Discrimination is Delicate - Leave This One to Lawyers

Today we got the ruling from the Supreme Court in Ricci v. DeStefano - the case that people only really care about because the Supreme Court overturned the Second Circuit panel on which nominee J. Sonia Sotomayor sat. The point I want to make is not the one that you will see splashed all over the papers or cable news in the coming months, but instead I want to use this opportunity to reiterate that discrimination is an extremely delicate topic - and really, one best dealt with by lawyers.

The New Haven Fire Department thought it was doing the right thing in tossing a test that seemed discriminatory against African Americans. Turns out, as the Supreme Court has ruled, it was discriminatory against Whites and Latinos. The question here was whether in trying to reduce a disparate impact against one racial minority, the employers in fact committed disparate treatment Photocredit: TheeErinagainst other racial groups. Really, this is can't win territory here and the best legal route may not, and probably does not, correspond with the best ethical route. Ethics aside, even then it can be extremely difficult to know what the proper legal route is as we swing 5-4 in case after case from the Supreme Court in this area. 

So, I am going to go against my normal tradition today which encourages school administrators to make their own informed, best legal judgments and recommend that when it comes to issues of discrimination in the workplace ... call your board attorney.

P.S. - Know what today's decision makes me think about, and question? - the discrimination inherent in merit pay systems. Today's decision may quell some of those fears (or heighten them, as we know that future Justice Sotomayor would go the other way).