racial group—regardless of their age, education, economic status, or the community in which they live—think alike . . . .’” (quoting 

Shaw 

v. 

Reno

, 509 U. S. 630, 647 (1993))).

Yet by accepting race-based admissions programs inwhich some students may obtain preferences on the basis of race alone, respondents’ programs tolerate the very thingthat 

Grutter 

foreswore: stereotyping. The point of respondents’ admissions programs is that there is an inherent benefit in race 

qua 

race—in race for race’s sake. Respondentsadmit as much. Harvard’s admissions process rests on the pernicious stereotype that “a black student can usually bring something that a white person cannot offer.” 

Bakke

, 438 U. S., at 316 (opinion of Powell, J.) (internal quotation marks omitted); see also Tr. of Oral Arg. in No. 20–1199, at 92. UNC is much the same. It argues that race in itself “says [something] about who you are.” Tr. of Oral Arg. in No. 21–707, at 97; see also 

id.

, at 96 (analogizing being of acertain race to being from a rural area). 

We have time and again forcefully rejected the notionthat government actors may intentionally allocate preference to those “who may have little in common with one another but the color of their skin.” 

Shaw

, 509 U. S., at 647. The entire point of the Equal Protection Clause is thattreating someone differently because of their skin color is 

not 

like treating them differently because they are from a city or from a suburb, or because they play the violin poorly or well. 

“One of the principal reasons race is treated as a forbidden classification is that it demeans the dignity and worthof a person to be judged by ancestry instead of by his or her own merit and essential qualities.” 

Rice

, 528 U. S., at 517. But when a university admits students “on the basis of race, it engages in the offensive and demeaning assumption that [students] of a particular race, because of their race, think alike,” 

Miller 

v. 

Johnson

, 515 U. S. 900, 911–912 (1995) (internal quotation marks omitted)—at the very least alike in the sense of being different from nonminority students. 

In doing so, the university furthers “stereotypes that treat individuals as the product of their race, evaluating theirthoughts and efforts—their very worth as citizens—according to a criterion barred to the Government by history and the Constitution.” 

Id.

, at 912 (internal quotation marks omitted). Such stereotyping can only “cause[] continued hurt and injury,” 

Edmonson

, 500 U. S., at 631, contrary as it is to the “core purpose” of the Equal Protection Clause, 

Palmore

, 466 U. S., at 432. 

Board of Education

, 347 U. S. 483 (1954), in the infamous case 

Korematsu 

v. 

United States

, 323 U. S. 214, 216 (1944). There, the Court upheld the internment of “all persons of Japanese ancestry in prescribed West Coast . . . areas” during World War II because “the military urgency of the situation demanded” it. 

Id.

, at 217, 223. We have since overruled 

Korematsu

, recognizing that it was “gravely wrong the day it was decided.” 

Trump 

v. 

Hawaii

, 585 U. S. ___, ___ (2018) (slip op., at 38). The Court’s decision in 

Korematsu 

nevertheless “demonstrates vividly thateven the most rigid scrutiny can sometimes fail to detect an illegitimateracial classification” and that “[a]ny retreat from the most searching judicial inquiry can only increase the risk of another such error occurringin the future.”

Adarand Constructors, Inc. 

v. 

Peña

, 515 U. S. 200, 236 (1995) (internal quotation marks omitted).