n torn down, and racial exclusion from the benefits of society and the rights of citizenship is no longer nearly total, as it once was. But discrimination still limits the opportunities and stifles the hopes of many black Americans and other minorities. In the realms of housing, employment, medical care, education and the administration of the criminal justice system, we are still, as the 1968 Kerner Commission Report on civil disorders warned, two separate Americas. At this moment in our nations history, it is critical that we move definitively forward in remedying the effects of discrimination. But tragically, the most successful civil rights remedies have come under attack from conservative politicians and pundits. Affirmative action, for example, which is to be credited with the creation of an increasingly diverse workforce, has come under intense criticism. Voting rights laws, which have begun to integrate the halls of Congress and state legislatures, are also under attack. As long as our society is ridden with race-based problems, we will need race-based remedies. And while we have come a long way, we still have a long way to go....
