BETTER TO BE WHITE AT THE COURTHOUSE

It's always the little stuff that turns around to bite you on the
backside.

Case in point: A couple of weeks ago, I observed in this space that
there is "different justice in this country for those who are white
enough or wealthy enough to afford it." I said this en route to a
larger point, and it never occurred to me that the remark was anything
but a self-evident truth, one that required no explanation, much less
a defense.

Shows what I know. I've since heard from dozens of white women and men
wounded by the contention that their skin color might buy them
leniency in the criminal justice system. The influence of wealth, they
didn't argue. But about whiteness, they had a conniption. Some even
demanded that I produce proof.

From my perspective, it's not unlike being asked to produce proof that
fire is hot.

But for the record:

- - According to "The Real War on Crime: The Report of the National Criminal
Justice Commission," African-Americans account for 13 percent of all
regular drug users, but 35 percent of those arrested for drug possession,
55 percent of those convicted for drug possession and 74 percent of those
imprisoned for drug possession.

- - Then there's "And Justice for Some," a 2000 study whose sponsors
include the U.S. Justice Department itself. Researchers reported that
black and Hispanic offenders receive harsher treatment than white ones
with similar records at every step of the justice system.

To cite just one finding: Among kids who have not been in juvenile
prisons before, a black defendant in a drug case is a whopping 48
times more likely to be incarcerated than a white one with the same
record.

There's more, but you get the point.

I offer these statistics, by the way, only because I was asked and not
out of any illusion that they will sway those who find it necessary to
think race plays no part in the American justice system. I refuse to
believe - for the sake of my sanity as much as anything - that they
represent the predominant mindset of my white countrymen and women.
But it seems sadly obvious to me that, at the very least, they speak
for a sizable minority.

And truth to tell, it's not that such people fail to grasp the racial
realities of the justice system that galls me most. Rather, it's the
implication of that failure, what it says about the inability or
unwillingness of some white people to accept the simple, obvious fact
that, where race is concerned, America is a game rigged in their favor.

For the life of me, I can't understand why some people find this so
hard to see. I mean, where gender is concerned, the game is rigged in
favor of men, with the possible exception of men in divorce courts.
The point is not that all men are sexists, but that all benefit from a
system that is. For a man to pretend otherwise flies in the face of
the apparent. Just as it does for a white person to claim, in a nation
with a recent history of racial apartheid, that whiteness does not
have its privileges.

Fact is, when it comes to making trouble go away, the only color
superior to white is green. Ask O.J.

As the kids say, I'm not mad at'cha.

Indeed, one reason I've grown increasingly ambivalent - not
antagonistic, but ambivalent - toward such issues as reparations and
affirmative action is that I've grown increasingly weary of blacks
placing ourselves in positions where happiness depends on persuading
white folks to "do" ... whatever. I'll be a happy man the day we
decide to place as much of our contentment as possible in our own hands.