Thursday, July 6, 2023 | 2 a.m.
Imagine there’s a basketball game. One team, the Winning Team, gets to make the rules. The rule that it makes go like this: Members of the Winning Team are free to play using both hands. Players on the Other Team are not free to use either hand.
You can imagine how that game would go. One team can dribble, shoot and pass. The other team can do none of those things. You would expect the Winning Team to build a large, almost insurmountable lead in short order.
Now, suppose that the Winning Team, after much internal (sometimes violent) conflict in the locker room, decides to change the rules at halftime. They decide that, at the start of the third quarter, players on the Other Team will now be free to use one hand during the game. The Winning Team is still free to use two.
This is a huge step forward for the Other Team. One hand is significantly better than none. A player can dribble, shoot, and pass all with one hand, although not without serious difficulty.
How would the game go after that change? Would you expect the Other Team to make a comeback? Probably not. Playing basketball is much easier when played with two hands than one. But you might expect them to finally score some points and have a shot to stop the Winning Team on defense.
Now suppose that, after the third quarter (and some more conflict), the Winning Team decides to change the rules yet again. This time, in a grand benevolent gesture, the Winning Team allows the Other Team to finally have the same freedom to use both hands to play at the start of the fourth quarter.
How would the course of the game change after that? Would you expect the Other Team to come back? Certainly not with only one quarter left. The game is over.
What if the game was extended and the teams were given additional quarters to play? Would you expect the Other Team to come back then? To finally catch the Winning Team? A comeback would be possible, but it would be extraordinarily difficult. Three quarters have been played during which one team has been fully free to use both of its hands, and the other team has either lacked any freedom to use its hands or possessed partial freedom to use them. To come back, the Other Team would have to play a lot better than the winning team for an extended period of time, likely consecutive quarters. In basketball terms, the Other Team would have to get “a lot of stops.” Simultaneously, it would have to score on almost every possession.
This would be a tall task if the teams were equal. If the teams had similar players, with similar skill sets and physical qualities, that would likely mean that each team has a similar chance of stopping each other and scoring the basketball. If they stopped each other and scored at similar rates, it would be mathematically impossible for the losing team to come back. The score differential would simply remain the same until the clock ran out.
Still, it would be possible for the Other Team to come back if the teams were equal in all the measurable ways. The Other Team, perhaps because it has played for most of the game with zero or limited freedom, has developed intangible skills like persistence and determination that it could rely on to mount a comeback.
A comeback fueled by these intangibles is possible, but is it likely? Would you bet on the Other Team overcoming an almost insurmountable lead because of intangibles that it developed while being on the wrong side of that almost insurmountable lead? I don’t think many of us (unless we’re serious gamblers) would place that bet.
For much of our nation’s history, the rule was that negroes were not to be educated. When that rule changed, we were allowed to be educated, but our education had to be “separate but equal.” In 1954, the rule was changed again, and our separate but equal education was deemed to be inherently unequal. Equality was the same facilities, together.
To address the history of inequality, some colleges chose to consider the race of their applicants when making admissions decisions. In 1978, the U.S. Supreme Court approved this practice, holding that colleges may “act affirmatively to achieve equal opportunity for all.” The justification being that creating a diverse classroom environment was a compelling state interest.
Over 40 years later, the rules changed again. Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court eliminated the consideration of race as a factor in the college admissions process. The court held that diversity was no longer a compelling state interest, and the consideration of race in this context was harmful to whites and Asian American applicants, who were not getting the same “benefit” of their racial identity as Black and Hispanic applicants.
The Winning Team has changed the rules again. And it did so because it believes that the teams are equal. My question for the court (and you) is a simple one:
How will the Other Team ever come back?
Eric Foster is a columnist for cleveland.com.
