Vision Circle

Right at the top of the CCR page you'll note the following:

The United States Commission on Civil Rights is composed of eight Commissioners: four appointed by the President and four by Congress. Not more than four members shall at any one time be of the same political party.

The President also designates the Chairperson and Vice Chairperson from among the Commission's members with the concurrence of a majority of the Commission's members.

The Commissioners serve 6-year terms. No Senate confirmation is required. The President may remove a member of the Commission only for neglect of duty or malfeasance in office.

Abagail Thernstrom is the notable Republican of the group; her colleagues are not recognizeable.

But back to Fletcher. I want to quote this article from the WaPo of October 1996.

When [Clint] Bolick got the word from Dennis Shea, Dole's deputy chief of staff, that his boss wanted to join the anti-affirmative action team, his first reaction was equal parts "delight and skepticism." Dole was among the last Republicans that Bolick thought of as a prospective ally. Movement conservatives were nonetheless delighted by Dole's move rightward, Bolick said, because "we felt having the Senate majority leader, and someone whose civil rights record was unassailable, behind this legislation was the best possible scenario." Dole had been a moderate on issues of race going back to his vote as a young congressman for the 1964 Civil Rights Act. During the ideological struggles of the Reagan era, he had constantly frustrated the efforts of Justice Department officials to eviscerate federal affirmative action programs.

But Shea, a movement conservative working within Dole's eclectic legislative shop, insisted that his boss had come to believe strongly that affirmative action was no longer fair or needed. Shea, carrying out Dole's wishes, drafted a letter to the Congressional Research Service requesting a detailed account of every program on the federal books in which race or gender could be used as a factor in the selection process. When the list came back with 160 programs, the publicity helped compel President Clinton to reexamine his position on affirmative action and produced the White House's "mend it, don't end it" conclusion. At one strategy session, Dole surprised and impressed conservatives in the room by declaring, "If we are not going to do this for the principle involved then we shouldn't do it at all." He also said that he was planning to push the bill aggressively. "We're gonna do this!" he declared privately.

When? Bolick and his allies began to wonder. Twice that spring they set dates to announce the legislation, and Dole's staff called to back out at the last minute. Shea said they were working out details. Bolick concluded "they were getting cold feet right at the start."

Dole finally unveiled what was called the Equal Opportunity Act on July 27, 1995. "Earlier in the year, I promised to introduce legislation to get the federal government out of the business of dividing Americans, and into the business of uniting Americans," Dole said at a news conference. "Today, I am fulfilling this commitment." He said he hoped his bill would be "a starting point in a national conversation, not just on the future of affirmative action, but on the future of America."

Arthur Fletcher, a black Republican who grew up in Kansas, was so depressed and angered when he heard Dole's statement that day that he immediately sat down and wrote him a 13-page letter. Fletcher, who had helped develop affirmative action programs as an official in the Nixon administration, told Dole he had foolishly bowed to pressure from the right and underestimated the dismay his decision would cause in black America. But within hours there was also dismay among conservatives. When Dole returned to the Senate floor and delivered his maiden speech as an anti-affirmative action man, Bolick watched on C-SPAN with growing alarm. The words were similar but Dole's demeanor had changed. "I was watching his eyes and his eyes would not leave the text on the podium," Bolick recalled. "It struck me that he was uncomfortable pushing the issue. I was afraid that he would lose his convictions and that he would be a poor advocate even if he remained constant. Both of those fears proved well founded." In the months that followed, Dole made little effort to get Senate co-sponsors and then went large stretches without talking about the issue. The revolutionary fervor waned, and with it the call for drastic action. Dole went silent on the issue. Considering his history, this was not a major surprise.

We may speculate on the amount and scignificance of Fletcher's influence on Dole, but there is no question that he had some, both as a fellow Kansan and as a fellow Republican. Was that the source of Dole's ultimate reticence? I don't know. What I do know is that black Republican leverage doesn't seem possible in the minds of most Americans, and yet a mere 7 years ago it was there in plain sight.

Was there something extraordinary about Arthur Fletcher? I don't know. There isn't enough within easy reach of Google for me to find out. But I'm getting closer to the ability to find out such things. In the meantime it looks to me that he was simply a right man on the right at the right time.

Too bad he's alone and forgotten.

Posted by mbowen at September 13, 2003 06:19 PM | TrackBack