Gift Children: A Story of Race, Family, and Adoption in a Divided America By J. Douglas Bates. Ticknor & Fields, 270 pages, $21.95 Secret Thoughts of an Adoptive Mother By Jana Wolff. Andrews and McMeel Publishing, 148 pages, $12.95 Loving across the Color Line: A White Adoptive Mother Learns about Race By Sharon E. Rush. […]
Randall Kennedy
Randall Kennedy has been a contributing editor of the Prospect since 1995. He is the Michael R. Klein Professor of Law at Harvard University. His several books include The Persistence of the Color Line: Racial Politics and the Obama Presidency.
Posted inBooks, Arts and Culture
State of the Debate: The Case Against “Civility”
Can’t we all just get along? Not when “civility” is just a genteel way to mask the inevitable tensions and antagonisms of democratic society.
Posted inFeatures
In Extremis
The confirmation of John Ashcroft as attorney general conjoins fearsome power with reactionary politics. The attorney general makes crucial decisions regarding the administration of justice that are beyond the power of the press, Congress, the White House, or the courts to oversee effectively on an ongoing basis. And Ashcroft, despite his sudden amiability and professed […]
Posted inFeatures
Contempt of Court
T he U.S. Supreme Court’s intervention into the presidential election was and is a scandal. Five right-wing justices used the flimsiest of pretexts to block the Florida vote recount. Chief Justice William Rehnquist and Company are typically unmoved by alleged Equal Protection Clause violations (except when the plaintiffs are whites charging so-called reverse discrimination). In […]
Posted inArticle
Confirmation of Dishonesty:
The Senate confirmation hearings on the proposed appointment of John Ashcroft as attorney general offered little respite from a season of political bad news. First, it seems clear now that, barring some unforeseen last-minute development, Ashcroft will be confirmed. This alone would be bad enough — a conjoining of fearsome power with reactionary politics. The […]
Posted inCivil Rights in America
Is He a Soul Man?
As Democrats’ most loyal constituency, blacks have rallied around the President during his political crisis, even (some argue) going so far as to confer on him honorary black status. Maybe blacks are selling their political capital too cheaply.
Posted inCivil Rights in America
Orphans of Separatism: The Painful Politics of Transracial Adoption
Liberals’ misguided efforts to respect race may harm children — and deepen racial intolerance.
Posted inLaw and Justice
Lani Guinier’s Constitution
Guinier’s critics were only half right. She is a political radical–but no quota queen. As a constitutionalist, she was neither separatist nor undemocratic. She would have gotten along nicely with James Madison.
