Having the power is not the same as having the right

In his response to my letter, Bryan Victor confuses "right" with "power". He correctly points out the Supreme Court decisions allowing the government to claim this power, but claiming power does not confer a right. Certainly Victor would not argue that our government had the right to segregate races based on Plessy v. Ferguson (1896). Writing for the majority, Justice Billings Brown stated that treating races differently did not violate the Thirteenth or Fourteenth Amendments, two of the Civil War amendments passed to abolish slavery and secure the legal rights of the former slaves. The Court was wrong then and it is wrong now.

In spite of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, Brown v. Board of Education, the Civil Rights Act, and the Michigan Constitution, the Court still believes the government has the power to treat people differently based on race. When our government abuses its power, citizens must take steps to stop it. The Michigan Civil Rights Initiative dismantles the government’s structural racism practiced in the form of racial preferences.

[Letter to the Editor - The State News. Submitted 03/24/2006.]