Race-based tax remedies fail constitutional review without proven discriminatory intent

Evidence

However, let’s assume inertia wins. My next best option, after a full repeal of federal tax subsidies for homeowners, would be to reserve those subsidies for homeowners living in the neighborhoods that suffer under the system. … I propose we revise all homeownership subsidies to target them directly to those living in neighborhoods that are undervalued because of the race of their occupants. Those neighborhoods deserve government tax subsidies, because the government’s original discrimination against black Americans gave rise to the current discrimination perpetuated by private white homebuyers. Since 10 percent seems to be the magic number of black homeowners that makes a neighborhood lose value, homeowners living in neighborhoods with more than 10 percent black homeowners would be eligible for all current tax subsidies. Won’t that lead to gentrification? Well, a tax break could help offset rising property taxes, and keep black homeowners in place; and as we’ve seen, when black homeowners remain, neighborhoods are much less attractive to many white homeowners. … This isn’t likely to be upheld by the Supreme Court, however. Why? When it comes to allowing race-based remedies, the Supreme Court requires evidence of discriminatory intent as well as discriminatory impact. It wouldn’t matter that the government caused the problem by discriminating against the very racial group that would benefit from this new tax subsidy, as long as the federal government can claim that it didn’t intend these tax policies to be discriminatory. … What would be allowed is to tie all homeownership subsidies to neighborhoods and neighborhood wealth. If you compare neighborhood median wealth to citywide median wealth, you could legally create subsidies that exclusively go to homebuyers in neighborhoods below the citywide median. — Dorothy A. Brown, The Whiteness of Wealth, 238

Categorization

• XREF: This passage forces a racial-remedy onto a constitutional test requiring intent plus impact — the same doctrinal asymmetry political writers flag when state action neutral on its face hurts minorities without provable hostile intent.
• ADDENDUM: The neighborhood-wealth workaround for the race-based remedy aligns with how structural racism gets argued through neutral proxies — the same move the Sacrifice book documents in stratified societies.