1. There are arguments to support the claim that race is no longer an issue in America. The most salient of those arguments revolves around the legal equality that people of different races have in America. The United States Constitution specifically prohibits race-based discrimination. Moreover, several important Supreme Court decisions, most notably Brown v. Board of Education, have changed the legal landscape of the United States, making it illegal to discriminate on the basis of race. However, even that argument is untenable. While some people may be legally guaranteed certain rights, the fact is that minorities are routinely denied those rights. Many urban areas still have de facto racial segregation in their school systems, neighborhoods, and in their law enforcement procedures. As a result, minorities continue to be discriminated against in a very oppressive manner, which makes it extremely unlikely that the majority of them will ever be in a position to take the steps necessary to ensure the protection of those rights.
             Furthermore, even if society were to suddenly become colorblind overnight, that would not ameliorate the racial problems that plague the United States. Those who want to maintain that race is no longer an issue in the United States point to the fact that slavery ended well-over a century ago. However, that argument is nonsense; while legal slavery may have ended in the late 1800s, the fact is that African-Americans lived without the basic protection of legal rights until the 1960s. Therefore, it is patently unfair to claim that no living Americans have actually been impacted by slavery, and placing African-Americans on a level playing field with non-African Americans does not ameliorate discrimination, but continue it. For example, looking the disparity in literacy rates between African-Americans and non-African Americans, one can see the vestiges of slavery. Slaves were prohibited, by law, from...