Dartblog

It has happened that the state of Michigan is the primary theater in the national war over racial preferences. On the one side, absolutists who believe that racial equality is a term which means, basically, racial equality. On the other side, an ad-hoc coalition of diverse people whose immediate interests would be diversely served by special preferences in job hiring, university admissions, and the like. Also on that side, reparationists who believe that inequality today is fair so long as it is a response to the inequality of yesterday.

In this election cycle, the absolutists deployed their nuclear bomb: A statewide referendum which, if approved, would enter the following language into the constitution of the state of Michigan:

The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting.

That’s it. Surprised? You probably shouldn’t be—things that are essential and right and just are very often elegant, also. The absolutists deployed this nuclear bomb under the thinking that bypassing such dirty filters as the media and the litigators and the university public relations departments would put its position on equal ground. So folks in Michigan were asked if they wanted that language inserted into their constitution. Michigan, by a vote of 58 to 42, said “yes.” In modern electoral parlance, that is known as a landslide.

As a result, the state government, its underlings, and the University of Michigan, Michigan State University, Wayne State University, and sundry other colleges will be unable to conduct business in such a way that systemically favors those of one skin color (or sex or ethnicity or nationality) over others. And these universities, which in a saner time would be at the vanguard of such legislation, are outraged. Mary Sue Coleman, the president of the University of Michigan, gave a major address yesterday, after it was clear that the people of Michigan—her bosses and her benefactors, all—had rejected her policy. “I will not stand by,” she said, “while the very heart and soul of this great university is threatened.” Well, stand by, honey.

“We are Michigan and we are diversity,” she added.

And that was her refrain: “We are Michigan and we are diversity.” “The University of Michigan embraces diversity.” “The University of Michigan promotes diversity.” “The University of Michigan wants diversity.” “The University of Michigan believes in diversity.” “The University of Michigan is diversity.” “The University of Michigan embraces … promotes … wants … and believes in diversity.” “We are Michigan and we are diversity.”

Those are all from the same speech. It was a speech in which the president of the University of Michigan did violence to the name of diversity. Diversity, after all, is something that matters. But it is one of those things that has both quantitative and qualitative components. In other words, there is such a thing as meaningless diversity. The president of the University of Michigan—one of the world’s finest in spite of itself—could walk into a room full of single-minded, uni-skinned, mono-voiced students and swoon at the diversity in that room. Diversity, in other words, has become meaningless.

The president also had this to say:

I am standing here today to tell you that I will not allow this university to go down the path of mediocrity. That is not Michigan. Diversity makes us strong, and it is too critical to our mission, too critical to our excellence, and too critical to our future to simply abandon.

I think that passage does a good job of encapsulating the relative ignorance of the prevailing school of thought in the academy, and the comparative intelligence of the public, which is constraining and redirecting the academy. The majority of Michigan residents voted in favor of civil rights and equality for their state. But they wouldn’t have done so if they were under the intellectually facile notion—Ms. Coleman’s notion—that the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative would lead the universities down the path of mediocrity.

Au contraire mon frere.

The voters gave it a little thought. And they decided that the university’s “very heart and soul” and its “critical mission” is not, in fact, diversity. It is excellent education. The academy, in trying to fend off this civil rights initiative and others like it, has tipped its hand. The academy has let people know that its obsession over racial diversity has detracted from the mission of education.

UPDATE: Scott Johnson: “Everyone but the voters in Michigan opposed the MCRI — the Democratic Party, the Republican Party, big business, the universities, women’s groups, ‘civil rights’ groups.”