by white-supremacists. First, they defended states’ rights. They
said that the framers of the Constitution had given states the
sovereign right to legislate social policy, including the separation of the races, and that the power of the federal government to intervene had been strictly and severely limited by the framers.
What they said was true. In fact, the framers had constructed
the Constitution so that the states had the power to protect
slavery' Segregation could hardly have mat ered a hill of beans
to them. Second, those in power. said that integration would take
from them a precious civil liberty protected by the First Amendment: the right to freedom of association. Forced to integrate schools, parks, hotels, restaurants, toilets, and other public accommodations, whites lost the power to exclude Blacks. This they experienced as having lost the “right” to associate with
whom they wanted, that is to say, exclusively with each other.
Wrongful power is often protected by law because law is the
ordering of power. Law organizes power. In a society where
women and Blacks have been legal chattel, the law is not premised on a sensitivity to their human worth. Law protects
“rights”—but mostly it protects the “rights” of those who have
The Nature of Change
17
power. The United States is a particularly self-congratulatory
nation. We say that we invented democracy and that our Constitution represents the highest principles of civilized governing. Yet our Constitution was designed to protect slavery and to keep women chattel. The “rights” guaranteed to white men
were grants of freedom that established a civil and social dominance over Blacks and women. Change has not occurred because white men developed a passion for equality. (Had they, that passion would not have been constitutional. ) Change has
not occurred because those with power felt that they had too
much and wanted to give some up. Change has come from sustained, often bit er rebellion against power disguised as
“rights. ” Highfalutin legal principles have masked and protected privilege, dominance, and exploitation.
Change is not easy, fast, or inevitable. The powerless are responsible for creating change. They have to, because those who have power wil not. Why should they? This is not fair, but it is
true. Power takes dominance for granted; dominance is like
gravity, not felt as a force at al , simply accepted as the way things
are, each thing being in its proper place. Dominance is dignified—sincerely, not cynical y—as a “right” or a series of “rights. ”
If someone has power over you and you take that power away
from him, he wil say you are taking away his rights. Society wil
have given him a legitimate way—often a legal way—to claim that
dominance is a right of his and that submission is a duty of yours.
Principles:
1. Equality requires the redistribution of power.
2. Those who are social y dominant experience dominance as
a right.
3. Take away wrongful power and you wil be accused of
taking away rights. Often, this wil be true because the law,
under the guise of protecting rights, protects power.
18
Pornography and Civil Rights
Authority and Resistance
Even though the framers gave the states the right (power)
