White Interests and Civil Rights Realism: Rodrigo's Bittersweet Epiphany

Abstract

1. See Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Chronicle, 101 YALE L.J. 1357 (1992) [hereinafter Delgado, Rodrigo's Chronicle], introducing my interlocutor and alter ego, Rodrigo. The son of an African-American serviceman and Italian mother, Rodrigo was born in United States but raised in Italy when his father was assigned to a U.S. outpost there. Rodrigo graduated from high school at base school, then attended an Italian university and law school on government scholarships, graduating second in his class. When reader meets him, he has returned to United States to investigate graduate law (LL.M.) programs. At suggestion of his sister, famed U.S. civil rights lawyer Geneva Crenshaw, see DERRICK BELL, AND WE ARE NOT SAVED 7 (1992), he seeks out the professor for career advice. Despite their age difference, two become good friends, discussing affirmative action and decline of West (Delgado, Rodrigo's Chronicle, supra), law and economics (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Second Chronicle: The Economics and Politics of Race, 91 MICH. L. REV. 1183 (1993)), love (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Third Chronicle: Care, Competition, and Redemptive Tragedy of Race, 81 CAL. L. REV. 387 (1993)), legal rules (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Fourth Chronicle: Neutrality and Stasis in Antidiscrimination Law, 45 STAN. L. REV. 1133 (1993)), critique of normativity (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Fifth Chronicle: Civitas, Civil Wrongs, and Politics of Denial, 45 STAN. L. REV. 1581 (1993)), relations between men and women (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Sixth Chronicle: Intersections, Essences, and Dilemma of Social Reform, 68 N.Y.U. L. REV. 639 (1993)), Enlightenment political theory (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Seventh Chronicle: Race, Democracy, and State, 41 UCLA L. REV. 721 (1994)), black crime (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Eighth Chronicle: Black Crime, White Fears On Social Construction of Threat, 80 VA. L. REV. 503 (1994)), narrative jurisprudence (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Final Chronicle: Cultural Power, Law Reviews, and Attack on Narrative Jurisprudence, 68 S. CAL. L. REV. 545 (1995) (final chronicle in first cycle and final chapter of RICHARD DELGADO, THE RODRIGO CHRONICLES (1995))), rule of law (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Ninth Chronicle: Race, Legal Instrumentalism, and Rule of Law, 143 U. PA. L. REV. 379 (1994)), affirmative action (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Tenth Chronicle: Merit and Affirmative Action, 83 GEO. L.J. 1711 (1995) [hereinafter Delgado, Rodrigo's Tenth Chronicle]), clinical theory (Richard Delgado, Rodrigo's Eleventh Chronicle: Empathy