Burning shoes and the spirit world: The charade of neutrality

Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review

Volumn 44, Issue 2, 2009, Pages 314-327

  Wu, Frank H ^a  

^a GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 70149101544     PISSN: 00178039     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Review

References (162)

1. See, e.g., Shelby Steele, White Guilt: How Blacks and Whites Together Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Era (2006).
2. Peter Collier & David Horowitz, The Race Card: White Guilt, Black Resentment, and the Assault on Truth and Justice (1997).
3. For responses, see Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, Racism Without Racists: Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in the United States (2006).
4. Michael K. Brown et al., Whitewashing Race: The Myth of a Color-Blind Society (2005).
5. Thomas M. Shapiro, The Hidden Cost of Being African American: How Wealth Perpetuates Inequality (2005). Walter Benn Michaels has offered a perceptive analysis.
6. See Walter Benn Michaels, The Trouble with Diversity: How we learned to love identity and ignore Inequality (2006).
7. Malum prohibitum refers to "[a]n act that is a crime merely because it is prohibited by statute, although the act itself is not necessarily immoral." Black's Law Dictionary 978-79 (8th ed. 2004). Malum in se refers to "[a] crime or an act that is inherently immoral, such as murder, arson, or rape." Id. at 978.
8. Telephone interview with Peng Song (Sept. 19, 2008) (on file with author) [hereinafter "Song interview"].
9. See also University of Michigan General Incident Report from Joseph Anderson (Jan. 20, 2008) (on file with author).
10. Narrative/Supplement Report from Joseph Anderson (Jan. 20, 2008) (on file with author). Song interview, supra note 3. Id.; General Incident Report, supra note 3.
11. Song interview, supra note 3.
12. Id.
13. General Incident Report, Supra note 3.
14. Narrative/Supplement Report, supra note 3, at 1.
15. Song interview, supra note 3.
16. See, Laura Berman, Honor, Honor, Families, and a Rigid U.S. Judicial System, Detroit News, Sept. 11, 2008, at B1.
17. General Incident Report, supra note 3.
18. Narrative/Supplement Report, supra note 3 (not disputing these basic facts).
19. General Incident Report, supra note 3.
20. Narrative/Supplement Report, supra note 3.
21. In litigation defending affirmative action, the University of Michigan presented an aggressive, empirical case for the importance of diversity in higher education. It succeeded in establishing that diversity could be a "compelling state interest." See Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306, 307 (2002).
22. Gratz v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 244, 246 (2002).
23. see also Patricia Gurin et al., Defending Diversity: Affirmative Action at the University of Michigan (2004).
24. Complaint, People v. Song, No.08-0286 (Mich. Dist. Ct. filed Mar. 27, 2008).
25. Bd. of Regents, Univ. of Mich., Regents' Ordinance art. XII,§1(6) (2001), available at http://www.regents.umich.edu/ordinance.html.
26. Id.
27. The ethical norms governing the bar prohibit discriminatory "bias or prejudice" on the part of attorneys only when the conduct is "knowing." See Model Rules of Prof'l Conduct R. 8.4 cmt. 3.
28. See also Standards for Criminal Justice§3-3.9 (1993) (discussing "Discretion in the Charging Decision").
29. Berman, supra note 7.
30. See also Taryn Hartman, Beyond Black and White: Former WSU Dean's Book Explores Asian American Racial Tensions and Stereotypes. Detroit Legal News. Oct. 7, 2008, at 1.
31. Richard Thompson Ford has been a thoughtful critic of the means by which claims about racial prejudice may reinforce racial stereotypes.
32. See, e.g., Richard Thompson Ford, The Race Card: How Bluffing About Bias Makes Race Relations Worse (2008).
33. Richard Thompson Ford, Racial Culture: A Critique (2004).
34. For additional analysis, see Tali Mendelberg, The Race Card: Campaign Strategy, Implicit Messages, and the Norm of Equality (2001).
35. Linda Williams, Playing the Race Card: Melodramas of Black and White from Uncle Tom to O.J. Simpson (2002).
36. An influential book by Martha Minow provides a comprehensive overview of the tension between these models.
37. See Martha Minow, Making All the Difference: Inclusion, Exclusion, and American Law (1991).
38. For additional examination of this subject, see Engaging Cultural Differences: The Multicultural Challenge in Liberal Democracies (Richard A. Shweder et al., eds., 2004).
39. U.S. Const. amend. XIV,§ 1.
40. The classic work on the subject is Milton M. Gordon, Assimilation in American Life: The Role of Race, Religion and Naitional Origins (1964).
41. A more recent argument that assimilation is compulsory is presented in Peter D. Salins, Assimilation, American Style (1997).
42. Joseph Tussman & Jacobus tenBroek, The Equal Protection of the Laws, 37 Cal. L. Rev. 341 (1949).
43. Id. at 356 (citing Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944)).
44. See Ozawa v. United States, 260 U.S. 178, 195 (1922).
45. See also United States v. Thind, 261 U.S. 204, 214 (1923).
46. An important analysis of these racial prerequisite cases is Ian Haney Lopez, White By Law: The Legal Construction of Race 49-78 (1997).
47. See Stephen R. Fox, UnCivil Liberties: Italian Americans Under Siege During World War II 58-59 (2000).
48. See generally Stephen R. Fox, The Unknown Internment: An Oral History of the Relocation of Italian Americans During World War II (1990).
49. But see, Jeffrey L. Sammons, Were German Americans Interned During World War II? A Question Concerning Scholarly Standards and Integrity, 71 German Q. 73, 73-77 (1998) (questioning data on German American internments).
50. Korematsu, 323 U.S. at 214.
51. Tussman & tenBroek, supra note 20, at 367.
52. They were, in chronological order: Hirabayashi v. United States, 320 U.S. 81 (1943), Yasui v. United States, 320 U.S. 115 (1943), and Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944). In a fourth case, however, the Supreme Court appeared to indicate the incarceration of individuals innocent of wrongdoing in the internment camps was, and had always been, without constitutional authorization. See Ex parte Endo, 323 U.S. 283 (1944).
53. Adarand Constructors v. Pena, 515 U.S. 200, 213-16, 236 (1995).
54. 50 U.S.C. § 1989 (2000).
55. Proclamation No. 4417, 41 Fed. Reg. 35 (1976).
56. U.S. Comm'n on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, Personal Justice Denied (1997).
57. For the continuing significance of "strict scrutiny," see Adarand Constructors, 515 U.S. at 202.
58. See also Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306, 308 (2003).
59. Gratz v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 244, 270 (2003).
60. Gerald Gunther, The Supreme Court, 1971 Term-Foreword: In Search of Evolving Doctrine on a Changing Court: A Model for a Newer Equal Protection, 86 Harv. L. Rev. 1, 8-12, 18-20 (1972).
61. For a comprehensive critique of the "color blind" argument, see Neil Gotanda, A Critique of "Our Constitution Is Color-Blind," 44 Stan. L. Rev. 1, 2-7 (1991).
62. 33 See Kenji Yoshino, Covering: The Hidden Assault on Our Civil Rights (2006).
63. 34 See, e.g., Will Kymlicka, Multicultural Citizenship: A Liberal Theory of Minority Rights (1996).
64. Ronald Takaki, A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America (2008).
65. Charles Taylor, Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition (1994).
66. For discussions of the coercive aspects of assimilation, see generallj Yoshino, supra note 33.
67. See also, Barry Rubin, Assimilation and Its Discontents (1995) (discussing Jewish assimilation).
68. Beverly Daniel Tatum, Assimulation Blues: Black Faimilies in White Communities: Who Succeeds and Why (2000) (discussing African American assimilation).
69. See Horace M. Kallen, Culture and Democracy in the United StAtes: Studies in the Group Psychology of the American People 67 (1924).
70. Randolph Bourne, The Radical Will: Selected Writings, 1911-1918 at 11 (1977).
71. 17 See Sarah Schmidt, Horace M. Kallen: Prophet of American Zionism xii (1995).
72. See generally David Goldfield, Still Fighting the Civil War: The American South and Southern History (2002) (discussing neo-Confederates).
73. Wilson Moses, Classical Black Nationalism: From the American Revolution to Marcus Garvey (1996) (discussing black nationalists);
74. Michael Novak, Unmeltable Ethnics: Politics and Culture in American Life (2d ed. 1995) (discussing ethnic consciousness).
75. Dean E. Robinson, Black Nationalism in American Politics and Thought (2001) (discussing black nationalists).
76. William Van Deburg, Modern Black Nationalism: From Marcus Garvey to Louis Farrakhan (1996) (discussing black nationalists).
77. See generally, Carol Gilligan, In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development (1993).
78. Catherine A. MacKinnon, Feminism Unmodified: Discourses on Life and Law (1987).
79. See generally, Paula Ettelbrick, Since When Is Marriage a Path to Liberation?, in LESBIANS, GAY MEN, AND THE LAW 401 (William B. Rubenstein ed., 1993).
80. See generally, Ann Hubbard, Meaningful Lives and Major Life Activities, 55 Ala. L. Rev. 997 (2004).
81. Michael Ashley Stein, Disability Human Rights, 95 Cal. L. Rev. 75 (2007).
82. See Susan Moller Okin, Is Multiculturalism Bad for Women? (1999).
83. Compare Andrew Sullivan, Virtually Normal (1996) (arguing for gay rights using an assimilationist model), with Michael Warner, The Trouble with Normal: Sex, PolitICS, and the Ethics of Queer Life viu (1999) (arguing for gay rights using a "queer" model).
84. Compare Bonnie Tucker, Feel of Silence (1995) (memoir of deaf woman who assimilated), with James I. Charlton, Nothing About Us Without Us: Disability Oppression and Empowerment (2000) (disability advocate's argument for a civil rights model, rather than a medical model, for understanding disability) and Joseph P. Shapiro, No Pity: People with Disabilities Forging a New Civil Rights Movement (1994) (same).
85. 45 See, e.g., Kymlicka, supra note 34; Taylor, supra note 34.
86. 46 See Elaine M. Chiu, Culture as Justification, Not Excuse, 43 Am. Crim. L. Rev. 1317, 1321 (2006).
87. Leti Volpp and Doriane Lambelet Coleman have also debated whether cultural evidence should be barred or solicited in criminal proceedings.
88. Leti Volpp and Doriane Lambelet Coleman have also debated whether cultural evidence should be barred or solicited in criminal proceedings. See Doriane Lambelet Coleman, Individualizing Justice Through Multiculturalism: The Liberals' Dilemma, 96 Colum. L. Rev. 1093, 1097 (1996).
89. Leti Volpp, Talking "Culture": Gender, Race, Nation, and the Politics of Multiculturalism, 96 Colum. L. Rev. 1573, 1612-1613 (1996).
90. See also Doriane Lambelet Coleman, Culture, Cloaked in Mens Rea, 100 S. Atlantic Q. 981 (2001).
91. Leti Volpp, Feminism and Multiculturalism, 101 Colum. L. Rev. 1181, 1189 (2001).
92. Leti Volpp, Blaming Culture for Bad Behavior, 12 Yale J.L. & Human. 89 (2000).
93. Leti Volpp, (Mis)Identifying Culture: Asian Women and the "Cultural Defense," 17 Harv. Women's L.J. 57, 57 (1994).
94. 47 See generally, Rhoda E. Howard, Group Versus Individual Identity in the African Debate on Human Rights, in Human Rights in Africa: Cross-Cultural Perspectives 159 (Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im & Francis M. Deng eds., 1990).
95. 48 See Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures 9-10 (1973).
96. See Berman, supra note 15.
97. See Alan Chan, Filial Piety in Chinese Thought and History 1 (2004) (discussing the primacy of filial piety in Chinese culture).
98. Charlotte Ikels, Filial Piety: Practice and Discourse in Contemporary East Asia 2-7, 10 (2004) (exploring filial piety in the context of modernization in Asia).
99. Philip J. Ivanhoe, Filial Piety as a Virtue, in Working Virtue 297, 297-312 (Rebecca L. Walker & Philip J. Ivanhoe eds., 2007).
100. See also Norman Kutcher, Mourning in Late Imperial China: Filial Piety and the State (1999).
101. See Anthony W. Alumkal, Asian American Evangelical Churches: Race, Ethnicity, and Assimilation in the Second Generation 32-44 (2003) (discussing the range of studies on Chinese American and Korean American Protestant churches).
102. Tony Carnes & Fenggang Yang, Asian American Religions: The Making and Remaking of Borders and Boundaries (2004).
103. Elaine Howard Ecklund, Korean American Evangelicals (2006).
104. Russell Jeung, Faithful Generations: Race and New Asian American Churches (2004).
105. Rebecca Kim, God's New Whiz Kids: Korean American Evangelicals on Campus (2006).
106. See generally Janet Lee Scott, For Gods, Ghost and Ancestors: The Chinese Tradition of Paper Offerings (2007).
107. See also Sue Fawn Chung & Priscilla Wagers, Chinese American Death Rituals: Respecting the Ancestors (2005).
108. Nicholas Standaert, The Interweaving of Rituals: Funerals in the Cultural Exchange Between China and Europe (2008).
109. James L. Watson & Evelyn Rawski, Death Ritual in Late Imperial and Modern China (1988).
110. Valerie Hansen, The Law of the Spirits: Chinese Popular Beliefs, in Facing Death: Where Culture, Religion, and Medicine Meet 142 (Howard M. Spiro, Mary G. McCrea Curnen & Lee Palmer Wandel eds., 1996).
111. 53 See Scott, supra note 52, at 20-25.
112. Id. at 103-112.
113. Telephone interview with Kelly Flint, Counsel for Peng Song (Sept. 11, 2008) (on file with author) [hereinafter Flint interview].
114. See also First Amended Motion to Dismiss and Affidavit in Support, People v. Song, No.08-0286 (Mich. Dist. Ct. Sept. 11, 2008).
115. Flint interview, supra note 55.
116. Bd. of Regents, Univ. of Mich., Regents' Ordinance art. XII,§1(6) (2001), available at http://www.regents.umich.edu/ordinance.html.
117. Jury nullification, wherein a jury chooses to disregard evidence or the law and "acquits an otherwise guilty defendant, because the jury objects to the law the defendant violated or the application of that law to the defendant," has been a prominent topic of discussion since the O.J. Simpson acquittal. The leading article is Paul Butler, Racially Based Jury Nullification: Black Power in the Criminal Justice System, 105 Yale L.J. 677, 700 (1995).
118. Song's dilemma could be likened to one of the great Greek dramas. In the story of Antigone, as told in Sophocles's Oedipus trilogy, the heroine must choose between the law of the land (prohibiting her from burying her brother) and family obligation (requiring her to do so). See Sophocles, The Oedipus Cycle: Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone 186-252 (Dudley Fitts & Robert Fitzgerald trans., 1949).
119. Under even the current black-letter doctrine, it would be unlawful for a prosecutor to pursue prosecutions that were explicitly premised on race; in such a hypothetical instance of open discrimination, the problems of proof that have impaired previous constitutional claims of discrimination would be overcome. See United States v. Armstrong, 517 U.S. 456, 464-465 (1996) (holding that to establish discriminatory effect of prosecution based on race, defendants would need to demonstrate that members of other races could have been prosecuted for similar crimes but were not).
120. See also Angela Y. Davis, Arbitrary Justice: The Power of the American Prosecutor 186-193 (2007).
121. Randall Kennedy, Race, Crime, and the Law 311 (1998).
122. 61 See Justin D. Levinson, Forgotten Racial Equality: Implicit Bias, Decisionmaking, and Misremembering, 57 Duke L.J. 345, 353 (2007).
123. See generally Christine Jolls & Cass R. Sunstein, The Law of Implicit Bias, 94 Cal. L. Rev. 969 (2006).
124. Jerry Kang, Trojan Horses of Race, 118 Harv. L. Rev. 1489 (2005).
125. Jerry Kang & Mahzarin Banaji, Fair Measures: A Behavioral Realist Revision of "Affirmative Action," 94 Cal. L. Rev. 1063 (2006).
126. Charles Lawrence, The Id, the Ego, and Equal Protection: Reckoning with Unconscious Racism, 39 Stan. L. Rev. 317 (1987).
127. 163 U.S. 537 (1896).
128. Id. at 551.
129. 494 U.S. 872 (1990).
130. Id at 885.
131. 65 Id. at 885. For a comprehensive discussion of the litigation and the legislation in this area, see Christopher L. Eisgruber & Lawrence G. Sager, Religious Freedom and the Constitution (2007), especially pages 257-276.
132. Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, Pub. L. No.103-141, 107 Stat. 1488 (1993) (codified at 42 U.S.C.§2000bb (2006)).
133. See City of Boerne v. Flores, 521 U.S. 507, 534-536 (1997).
134. 426 U.S. 229, 239 (1976).
135. Id.
136. 517 U.S. 456 (1996).
137. Id. at 464-465.
138. Id.
139. 73118 U.S. 356 (1886).
140. Id. at 373-374.
141. The rationale for the Supreme Court's decision has been discussed at length. See David E. Bernstein, Revisiting Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 2008 U. ILL. L. Rev. 1393 (2008).
142. Gabriel J. Chin, Unexplainable on Grounds of Race: Doubts About Yick Wo, 2008 U. Ill. L. Rev. 1359 (2008).
143. Thomas W. Joo, Yick Wo Re-Revisited: Nonblack Nonwhites and Fourteenth Amendment History, 2008 U. Ill. L. Rev. 1427 (2008). The symposium containing the foregoing articles continues a dialogue begun in earlier works.
144. See David E. Bernstein, Lochner, Parity, and the Chinese Laundry Cases, 41 Wm. & Mary L. Rev. 211 (1999).
145. David E. Bernstein, The Supreme Court and "Civil Rights," 1886-1908, 100 Yale L.J. 725, 743-44 (1990).
146. Thomas Wuil Joo, New "Conspiracy Theory" of the Fourteenth Amendment: Nineteenth Century Chinese Civil Rights Cases and the Development of Substantive Due Process Jurisprudence, 29 U.S.F. L. Rev. 353 (1995).
147. Reno v. American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Comm., 525 U.S. 471, 489 (1999) (Scalia, J., concurring).
148. 159 F.3d 969 (6th Cir. 1998).
149. Id. at 977.
150. Id. at 975.
151. See id. at 977.
152. 80 See Frederick M. Lawrence, Punishing Hate: Bias Crimes Under American Law 163-167 (1999).
153. Id. at 167-169.
154. See Berman, supra note 15.
155. See Register of Action at 2, People v. Song, No.08-0286 (Mich. Dist. Ct. Mar. 27, 2008).
156. George Lakoff has been the most influential public intellectual arguing that progressives must reframe political discourse. See George Lakoff, Thinking Points: Communicating Our American Values and Vision (2006).
157. George Lakoff, Don't Think of an Elephant: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate (2004).
158. George Lakoff, Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think (2002).
159. George Lakoff, Moral Politics: What Conservatives Know That Liberals Don't (1997).
160. See also, Gary Blasi & John T. Jost, System Justification Theory and Research: Implications for Law, Legal Advocacy, and Social Justice, 94 Cal. L. Rev. 1119, 1126 (2006). The argument presented in this essay is by no means limited to individuals who belong to racial minority groups. One of the celebrated cases encompassed by this argument is portrayed in the documentary Brother's Keeper. A poorly educated, unsophisticated, impoverished white farmer who lived in squalor with his siblings was accused of the murder of the eldest of his brothers. His neighbors rallied to his cause, against the more urban prosecutors and what they represented. The drama attracted national media attention, largely favoring the defendant. Brother's Keeper (American Playhouse 1992).
161. See Kathryn M. Stanchi, Resistance is Futile: How Legal Writing Pedagogy Contributes to Law's Marginalization of Outsider Voices, 103 Dick. L. Rev. 7, 33 (1998).
162. Paul T. Wangerin, Skills Training in "Legal Analysis": A Systematic Approach, 40 U. Miami L. Rev. 409, 474-476 (1986).