I was wrong. Or was I? From the inception of Project RACE in 1990, I said this:

"I favor no racial classifications at all, but I do not believe that will happen in my lifetime nor in my children's lifetime. Until the time when it does happen, we need an appropriate classification for them and children like them, and that the membership of Project RACE has decided that classification should be 'multiracial.'"

The Supreme Court ruled on June 28, 2007 that schools can no longer use race as a determining factor in school placement for purposes of desegregation. They said "racial classifications are simply too pernicious to permit any but the most exact connection between justification and classification." This is BIG. So, if racial classifications cannot be used, collecting racial information will cease! Yes? Maybe. If collecting racial information ceases, we won't need a multiracial classification! No? Maybe.

Confused? There's more.

The Democrats fumed -- no more races? How dare the Supreme Court rule this?! The Democratic forerunners for our next President were all aghast and lambasted the Republicans. We have always been led to believe the Democrats were for civil rights for everyone. Oh wait, the very Democratic NAACP only wants equal rights for multiracial people who call themselves "black," like Barack Obama. Right. So the colorblind society sought by people like Rev. Martin Luther King wasn't the Democratic dream that we thought.

The Republicans danced the happy dance -- no more races? Great! No more entitlements for those blasted, greedy minorities! They had balanced the Supreme Court just right. Or had they? How would they know who was black anymore without racial classifications? Ohhh...maybe they could just go back to looking at people and classifying them. And maybe in certain cases they could kinda, sorta ask people for their race. "A district may consider it a compelling interest to achieve a diverse student population," Justice Kennedy said. "Race may be one component of that diversity." Oh, in that case, nevermind.

Yes, I'm confused. It's just not possible for the black community to get their numbers as big as possible by reallocating people who check more than one box into the black box and have true equality if the court does away with the boxes. But then there is the woman appearing on national news shows who says Obama and other multiracial people are not black anyway because only oppressed people from Africa are black. Another woman has suddenly surfaced who calls herself a "biracial African-American," which sounds a lot like the old one-drop rule. Wow. No wonder I'm so confused.

The one who really makes me scratch my head is a woman who claims her multiracial children were responsible for the multiracial classification on forms in Georgia and Florida. Hmmmm...and I thought that the members of Project RACE were responsible for that! I honestly just don't remember this woman working with us for three years, day after day, at the Georgia State Capitol until we got our legislation passed. I can identify all the mothers at the photograph of the bill's signing with then Governor Miller. I also have no recollection of her fighting the State of Florida until we got them to include "multiracial" on school forms. I know it wasn't her name, but was that of a Project RACE member, who brought a lawsuit in the State of Florida on behalf of her multiracial children.

People who never fought the fight are suddenly taking credit. I'll say it: it's an insult to every single person who did fight the fight, who did spend amazing amounts of time and effort in their districts and states, who did go to Washington, and those who wrote letters, made phone calls, and visited their local, state, and congressional representatives for the same rights as other racial and ethnic groups. It's an insult to those who wrote about the problem with factual information and were involved in the community via legitimate web sites while it was happening, not after the fact. People who are inactive have no right to call themselves activists. It's an insult to those of us who have maintained a consistent message through almost 20 years of advocacy.

Will this ruling lead to truly race-neutral schools? It's doubtful. Will it lead to a race-neutral society? Probably not. Will it mean racial classifications will cease to exist on all forms in America? I don't think so, but I hope I'm wrong. Will it lead to the inclusion of multiracial people on all forms in this country. Are you serious?

What now? I have no idea. We will just have to wait to see how this Supreme Court ruling plays out. While we're waiting, the entities that draft the forms we have to fill out are still very amused that our community cannot decide on terminology. The ruling hardly registered a blip in multiracial politics. If racial categories really do disappear, then that may be appropriate. If our children are still forced to choose only one race on any forms, then we are no further than we ever were. On the other hand, if all racial classifications are completely gone, our work is done.

Susan Graham
Executive Director
Project RACE, Inc.