Racial Profiling and Driving While Black: A Social Work View

Introduction: The Evidence for Driving While Black

For years, the Black community believed that Black Americans were routinely and disproportionately stopped by police officers while driving. Statistical evidence now supports the anecdotal evidence that had been accumulating for so many years.

For example, one scholar conducted a study in New Jersey which concluded that from 1988 to 1991, more than 73% of the persons stopped and arrested while driving on the New Jersey Turnpike were Black. Shockingly, fewer than 14% of the cars on the Turnpike even carried a Black person — whether as a passenger or driver. Other studies have reached the same findings and conclusions, and reports of such evidence have multiplied as the problem has become more widely known.

Racial profiling affects victims not just incidentally and individually; it also reflects and reinforces larger societal issues and injustices involving race, and it affects African Americans in particular. Moreover, racial profiling is a phenomenon that has plagued all people of color in America for years. However, Black Americans have been its primary targets.

Historical Roots of Racial Profiling

One scholar notes that in America, police targeting of Black people for excessive and disproportionate search and seizure is a practice older than the Republic itself. As early as the start of the eighteenth century, the State of Virginia permitted its slave patrols to arrest slaves on bare suspicion. By 1738, Virginia's patrols conducted mandatory searches of the homes of all Black residents. The patrols also possessed the power to arrest Black people whose mere presence excited suspicion, and to detain any slave found off his master's property without a pass.

Other states' laws were similar in their egregious authorization of random stop, search, and seizure of Black people. Of course, these laws primarily targeted enslaved people — who were deemed the property of their masters under American law — but a number of states' laws also applied to free Black people.

Our nation's low regard for the freedom of Black Americans in public spaces has not evolved far beyond the nineteenth-century attitude. Indeed, police treatment of Black people in the streets and public spaces of America resembles the slave patrols of the Old South in fundamental and troubling ways. As one scholar argues, "Using minor, generally under-enforced traffic violations as a pretext, officers target and stop Black and Hispanic motorists because they hope to discover illegal narcotics or other criminal evidence."

As another scholar observes: "Our society views race as an important, if not determinative, factor in identifying criminals. This view is part of a belief system deeply embedded in American culture that is premised on the superiority of whites and the inferiority of Blacks."

Racial Profiling in the Post-9/11 Era

In the wake of September 11th, the issue of widespread racial profiling reemerged as fears about terrorism and people of Muslim faith and Middle Eastern origin proliferated. Not surprisingly, this fear began to spread and now encompasses many other people of dark complexion in America. In other words, the racial profiling of Middle Easterners is not limited to Middle Easterners alone.

African Americans, Black Americans broadly, South Asians, and any other persons with dark skin are now being profiled in airports, on public transportation, and in other public places. Thus, racial profiling is hardly a vestige of the past. It is very much a problem of our modern, troubled times.

Social Work Values and the Driving While Black Problem

The problem of "driving while Black" has traditionally been approached from a law enforcement or governmental point of view — a perspective centered in an aggressive, fear-oriented, conflict-ridden context. Similarly, critiques of the profiling practice have come primarily from legal commentators and legal scholars. While such works are valuable, there is also a pressing need for a social work perspective that argues for social work intervention — an approach grounded in a value system of cooperation rather than conflict.

Social work focuses on the individual rather than on institutions, groups, or politics. This focus on the individual and her well-being is, of course, balanced against an assessment of the social justice issues at stake. There are at least three ways that client perspectives are important to social workers.

First, it is axiomatic that social work practice "starts where the client is." Second, the perspective of the individual, group, or organization is important because social workers often have the opportunity to give voice to, recognize, and legitimize clients' concerns. Finally, the perspective of clients is significant because the fundamental goals of the profession are to promote human well-being and social justice.

This balance between individual well-being and institutional or governmental goals is not achieved in the current American adversarial legal system, which either seeks a formal "balance" between two sides or goes entirely to one side or the other — with no underlying normative mandate to ensure fairness. In contrast, social work theory balances individual and social justice interests by promoting social change on behalf of clients. As one scholar puts it: "To promote social justice, our response to individuals must consistently focus not only on their perspective, but also on their perspective in the multilayered social context in which they live. The voice of service users — our clients — is significant because it helps us stay true to our purpose, to live up to our ideals and standards."

Therefore, social workers' decisions must be grounded in their clients' perspectives. Social workers should be allowed to intercede in the judicial process on behalf of suspected profiling victims in order to ensure the accused's perspective is heard. Social workers are often the only persons present who are genuinely there to listen to what their clients have to say, rather than speaking at them or offering solutions based on generic theories. While many in the social work field espouse "empowerment," the perspectives of clients have too often been ignored altogether.

References

Harris, David A. "The Stories, The Statistics, and The Law: Why 'Driving While Black' Matters." Minnesota Law Review 84 (1999): 279.

Bowden, Mark, and Mark Fazlollah. "Lying Police Officer Never Counted on FBI." Philadelphia Inquirer, September 12, 1995: A1.

Worden, Robert E. "The Causes of Police Brutality: Theory and Evidence on Police Use of Force." In Police Violence, edited by Geller and Hans Toch (1996).

Johnson, Kevin R. "The Case Against Race Profiling in Immigration Enforcement." Washington University Law Quarterly 78 (2000).

Maclin, Tracy. "Race and the Fourth Amendment." Vanderbilt Law Review (1998): 333.

Roberts, Dorothy E. "Crime, Race and Reproduction." Tulane Law Review 67 (1993): 1951.

Gardner, F. "Design Evaluation: Illuminating Social Value Work for Better Outcomes." Social Work 45 (2001): 176–82.

Glisson, C. "The Art of the State of Social Work Research: Implications for Mental Health." Research on Social Work Practice 5 (1995): 201–2.

Marsh, Jeanne. "Learning from Clients." Social Work.

Davis, Angela J. "Prosecution and Race: The Power and Privilege of Discretion." Fordham Law Review 67 (1998).