Facts and profiling

A key reason to crack down on racial profiling is that it doesn't work. A 2001 Department of Justice report found that, while African-Americans and Hispanics were more likely to be stopped and searched, they were less likely than white drivers to possess contraband. The US General Accounting Office found a similar problem turned up in a review of customs stops made in 1998: Women and minorities were targeted at rates that were not consistent with the rates of finding contraband.

One of the best antiprofiling tools is data. Researchers in Massachusetts, New Jersey, California, and North Carolina have counted incidents and analyzed the information. The findings point the way toward both better protection of civil rights and better policing.

The proposed "End Racial Profiling Act" would ban the practice, give profiling victims the right to sue, and have federal, state, and local police departments collect data to paint a more complete statistical picture. The bill is sponsored by Senator Russ Feingold, a Wisconsin Democrat, and Representative John Conyers, a Michigan Democrat.

The bill also calls for grants to promote best practices gleaned from successful programs, including training, technology to collect data, and equipping police cars with video cameras and portable computers to verify the accuracy of collected data. Other best practices include procedures for registering public complaints about profiling and for holding police department managers accountable.

Since Sept. 11, the added challenge is to protect Arabs, Muslims, Central and South Asians, and Sikhs from profiling. The Feingold-Conyers bill notes the post-9/11 air of "generalized suspicion" that led to "searches and seizures based upon religion and national origin without trustworthy information linking a particular person to a particular crime." The bill says this profiling has "failed to produce tangible benefits," an important reminder that fighting terrorism should not devolve into anything-goes, rights-trampling law enforcement.

Senators John Breaux, a Louisiana Democrat, and George Voinovich, a Republican from Ohio, offer another racial profiling bill that spotlights the problem admirably but does not call for collecting data.

A strong antiprofiling law, which includes a requirement for data collection, could lead to new insights into policing. And it would show that protecting civil rights can go hand in hand with promoting greater security.