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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Where was David Bohannon a developer after World War II?

2. What does Rothstein say police knew of, and ignored, in the rioters at Bill Myers’ house?

3. What does Rothstein say was an obstacle to quick change in the housing market after the passage of the Fair Housing Act?

4. What is reverse redlining?

5. For white families who bought homes in Levittown in 1948, how much value did they derive from appreciation?

Short Essay Questions

1. What steps does Rothstein say the real estate industry could take to remedy years of structural injustice?

2. How does Rothstein say the 2008 housing collapse affected black families?

3. Who does Rothstein say was arrested when Andrew Wade, an African-American veteran, tried to move into the white suburb of Shively outside Louisville, Kentucky in 1954?

4. What is Rothstein’s first suggestion for reforming our country to address systemic racism?

5. How does Rothstein characterize the obstacles faced by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) in desegregating Richmond, CA?

6. What does Rothstein say was the other regulatory agencies’ role in promoting segregation?

7. How does Rothstein say federal policies actively injured black communities?

8. What strategies does Rothstein say whites used to keep black wages down?

9. What does Rothstein say caused the fire bombings in Chicago in 1919?

10. Why does Rothstein examine the wage suppression of African Americans?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Identify the most important plot points in The Color of Law. What is at stake in each of these moments? What possibilities do these moments present, and how are those possibilities channeled into specific actions or events? How does the plot chart its course among other alternative or possible plots?

Essay Topic 2

What do you think it would take, to change the laws on a national level, to remedy the injustice that was perpetrated since reconstruction began in 1877? Could a charismatic leader do it? Would it take a grass-roots movement? Would it take a crisis that would allow hard decisions to be made?

Essay Topic 3

When is The Color of Law most itself? What is its characteristic passage, or moment? What makes that moment or passage the most representative of the book as a whole? Are there any places where the book seems to depart from its typical self, as if to become a different book?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,014 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample