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Opinion: Clinton Must Resist Impulse to Control the Race Debate

Promise and peril surround President Clinton's initiative on race relations.

The promise is a focused examination of racial issues that will clarify dilemmas so that at least we can know where and why we agree or disagree with one another. This is a precondition for sensible reform. Nearly everyone recognizes, as the president recently said, that "we have a long way to go." What precisely, however, is our aim? Thirty years ago, in the title of a book, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. asked "Where Do We Go From Here?" But neither he -- nor anyone since -- has answered that question in a compelling, detailed and comprehensive fashion.

Do we want a society governed by racial demography in which presidential cabinets, criminal juries and editorial offices must "look like America"? Or do we want a society governed by an anti-discrimination principle that requires citizens to look beyond looks? To understand the ramifications of this choice, as well as many others along the way, requires considerable thought and discussion.

That is why the public should eschew the objections of those who contend that we have had too much "mere" talk about racial matters. We have not had too much talk; we have had too much rhetoric and spectacle. We have not had enough focused conversations from which participants and observers leave with more information and insight than they had when the conversation began.

The peril is that Clinton and his aides will squelch the possibilities for an informative, intense and perhaps surprising discussion and instead sponsor a series of scripted, pseudo-events devoid of the candor and contentiousness required for any serious attempt to grapple with the race question.

I hope, of course, that the president will rise to the occasion and frame and participate in debates that will be looked upon subsequently as a significant and productive venture. I fear, though, that this will not occur and that the president will be swayed by the sort of advice that appears to triumph all too often in the Clinton White House -- advice that is primarily concerned with short-term benefits that are easily discernible by pollsters whose only frame of reference is political advertising. I fear that over the next year, we will hear little more than a series of extended exhortations in which the American people are told things that virtually all of them already know and believe: "Racism is bad;" "Don't hate people because of the color of their skin," and so on.

Most of what the president has said in his recent forays into race talk is unobjectionable. But most of it has also been devoid of challenge. The tribute to Jackie Robinson, the medals for the long-ignored black heroes of World War II, the apology for the Tuskegee experiment, and the condemnation of racially motivated violence were all politically safe gestures rendered according to wholly conventional formulas. That these gestures were so totally uncontroversial is a testament to their marginal relationship to America's racial divisions.

The president's address yesterday at the University of California at San Diego was somewhat different in that the locale forced him to at least touch upon a current dispute. After all, during the past year, California had ended affirmative action in all state agencies and programs. As a supporter of affirmative action, Clinton disagrees with California's governor and a majority of its voters. Many who feared that Clinton would pull a "Lani Guinier" on affirmative action -- i.e., abandon his position in the face of strong opposition -- are relieved and pleased that he has reconfirmed his commitment to this embattled policy.

In terms of public enlightenment, however, even Clinton's engagement with the affirmative action issue has been uninspiring, since his defense evades the deepest, most difficult questions posed by its critics.

If Clinton's initiative is to amount to anything memorable it must create forums in which knowledgeable thoughtful people address their fellow citizens about the racial matters that touch them most intimately.

We need to hear about and from people who live in the nation's black and brown ghettos. Do they have reason to believe that if they "play by the rules" their lives and the lives of their children will become more prosperous, secure and enjoyable?

We need to hear about and from white women who view race as a signal that a black male stranger poses more of a threat to them than a white male stranger. Is their calculation sensible? Is it fair?

We need to hear about and from those who view Asians as the model minority. Are they implicitly labeling blacks as the non-model minority?

We need to hear about and from Latinos, Asian Americans and blacks, who view one another with racial resentment and distrust. What is the basis of their discord? What would satisfy the antagonists?

We need to hear about and from those who encourage their children to marry persons within their race, religion or ethnic group. Does such advice warrant praise or condemnation?

To pose these and even more pointed questions, and to permit and consider a range of divergent responses, might help to create the thought-provoking conversation that many Americans would like to have about their racial dilemmas.

Allowing, much less facilitating, such a venture, however, cuts against the grain of the administration's style. It typically wants to control, not learn from, public discussion of difficult issues.

The conversation about race that the country needs is one that entails taking risks. Because we are unlikely to see much presidential risk taking in the race initiative, we are unlikely to benefit much from it. Hopefully, the man from Hope will prove me wrong.

Randall Kennedy is a professor at Harvard Law School and the author of "Race, Crime and Law," published last month by Pantheon Books.