The U.S. Department of Education announced last week its investigation into Duke and Duke Law Journal, alleging racial bias in selecting new editors for the Journal. The DOE's Office of Civil Rights pointed to reports that the Law Journal sent a packet dealing with the application process to school "affinity groups" in 2024.
It's reported applicants from these "affinity groups" were given the opportunity to get extra points if they would reference race or ethnicity in their statements, plus an additional extra ten points if they described how their own membership in what it called an "underrepresented group" promoted "diverse voices." That, said the DOE, would constitute a violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
AFN talked with Terris Todd, director of Project 21 Black Leadership Network with the National Center for Public Policy Research in Washington, DC.
"If they are in violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and there are discriminatory practices, of course … giving preferential treatment to one group over the other, or something as silly as someone's ethnicity or their skin tone is obviously worthy of investigating," he says.
Todd said this is racist to say the least. "It's what some people would call the 'bigotry of low expectations.' Unfortunately some people don't see it that way – but that's exactly what it is."
The Department of Education, he argues, is correct in investigating Duke.
"If this is the case that Duke University is giving preferential treatment to a group because of their ethnicity, their skin tone, or whatever, I think they're on the right path," Todd concludes. "Hopefully they can bring the right … disciplinary action or administrative actions to those who are responsible for it."
In late April, the DOE and the Department of Health and Human Services launched a Title VI investigation into Harvard University and Harvard Law Review amid reports of race-based discrimination permeating the operations of the journal.
Image compliments of Duke University
