Author: mopress

The following note responds to articles that were published at CounterPunch

Dear Mr. Moses,
Thank you for

informing me about what’s going on in Texas. I do think at the heart of it is that white people do

not respect or understand black people. I’m white myself, and I see this kind of ignorance as willful

and damaging, both to whites and to blacks.
So many times colleagues of mine at the minimum

security prison where I teach refuse to open their ears to the nuances of African American

speech.
They don’t seem to understand that the experience of a black man or woman is so different

from theirs. They can accept Oprah…but to realize that a black man who has been subjected to violence

since the day he’s been born and yet can still stand in front of you and say, “I’m a man,” that

this is greatness.

Yesterday a man told me about the visions he had the two times he was

shot in the head. I tried to talk to my fellow workers about him, but they just cynically brushed off

his insights and laughed about his experiences.

We whites don’t understand the surreal

nature of American life for black people, the boundedness and lack of control that blacks are subjected

to. I learned first about all this in college, reading Richard Wright
and Toni Morrison, and then

saw their enactment when I started working in a prison. It’s not that we whites have no souls, but

sometimes I’m sure it must seem that way to blacks.

In sadness,

Back to my point. If you want an admissions process based merely on individual merit then

you can’t utilize a students lineage in the process. I say we maintain alumni legacy and race in our

admission practices at N.C. State. If not, well, you’ll be seeing a lot more white on campus.

[TechnicianOnline, NC-State, “Seeing white:
Legacy admissions are common at universities,” Andrew

Payne looks at its relation to campus diversity, Jan. 15, 2004]. On a side note, former N.C. State

vice provost James Anderson became Texas A&M’s first vice president of diversity. Texas A&M is a

predominately white male campus with little racial, ethnic and gender diversity. The university’s

undergraduate enrollment is 82 percent white, 9 percent Hispanic, 2 percent African-American and 3

percent Asian-American. The position was created by Texas A&M president Robert Gates to increase

minority enrollment and enhance the university’s image. In response to the new position, a

conservative student group sold cookies and other items at their “affirmative action bake sale” where

prices where based on the buyer’s skin color.[see citation

above]

[Quote:] Statistics for the University of Texas last year showed 75

percent of the freshmen admitted were in the top 10 percent of their high school

class.

Texas A&M hopes not to be in the same boat, said Frank Ashley, associate provost

for enrollment….
Ashley said he believes the top 10 percent rule is a good rule, but it needs

some changes. He said he believes every student should take a college preparatory course, because some

students may not take more rigorous courses in high school. [end quote TheBatt.Com, Texas A&M, “Top

Ten Percent Rule Criticized,” by By Pammy Ramji, Jan. 30,

2004.]

Email: “Hola, Greg”
from Professor Marco Portales,
Texas A&M

University
Thu, 29 Jan 2004

Dear Greg,

Glad I have your e-mail

address from your
Texas Civil Rights Review website. Good to
see some outside help. I read your

letter to
the Eagle and the one to the Battalion and
meant to write to you . . . but I

have
been busy finishing the books listed below.
I have been writing on the race issue

for
awhile, as you may have gathered. FYI: When the minority faculty and staff met

with
President Gates on campus on December 18th,
2003 (a meeting that was not reported by any

of
the media), four Latino faculty members
stood up, as well as several other faculty

and
staff TAMU members, to urge him to follow
the Grutter decision, to leave legacy behind,

and
to do several other things that we believe would
improve our chances of recruiting more

minority
students and faculty. But he was already committed
to the position of admitting

applicants only on
“merit” considerations, excluding race anew (as
Hopwood, which has now been

superseded)
required between 1996 and 2003.

Below I am sending you my recent

and
forthcoming publications, two of which
address the issue of why we should embrace
race, in

keeping with the Constitution. As
you can see, I don’t buy the way conservative
groups have

interpreted the 14th Amendment
for their convenience, just as they had it their
way before the

Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Part of the problem is that they always want it
their way, and only

their way, without working to
bring in the perspectives of minorities.
Fortunately, Justice

O’Connor saw the
constitutionality of Bakke. So we are
constitutionally correct; the problem is

that
they have the power and the support of the
general public,

unfortunately….

Best

regards,
Marco

_____________________________

BOOK MANUSCRIPTS

under Contract for Publication

“Quality Education for Latinos: Print and Oral Skills

for All Students, K-College”; this book manuscript, written with my wife, Rita Portales, is designed

to produce more academically-competitive minority students. The 272-page manuscript received an

advanced contract from the University of Texas
Press in the summer of 2003 and will be published

late in 2004 or early 2005

“Latino Sun, Rising: Our Spanish-speaking U.S. World” is a

collection of 44 essays divided into three parts: Youth (8), Parenthood (12), and Public Policy Issues

(24).

The Texas A&M Press will published this 310-page
manuscript in Fall 2004

BOOK

CrowdingOut Latinos: Mexican Americans in the Public

Consciousness Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2000; 209 pages

FORTHCOMING

ARTICLE

“A History of Latino Segregation Lawsuits” in The Unfinished Agenda of Brown

v. Board of Education, edited by James Anderson; Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, (March or

April, 2004, 20 pp.

REFEREED PUBLICATIONS

“Can the Supreme Court

Constitutionally Uphold the
Hopwood Opinion? Race, ‘Color-blindness’ and Public Opinion before

Bakke,” Callaloo: A Journal of African Diaspora Arts & Letters , Volume 26, Number 1, Winter 2003,

26-46. Article traces the history of the concept of “color- blindness” from the Reconstruction Period

following the Civil War to Bakke and Hopwood.

“Examining the Recruitment and

Enrollment of Eligible Hispanic and African American Students at Selective Public Texas

Universities,” New York: AMS Press, Inc., 1999, Volume 16, Readings on Equal Education, an education

series. One of eleven articles in Education of Hispanics in the United States: Politics, Policies and

Outcomes, pp. 201-222.

“Hopwood, Race, Bakke and the Constitution,” Texas Hispanic

Journal of Law and Policy, University of Texas School of Law publication, Volume 4, Number 1, Spring

1998, pp. 29-44.

“Anti-Hopwood: Why Race Ought to be Legally Recognized,” The

Hopwood Effect: Problems, Prospects, and Impacts on Minorities in Higher Education; conference

proceedings, edited by Mitchell Rice, Race and Ethnic Studies Institute, Texas A&M University, Fall

1998; pp. 172-176.

“Affirmative Action: Best Idea, So Far,” Hispanonoticias: The

Hispanic Caucus of the American Association for Higher Education, featured one-page article; June

1995.

“K-12 Education and the Responsibilities of the University,” one-page excerpt

published by HACU, the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities; Seventh Annual Meeting

presentation; Washington, D.C., October 1993.