ConfirmThem

By DanCT Posted in Circuit Courts — Comments () / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

David Kravets has a nice AP piece on Janice Rogers Brown. It puts some of her quotable quotes in context, and paints a warm picture of a remarkable woman. For example:

Brown, 56, caught the attention of the Bush administration with her majority opinion in 2000 striking down a San Jose city ordinance requiring government contractors to solicit bids from companies owned by women and minorities. Her opinion traced the legal history of race in America, portraying it as ebbing and flowing on whether government should treat all races equally.
Her 40-page conclusion boiled down to this: People should be treated equally, regardless of race. Even if an ordinance assists minorities, Brown wrote, "benign motivation cannot sanction a requirement that conflicts with the proscription against discrimination and preferential treatment on the basis of race and sex."

California's chief justice concurred with her opinion "but attacked her portrayal of affirmative action as 'entitlement based on group representation,' calling it a 'serious distortion of history.'" A question for you: How is that portrayal a "serious distortion of history"?