Liberals represent a large majority of American university and college faculty, especially in the social sciences and humanities. This is a consistent finding challenged by no serious student. Does minority status affect the work of conservative scholars or the academy as a whole? In Passing on the Right, Dunn and Shields explore the actual experiences of conservative academics, which have long been neglected. While partisans on both sides have been preoccupied with the narrow question of whether or not conservative professors are passed over in hiring and promotion decisions, Dunn and Shields argue that the liberal dominance of the academy may affect conservatives in ways that are far more open to verification - for example, in the case of conservative professors who may censor their comments in public forums and avoid controversial questions in their research, especially prior to tenure. Conversely, minority status may also have its benefits, perhaps allowing conservatives to discover more original research questions and interpretations due to not being able to share the ideological assumptions of most of their liberal colleagues. Drawing on a collection of revealing interviews with conservative professors and graduate students, Dunn and Shields discover how these scholars negotiate their worlds, asking questions such as: How often do conservatives remain closeted? Do they discourage conservative undergraduate students from pursuing academic careers? Do they avoid mentoring conservative student groups? Do they see any professional advantages to being part of a political minority? In short, how does the liberalism of the academy shape conservative scholars and influence their sense of academic freedom? By avoiding partisanship and offering an insightful portrayal of this misunderstood political minority, this book aims to persuade liberal elites to take the minority status of conservative academics more seriously and encourage conservatives to move beyond simplistic caricatures of life in the liberal academy.

In 1987 Judge Russell Clark mandated tax increases to help pay for improvements to the Kansas City, Missouri, School District in an effort to lure white students and quality teachers back to the inner-city district. Yet even after increasing employee salaries and constructing elaborate facilities at a cost of more than $2 billion, the district remained overwhelmingly segregated and student achievement remained far below national averages. Just eight years later the U.S. Supreme Court began reversing these initiatives, signifying a major retreat from Brown v. Board of Education. In Kansas City, African American families opposed to the district court's efforts organized a takeover of the school board and requested that the court case be closed. Joshua Dunn argues that Judge Clark's ruling was not the result of tyrannical ""judicial activism"" but was rather the logical outcome of previous contradictory Supreme Court doctrines. High Court decisions, Dunn explains, necessarily limit the policy choices available to lower court judges, introducing complications the Supreme Court would not anticipate. He demonstrates that the Kansas City case is a model lesson for the types of problems that develop for lower courts in any area in which the Supreme Court attempts to create significant change. Dunn's exploration of this landmark case deepens our understanding of when courts can and cannot successfully create and manage public policy.