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93 Harv. L. Rev. 518 (1979-1980)
Brown v. Board of Education and the Interest-Convergence Dilemma

handle is hein.journals/hlr93 and id is 536 raw text is: COMMENT BROWN v. BOARD OF EDUCATION AND THE INTEREST-CONVERGENCE DILEMMA Derrick A. Bell, Jr. * After Brown v. Board of Education was decided, Professor Herbert Wechsler questioned whether the Supreme Court's decision could be justified on the basis of neutral principles. To him Brown arbitrarily traded the rights of whites not to associate with blacks in favor of the rights of blacks to associate with whites. In this Comment, Prof. Derrick Bell suggests that no conflict of interest actually existed; for a brief period, the interests of the races con- verged to make the Brown decision inevitable. More recent Su- preme Court decisions, however, suggest to Professor Bell a growing divergence of interests that makes integration less feasible. He suggests the interest of blacks in quality education might now be better served by concentration on improving the quality of existing schools, whether desegregated or all-black. N 1954, the Supreme Court handed down the landmark decision Brown v. Board of Education,' in which the Court ordered the end of state-mandated racial segregation of public schools. Now, more than twenty-five years after that dramatic decision, it is clear that Brown will not be forgotten. It has triggered a revolution in civil rights law and in the political leverage available to blacks in and out of court. As Judge Robert L. Carter put it, Brown transformed blacks from beg- gars pleading for decent treatment to citizens demanding equal treatment under the law as their constitutionally recognized right. 2 Yet today, most black children attend public schools that are both racially isolated and inferior.3 Demographic patterns, white flight, and the inability of the courts to effect the nec- essary degree of social reform render further progress in im- plementing Brown almost impossible. The late Professor Alex- * Professor of Law, Harvard University. This Comment is a later version of a paper presented at a Harvard Law School symposium held in October 1978, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Educ., 347 U.S. 483 (1954). I wish to thank Professors Owen Fiss, Karl Klare, Charles Lawrence, and David Shapiro for their advice and encouragement on this piece. 1 347 U.S. 483 (1954). 2 Carter, The Warren Court and Desegregation, in RACE, RACISM AND AMERICAN LAW 456-61 (D. Bell ed. 1973). 3 See Bell, Book Review, 92 HARV. L. REV. 1826, 1826 n.6 (1979). See also C. JENCKS, INEQUALITY 27-28 (1972).

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