HOW HAS THE COURT ADDRESSED FACIALLY NEUTRAL LAWS WITH A DISCRIMINATORY IMPACT OR WITH DISCRIMINATORY ADMINISTRATION AND THE REQUIREMENT FOR PROOF OF A DISCRIMINATORY PURPOSE?
The courts rule that some laws that are facially race neutral are administered in a manner that discriminates against minorities or has a disproportionate impact against them.
In Washington v. Davis, 426 US 229 (1976), the court applied a racial test for D.C. Police Department.
The Supreme Court has held that there must be proof of a discriminatory purpose for such laws to be treated as racial or national origin classifications.
The stated the central purpose of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment is the prevention of official conduct discriminating on the basis of race.
In specific, an invidious discriminatory purpose may often be inferred from the totality of the relevant facts, including the fact, if it is true, that the law bears more heavily on one race than another.
The court stated that nevertheless, we have not held that a law, neutral on its face and serving ends otherwise within the power of government to pursue, is invalid under the Equal Protection Clause simply because it may affect a greater proportion of one race than of another.
The court discussed the disproportionate impact is not irrelevant, but it is not the sole touchstone of an invidious racial discrimination forbidden by the Constitution.
The court ruled that racial classifications are to be subjected to the strictest scrutiny and are justifiable only be the weightiest of considerations.
The court ruled that whatever dicta the opinion may contain, the decision did not involve, much less invalidate, a statute or ordinary having neutral purposes but disproportionate racial consequences.
Under Title VII, Congress provided that when hiring and promotion practices disqualifying substantially disproportionate numbers of blacks are challenged, discriminatory purpose need not be proved, and that it is an insufficient response to demonstrate some rational basis for the challenged practices.
In addition, the court held that it is necessary that they be “validated” in terms of job performance in any one of several ways. The court stated that perhaps by ascertaining the minimum skill, ability, or potential necessary for the position at issue and determining whether the qualifying test are appropriate for the selection of qualified applicants for the purposes of applying the fifth and fourteenth Amendments in cases such as this.
Under the rule that a statute designed to serve neutral ends is invalid, absent compelling justification. If in practice it benefits or burdens one race more than another would be far-reaching and would raise serious questions about, and perhaps invalidate, a whole range of taw, welfare, public service, regulatory, and licensing statutes that may be more burdensome to the poor and to the average black than to the more affluent white.
In McCleskey v. Kemp, 481 U.S. 279 (1987), the court discussed whether the death penalty racial statistics involving crime versus color.
The court held that there is no U.S. Constitutional violation
In Palmer v. Thompson, 403 U.S. 217 (1971), the court held that swimming pools be integrated whereas closing all is compelled
