racism institutionalize
United States of America is not a country for one specific group of people such as French, China, or Angola. Instead, many of these people come to United States to live. Under one roof, all these different groups have to coexist for this country to function properly. As a result of interaction between groups of different background, race, tension develops. Soon, it becomes a personal dislike from one member of one group for members of another group. While these feeling are unavoidable and sometimes understandable, it is unacceptable to institutionalize these feelings and make it an acceptable part of society. Yet, this has existed and prospered in the social fabric of America since the day of slavery. Black Americans, victims of this institution of racism, have tried to change the system through legal means, and protest. The government has responded through legislation such as Civil Right Act of 1965 and Affirmative Action. These policies have faced opposition from some white Americans, but Justice Blackmun said, "In order to beyond racism, we must take account of race." The institution of racism has targeted minority Americans as its victim by denying them the opportunity that everyone else have such as making a living.
State and local government have almost stopped funding for mandatory busing. As a result, public school has become as segregated as ever and the accomplishment of Brown vs. Board of Education has vanished. In its place are programs such as magnet, school choice, voluntary enrollment, or voucher. However, these programs fall far short the goal of equal access, and integration. Magnet, school choice, or voluntary busing promise to bring diversity to school. However, these programs only bring children from urban school into suburban school. White parents will not risk sending their children to urban school for reasonable fear of drugs, crime, or lack of educational equipment. Suburban schools will end up getting more money, and urban schools will keep losing money and students. Since these programs have a quota of how many student can enroll, the majority of students cannot enroll. These unfortunate ones will have to settle for a school that lacks money at their neighborhood. So, these programs only allow a selected few to have an opportunity that students in suburban schools have. Another program is voucher that promotes to give poor minority students a chance for quality education at a private school. However, voucher works much better for a middle class white family trying to get into an exclusive private school than a poor black family. The voucher system determines how much to give by looking at the property tax of a family. If a family is poor, the voucher for that family will not have much worth. Since poor family cannot put much more money into their voucher, voucher program eliminates poor minority families as its recipients, contrary to what it promotes. Swain names the two most promising alternative method for packing are black representation in majority white district and voting for white candidates that can represent the interest of blacks (Swain 431). There has been many doubts that black candidates cannot win in a majority white district. However the election of Governor Wilder, Mayor Bradley, has proved otherwise. Black politicians has proved that they can both represent racial interest and their white constituent such as Louis Stokes (Swain 430). Black voters must not forget there are white politicians that can be as good a black politician such as Gephardt, Kennedy. Minority voters can only benefit from these two methods. First, it allows black politicians to look beyond the House of Representative for a higher office such as the Senate or may be the presidency. Second, it fosters a coalition with other racial and ethnic group (Swain 433). This will expand the representation of Black Americans. These two methods go beyond blaming white people or society for racism by reaching out to white people to combat it. Black and minorities need the help of white politicians and activist who are in a position to make a difference. Only then, the goal of racial equality will be achieved. State and local government then began to have gradual mandatory busing. However, gradualism has watered down the effort of true integration. Juan Williams, Thurgood Marshall's biographer, has said on C-span that Marshall has regretted for not having demanding more aggressively
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2170
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)
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