Dear John,
It’s been a week of setbacks before the Supreme Court—for racial equality, and those dedicated to advancing civil rights and the rights of women and girls.
In a long-awaited decision, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday to strike down race-based affirmative action in college admissions in cases brought against Harvard and the University of North Carolina. The decision, which found consideration of race as one among many factors unconstitutional on the grounds that it violates the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause, is likely to dramatically reshape college admissions processes.
In her dissent, Justice Jackson—the first and only Black woman on the court—wrote that “Deeming race irrelevant in law does not make it so in life. No one benefits from ignorance.” She continued, saying the Court has “detached itself from this country’s actual past and present experiences.”
“Gulf-sized race-based gaps exist with respect to the health, wealth and well-being of American citizens. They were created in the distant past, but have indisputably passed down to the present day through the generations. Every moment these gaps persist is a moment in which this great country falls short of actualizing one of its traditional principles—the ‘self-evident’ truth that all of us are created equal.” she wrote
And in a similarly scathing dissent, Justice Sotomayor said that the decision’s “devastating impact… cannot be overstated… Despite the Court’s unjustified exercise of power, the opinion today will serve only to highlight the Court’s own impotence in the face of an America whose cries for equality resound,” she continued.
Earlier in the week, the Court’s decision in Counterman v. Colorado will reduce protections for victims of stalking, verbal abuse and online harassment, and have a chilling effect on prosecutors. The case involved the conviction of a Colorado man who sent “thousands of unsolicited messages to a local female musician over a period of two years … messages that she found threatening in their cumulative effect.”
As Ms. contributor Michelle Onello explains, “In his appeal, Counterman argued that determining whether speech constitutes a true threat must take into account the mental state of the speaker rather than only considering whether a reasonable person would find the speech threatening. Since he never intended his messages to be threatening, he argued that they should be protected by the First Amendment.”
In siding with Counterman, the Court ruled that prosecutors must now prove the defendant’s state of mind, and that he intended his messages to be threatening. “Women are four times more likely to experience stalking than men, which means that the Court’s decision will have a disproportionate impact on the mostly female victims of stalking and verbal abuse who turn to the legal system for protection,” Onello concludes.
What’s more, the Court showed, in one of its final rulings of the term, that it is willing to prioritize religious freedoms over civil rights—ruling in favor of a web designer who sought the right to deny her services to same-sex weddings. The case is the latest in a series of disputes over whether the First Amendment can be used to get around anti-discrimination laws, and opens the door to discrimination on the basis of race, sex, religion and more. The designer who brought this most recent case was represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom—the same far-right group currently attempting to eliminate access to the abortion pill mifepristone, and promoting anti-abortion and anti-trans legislation across the U.S.
On a personal note, this week we lost a giant among feminists—Peg Yorkin, a co-founder and chair of the board of the Feminist Majority Foundation, publisher of Ms. A leading philanthropist, she contributed not only funds, but also her work, coming into our offices every day. Peg was impatient. She wanted to see change in her lifetime. She thought big and had total confidence we could make a difference.
“Since the day Feminist Majority Foundation started in 1987, Peg was important in conceptualizing the organization’s mission and potential significance in the struggle for equality and women’s rights,” Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority Foundation told Ms. “Above all, Peg was a feminist leader and activist, who also was a truth teller.”
Rest in power, Peg Yorkin.
This fourth of July, we’ll celebrate the ideals embodied in the Constitution and Declaration of Independence of equality for all, knowing that the country has yet to achieve these ideals, and has slipped backwards over the past year, including the Court’s decisions this week.
Onward,
