After posting my own brief comments on the Supreme Court’s historic decision in the affirmative action cases on Thursday, I wrote Professor Andrew Kull. Professor Kull is Distinguished Senior Lecturer at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law and the author of The Color-Blind Constitution. I told him I had been drawing on CBC for something like 20 years to write about the “affirmative action” regime and that it had served as an inspiration to me. I asked if he might be willing to forward a statement — a sentence, a paragraph, anything — on the Court’s decision. Professor Kull kindly responded yesterday (I have added two bracketed notes):
Dear Scott,
Thanks for the kind words—in this email, in your Power Line post yesterday, and over the years. I was aware of how loyal your support of “CBC” has been because of notes I used to get from Jim Seaton, a reader of yours and of mine. I wonder if the two of you were ever acquainted? He was a professor of English at MSU who died a few years ago, a real loss. [I was a fan of Professor Seaton and recall corresponding with him, but we never met.]
I did not see your message in time to send any response, and (to be frank) I have yet to read yesterday’s opinions. Westlaw says they occupy “approximately 231 pages,” and (not to be glib about it) I could not begin to list the ways that any of us could more profitably read 231 other pages.
So my impressions of the decision are naturally very limited. The reaction I like best is what you wrote yesterday: “in the course of ultimate extinction.” I’d like to see those words quoted more often, and we can only hope that it will ultimately prove to be so. The mechanical justice of racial PR will not be abandoned by today’s bureaucrats, so this will see a long era of “massive resistance.”
For 30 years I had expected that someone on the Supreme Court would mention my book in a footnote, since I always thought it made the most convenient citation for the relevant history on either side. So in that respect I feel vindicated by Justice Sotomayor [who cited “CBC” at page 6 of her dissent].
With thanks and warmest regards,
AK
I am grateful to be able to add Professor Kull’s message to our own comments on the Court’s decision.
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