So a business owner in Washington State wants to use his DNA ancestry-test results (90 percent white, 6 percent indigenous American, and 4 percent sub-Saharan African) to qualify him as a minority contractor, making him eligible for preferential treatment in state and federal contracting. The bureaucrats have balked, and so he has sued, as you can read here and here.


And, come to think of it, why is any evidence needed — why can’t your race be a matter of personal preference, just as we’re told your gender should be? But if we do require documentation, we must — in the spirit of those who urge American law to incorporate foreign law — look at past practices abroad, in enlightened places like Nazi Germany and apartheid South Africa. Justice Anthony Kennedy and, before him, Justice John Paul Stevens gave us that advice, tongues firmly in cheek.

Or we could avoid this creepy prospect by treating all Americans without regard to skin color or what country their ancestors came from, not only in government contracting, but in university admissions, employment, you name it.

P.S. According to the news story:

As part of the state’s application process a business owner must submit a photograph, typically a driver’s license or government ID. Those who aren’t “visibly identifiable” based on the photo must submit further proof such as a birth certificate or tribal-enrollment papers. The agency has no definition of “visibly identifiable,” and there is no manual that describes how employees should interpret someone’s visual appearance in a photograph.