Menu
Idea

"colorblind" ideology

87
Filter by:

Filter by published date

Martin Luther King Jr., 1967.

In Defense of the Color-Blind Principle

Wilfred Reilly reviews two books critiquing modern ideas of race, social status, and diversity, advocating in favor of racial color-blindness.
by Wilfred Reilly via National Review on February 22, 2024
John Marshall Harlan

We Shouldn’t Stop Talking About Justice John Marshall Harlan

Today, historical figures are held in deep suspicion, but refusing to acknowledge the heroes of the past diminishes our own sense of what is possible.
by Peter S. Canellos via Politico Magazine on July 11, 2023
Black and white scale of justice.

The Blindness of ‘Color-Blindness’

When the Supreme Court heard oral arguments on the future of affirmative action, I knew I had to be there.
by Drew Gilpin Faust via The Atlantic on December 2, 2022
Black and white image of Charles Hamilton Houston, standing at a desk alongside other attorneys, circa 1940.

Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard and the History Behind Colorblind Admissions

Colorblindness has a long history in college admissions, the Black intellectual tradition, and today’s assault on affirmative action and race-conscious policies.
by Brandon James Render via Black Perspectives on November 4, 2022
Eric Foner sits in an arm chair on stage during an interview, holding a microphone.

“Originalism Is Intellectually Indefensible”

On the persistent myth of the colorblind Constitution that the Supreme Court's conservatives have embraced.
by Eric Foner, Cristian Farias via Balls And Strikes on October 28, 2022
Supreme Court and college admissions illustration.

The Anti-Antiracist Court

How the Supreme Court has weaponized the Fourteenth Amendment and Brown v. Board of Education against antiracism.
by Jonathan Feingold via The Forum on October 24, 2022
Painting of the drafters if the U.S. Constitution

A Colorblind Compromise?

“Colorblindness,” an ideology that denies race as an organizing principle of the nation’s structural order, reaches back to the drafting of the US Constitution.
by Matthew Wills, Kasey Henricks via JSTOR Daily on September 9, 2022
Illustration by Molly Crabapple

Racial Metaphors

If colorblindness rests on the claim that the civil rights movement changed everything, the idea that racism is in our DNA borders on a fatalistic proposition that it changed nothing.
by Nikhil Pal Singh via Dissent on August 30, 2021
partner

'Not a Racist Bone in His Body’: The Origins of the Default Defense Against Racism

The rise of the colorblind ideology that prevents us from addressing racism.
by Justin Gomer, Christopher F. Petrella via Made By History on April 11, 2019
partner

Conservatives’ Self-Delusion on Race

How the right created the illusion of colorblindness.
by Joshua Tait via Made By History on October 5, 2018
Ronald Reagan signing MLK Day legislation on November 2, 1983 / Courtesy the U.S. National Archives.

Reagan Used MLK Day to Undermine Racial Justice

Reagan never really believed that Martin Luther King, Jr., deserved a holiday.
by Justin Gomer, Christopher F. Petrella via Boston Review on January 15, 2017
US National Guard troops block off Beale Street as Civil Rights marchers wearing placards reading, "I AM A MAN"

The Classical Liberal Foundation of Civil Rights

The progress we have seen toward civil rights for all Americans is inseparable from the history of classical liberalism.
by David Lewis Schaefer via Law & Liberty on June 24, 2025
African American boy watches a parade of white people from a distance.

The Great Resegregation

The Trump administration’s attacks on DEI are aimed at reversing the civil rights movement.
by Adam Serwer via The Atlantic on February 22, 2025
John Roberts, Lewis F. Powell Jr., and a statue of Lady Justice between them.

There’s a New Lewis Powell Memo, and It’s Wildly Racist

One young conservative lawyer would lead a determined fight to maintain Lewis Powell’s blindfolded race neutrality.
by David Daley via Slate on August 6, 2024
Collage of civil rights lawyers and school segregation headlines.

In Search of the Broad Highway

Revisiting Meredith v. Fair, we get the inside story of how critical race theory was developed in the years after Brown v. Board of Education.
by Dave Tell via The Hedgehog Review on July 26, 2024
Martin Luther King Jr. giving a speech.
partner

The Problem With Comparing Today's Activists to MLK

Media coverage of the civil rights movement is a reminder that the deification of King has skewed public memory.
by Hajar Yazdiha via Made By History on January 15, 2024
Martin Luther King, Jr. with hands raised in front of bookshelf

Martin Luther King, Critical Race Theorist

Republicans may claim otherwise, but the civil rights hero was no color-blind conservative.
by Sam Hoadley-Brill via The Nation on January 15, 2024
A statue of Martin Luther King Jr. stands larger than life in the center of the frame; two small figures view it in the foreground

The Struggle for Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Memory

How political misappropriations of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s legacy fuel right-wing movements.
by Hajar Yazdiha via Contexts Magazine on January 15, 2024
Group of freedmen and women posing for a picture.

How Could ‘Freedmen’ Be a Race-Neutral Term?

An opinion from Justice Clarence Thomas exposed the limits of originalism.
by Adam Serwer via The Atlantic on July 7, 2023
Cliff Joseph's art, Blackboard, 1969. One adult and one young Black person stand in front of a blackboard.

The Long War on Black Studies

It would be a mistake to think of the current wave of attacks on “critical race theory” as a culture war. This is a political battle.
by Robin D. G. Kelley via New York Review of Books on June 17, 2023
U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist testifies to a House Financial Services subcommittee about minting coins in commemoration of former Chief Justice John Marshall on March 10, 2004.

There’s Unsettling New Evidence About William Rehnquist’s Views on Segregation

The Supreme Court Justice's defense of Plessy v. Ferguson in a 1993 memo continues to influence the court's interpretation of the 14th amendment.
by Dahlia Lithwick, Richard L. Hasen via Slate on June 1, 2023
Portraits of white men.

How 155 Angry White Men Chained Alabama to Its Confederate Past

Their plan required not only a social and legal division along racial lines but a political one, too — a separation that persists today.
by Kyle Whitmire via al.com on December 5, 2022
Portrait photo of Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson
partner

Justice Jackson Offered Democrats a Road Map for Securing Equal Rights

Tying the fight for equal rights to the founders and the Constitution has worked before.
by Evan Turiano via Made By History on October 10, 2022
illustration of a hand with a shredded ballot

John Roberts’s Long Game

Is this the end of the Voting Rights Act?
by Linda Greenhouse via The Atlantic on September 20, 2022
Black and white photo of African American girl attending a white segregated school

A Powerful, Forgotten Dissent

Among the thousands of cases the Supreme Court has decided, only a handful of dissenting opinions stand out.
by Linda Greenhouse via New York Review of Books on September 15, 2022
Illustrative grid rid of students with the faces represented by various colors, fabric patterns, and textures.

How Affirmative Action Was Derailed by Diversity

The Supreme Court has watered down the policy’s core justification: justice.
by Richard Thompson Ford via The Chronicle of Higher Education on September 2, 2022
Kyle Rittenhouse waves to cheering fans as he appears at a panel discussion at a Turning Point USA America Fest event on Dec. 20, 2021.
partner

Bernhard Goetz and the Roots of Kyle Rittenhouse’s Celebrity on the Right

Why vigilante violence appeals politically.
by Pia Beumer via Made By History on June 15, 2022
Picture of Barack Obama and W.E.B Du Bois.

A Prophet and a President

Why black biography matters.
by David Levering Lewis via The American Scholar on October 21, 2021

Critical Race Theory is Just the Latest Battle

A new book shows how southern evangelicals looked to the Bible to justify their opposition to racial integration.
by Christopher D. Cantwell via Religion Dispatches on July 7, 2021
partner

What is Critical Race Theory and Why Did Oklahoma Just Ban It?

The theory, drawing the ire of the right, can help us understand our past.
by Kathryn Schumaker via Made By History on May 19, 2021
View More
30 of
87

Filter Results:

Suggested Filters:

Idea

Person

brought to you by
© Bunk History