Faces at the Bottom of the Well: The Permanence of Racism

The law professor reads another of Geneva Crenshaw’s stories, this time one about a United States in which the country passes a “Racial Preference Licensing Act.” Premised on the claim that African Americans’ interests and constitutional rights will never be achieved and sustained unless they align with the interests of white people, the act allows people to purchase licenses that permit racial discrimination so long as the holder announces the discrimination publicly and agrees to pay a licensing fee. This fee goes into a fund that select civil rights groups distribute for the benefit of African Americans.

Geneva Crenshaw appears to the professor when he finishes the story, and the two engage in a Socratic dialogue. The professor is troubled that the law undercuts constitutional rights, such as the 14th Amendment, which guarantees equal protection to all citizens. Crenshaw forces him to recognize that laws designed to enforce these rights always fail. Such laws attempt to use the law to ensure people behave morally by not discriminating. So many white people discriminate against African Americans through covert means, like hiring people who look like them, that the law cannot prevent outcomes that show discrimination is at work.