A Colorblind Constitution Is Not Just a Partisan Pet Project

‘Our Constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens,” Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan famously wrote in his dissent in the 1896 case Plessy v. Ferguson. It would take decades to dismantle the Jim Crow system of racial segregation challenged in that case. Through those years, Harlan’s vision of colorblindness shone as a moral North Star to the civil rights movement.

Yet recently, the Washington Post published a story titled, “How ‘colorblind Constitution’ went from conservative notion to legal pillar.” Its subheadline reads: “The once-obscure concept has been cited in recent landmark Supreme Court cases, but some liberals insist it has no basis in fact or history.”

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Alison Somin

Alison Somin is a senior legal fellow at Pacific Legal Foundation.

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‘Our Constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens,” Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan famously wrote in his dissent in the 1896 case Plessy v. Ferguson. It would take decades to dismantle the Jim Crow system of racial segregation challenged in that case. Through those years, Harlan’s vision of colorblindness shone as a moral North Star to the civil rights movement.

Yet recently, the Washington Post published a story titled, “How ‘colorblind Constitution’ went from conservative notion to legal pillar.” Its subheadline reads: “The once-obscure concept has been cited in recent landmark Supreme Court cases, but some liberals insist it has no basis in fact or history.”