George Will on Racial Spoils

In today's Washington Post, George Will addresses the Ricci v DeStefano case that was just heard by the Supreme Court this week. The fire department of New Haven, Connecticut gave a test for promotion to its firefighters. The test was written to specifically account for concerns regarding the 1964 Civil Rights Act. When no African-Americans passed the exams with high enough scores to warrant promotion, eighteen firefighters (17 white and 1 hispanic) who did score high enough were passed over for promotion when the test reults were thrown out.

Here's Will's best line:

So, to avoid defending the defensible in court, it did the indefensible. It used anxiety about a potential challenge under a statute to justify its violation of the Constitution. And it got sued.
Is this the end of racial quotas in America...we shall have to wait for the justices' decision.

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