For literally decades, the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division has had a hiring committee, made up of veteran career lawyers, who screened thousands of resumes, interviewed candidates, and made recommendations that were rarely rejected. Attorneys who were hired to the Division were not only excellent lawyers, but had demonstrated a firm commitment and years of experience in protecting civil rights.
That was before Bush took over. In 2002, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft changed the procedures that had been in place for a couple of generations. Now the president’s political appointees are in charge of the process, and as the Boston Globe explained several months ago, Bushies have “effectively turned hundreds of career jobs into politically appointed positions” — filled with conservatives who are less-than-committed to civil rights enforcement.
The results have been striking. Now the Civil Rights Division hires lawyers that either have no experience or have a background in protecting the discriminator against the discriminatee. The results have been predictable: “The division is bringing fewer voting rights and employment cases involving systematic discrimination against African-Americans, and more alleging reverse discrimination against whites and religious discrimination against Christians.”
Keep in mind, this division exists in part to protect the integrity of the 1965 Voting Rights Act and shield African American voters from discrimination. Rather, it used to.
There’s no greater demonstration of that fact than this simple fact: During the first five years of the Bush administration, the Justice Department’s voting section only filed a single case alleging voting discrimination on behalf of African American voters…. But during that same time period, the section managed to file the first ever “reverse” discrimination case under the Voting Rights Act.
That case, United States v. Ike Brown and Noxubee County, alleges that Brown, the chairman of Noxubee County’s Democratic Executive Committee in Mississippi, has been trying to limit whites’ participation in local elections. The case, filed in 2005, is currently being tried, and is likely to reach its conclusion later this month.
The closer one looks at what’s happened to this division of the DoJ, the more ridiculous it appears.
Career officials in the Civil Rights Division believed that the case was without merit, but it didn’t matter; political appointees made it a priority.
Consider some numbers. The single case filed on behalf of African American voters in the first five years of the Bush administration was actually a case that had been initiated during the Clinton administration; the complaint was finally filed in 2001. The section did not file its second complaint on behalf of African American voters until July, 2006. And that only happened after The Washington Post went front page earlier that year with the turmoil in the voting section. By comparison, the voting section filed eight cases alleging discrimination against African American voters in the last six years of the Clinton administration.
The voting section has filed ten total cases so far during the Bush administration; seven were on behalf of Hispanics.
“The Civil Rights Division’s core mission is to fight racial discrimination,” Rich told me. “That doesn’t seem to be happening in this administration.”
A similar shift has occurred in the division’s employment litigation section, which is tasked with preventing discrimination in employment. That section has managed to file two “reverse” discrimination cases alleging discrimination against whites under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, while filing only one alleging discrimination against African Americans in the past six years.
I’d only add that Joseph Rice, the chief of the voting section in the Justice Department’s civil rights division from 1999 to 2005, explained recently that since 2001, the department has been focused on helping improve the election prospects of Republican candidates.
I spent more than 35 years in the department enforcing federal civil rights laws — particularly voting rights. Before leaving in 2005, I worked for attorneys general with dramatically different political philosophies — from John Mitchell to Ed Meese to Janet Reno. Regardless of the administration, the political appointees had respect for the experience and judgment of longtime civil servants.
Under the Bush administration, however, all that changed. Over the last six years, this Justice Department has ignored the advice of its staff and skewed aspects of law enforcement in ways that clearly were intended to influence the outcome of elections.
I mention all of this not just because it’s offensive to anyone who takes civil rights seriously, but also as a reminder of just how much work the next president is going to have to do to get the executive branch back on track.