When I write about race and justice in the United States, my thinking is guided by a few simple principles. First, that between 1776 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the United States maintained a system of legalized bigotry defended by state violence, and second, that our nation bears an enduring moral responsibility for addressing the consequences of its own oppression.

At the same time, we can and should correct the consequences of both historical and contemporary injustice without engaging in additional racial discrimination. We can and should educate the American people about the requirements of federal law and the historical facts of American injustice without suppressing free speech or engaging in tendentious and destructive ideological indoctrination.

Harmonizing these principles is the moral and legal responsibility of every presidential administration, and Donald Trump is already failing. His executive orders banning diversity, equity and inclusion programs in the federal government do far more than simply ban illegal or irrational D.E.I. excesses.

Instead, they block the government from lawfully and fairly seeking to increase the representation of historically marginalized people in the federal government and — critically — threaten to undermine compliance with the federal civil rights laws they purport to uphold.

Let’s take, for example, Trump’s order dated Jan. 21, 2025, titled “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity.” Some of it is benign and even quite welcome. By its terms, it bars race-based preferences in federal hiring, retention and promotion — conduct that was already almost certainly illegal under controlling Supreme Court precedent.

Since the Supreme Court held that the use of race in college admissions decisions violated the Constitution, any government entity that uses race at all — either as a positive or a negative — in a personnel decision can face extraordinary judicial scrutiny.