Melissa Harris-Perry's Letter To Justice Clarence Thomas: You've Got Affirmative Action All Wrong

Dear Justice Clarence Thomas,

It's me, Melissa. Now, I know you're pretty excited that you have a chance to end, once and for all, the practice of considering race in college admissions. You've been waiting for this moment a long time, haven't you? I bet you think about it every time you look at your Yale Law school diploma and the 15 cent price tag from a cigar box that you stuck on it to remind yourself that, as you say in your book, affirmative action made your law degree worthless. You thought about it every time you look at that stack of 40-year-old rejection letters, saved from companies who refused to hire you right after your law school graduation because of what you call 'a taint or racial prejudice,' a humiliation that you said comes from their belief that you were only admitted to Yale because of affirmative action. Let me tell you, you and Abigail Fisher, the plaintiff in the current University of Texas case, you've got it all wrong.

Consider this: It is possible that you didn't get hired right out of law school because you just weren't good enough. Just like Abigail Fisher. She was a good student, but she failed to clear the bar of UT's academic achievement index. Abigail Fisher wasn't admitted, but a black student didn't talk her place. It was not her place. And so now Abigail Fisher and you, Justice Thomas, are poised to take the places of countless future students of color. So let's be clear. Devaluing the accomplishments of black people is not a legacy of affirmative action. It's a legacy of racism that continues to confound and challenge our nation. to change it we need more than months or even years. we need generations to break down the barriers that divide us. and do you know one of the important places where that work begins? in college classrooms, diverse classrooms, the kind of classrooms that affirmative action has created. And here's something I've learned as a college professor. The measure of merit isn't the test you take to get into school, it's what you learn after you've been admitted and what do you with that knowledge once you've left. Just look at your African-American classmates from Yale Law School in the early 1970s. You remember them, the ones tainted by affirmative action. Four are now federal judges. One became a college president. There are partners at the country's top law firms and two professors of law, including Harvard Law's first tenured black woman, Lani Guinier. And yes, even United States' second black Supreme Court justice. Their accomplishments and yours are the real legacy of affirmative action. Contrary to what you believe, Yale's admission policy was not a failure. It was an undeniable success.

Sincerely,

Melissa