N.Y. Post Beats Back Racism Lawsuits

Why Not Pay Washington Team Owner to Change the Name?

"Redskins owner Dan Snyder has refused good advice from diverse quarters on changing his team's offensive name," Justin Moyer wrote Sunday in the Washington Post. "He’s ignored the pleas of Native American tribes. He's ignored President Obama and Post columnists Charles Krauthammer and Mike Wise. When protesters showed up in Minneapolis at the Redskins-Vikings game in early November, he ignored them, too.

"After years of ineffective rallies, op-eds, lawsuits, House bills and D.C. Council hearings about this controversy, one remedy remains for those who want Snyder to change his mind:

"Pay him off. . . ."

Moyer concluded, "Snyder has responded to emotional arguments about his team's name — Change this name because it hurts us— with an emotional argument of his own: Changing this name will hurt me and my team's fans.

"But what if an organized group of Pigskins advocates — plus a wealthy donor — came to him with a substantial payoff that proved that their hurt was bigger than his? What if they sweated to raise a massive sum, then humbled themselves before Snyder and were willing to fork over the cash in exchange for a promise?

"How could Snyder turn them down?"

• Mary Hudetz, Seattle Times: Washington's NFL team name is offensive to Native Americans
  
  
• Arnold Loewy and Eugenia Charles-Newton, Lubbock (Texas) Avalanche-Journal: It's Debatable: Is name 'Redskins' for NFL's Washington D.C. team acceptable?
  
  
• Askia Muhammad, Washington Informer: To Change Racist Team Name, Fire the Owner(Nov. 13)
  
  
• Stephen Pevar, American Civil Liberties Union: Why "Redskins" Is Wrong(Nov. 25)

Journalists, Fellows Produce Black Guide to Law Schools

"You've undoubtedly read recent stories in Forbes, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times regarding the crisis in legal education, but missing from these news stories is the disproportionate impact higher student loan debt, diminished job prospects, and industry biases have on black law students," according to Yolanda Young, CEO and publisher of "On Being a Black Lawyer."

"Lawyers Of Color's veteran journalists and legal media fellows have compiled months of interviews and data collection into this year's 'Black Student's Guide to Law Schools,'" Young told Journal-isms Tuesday by email.

"Inside we report on the low black enrollment at flagship law schools in states that have disallowed race as a factor in admissions and reveal that some HBCU [historically black colleges and universities] law schools are no longer majority black.

"We also point out how both President Obama and Chief Justice [John G.] Roberts [Jr.] have suggested the need for law school reform. Finally, we rank the best law schools for black students using objective criteria like job placement rates, black student and faculty percentages, and costs and eschew traditional subjective measures like 'reputation' that tend to undervalue a school like Howard Law, which places as many black graduates in large law firms as do Ivy League law schools. . . ."

Leading the list of the "Top 25 National Law Schools for Black Students" are Harvard Law School, Stanford Law School, the University of Chicago Law School, Howard University School of Law and Yale Law School.

North Carolina Central School of Law (48.9 percent black) and Texas Southern University's Thurgood Marshall School of Law (44.8 percent) were listed among law schools at historically black universities that are no longer majority black.

A free digital version is available for review and download on the Lawyers of Color website: http://www.onbeingablacklawyer.com/wordpress/black-students-guide-to-law-schools-2014.

• Matt Leichter, Am Law Daily: 'White Flight' Hits Nation's Law Schools (Nov. 27)