For many liberals, it is simply intuitive that the police stop more black motorists than white. Conservatives tend to dismiss this intuition as mere liberal bias. Intuitions and ideology are not a good source of information about this matter, so it is fortunate that research has been done on this matter.
When considering the data from the 2015 Stanford study, it is important to note that only about half of the states responded to the request for data and many of the states that did respond, did not track race. Despite these problems, the study does provide useful data—if its limits are kept in mind. While doubt about the accuracy of the study can be reasonable, to take its limits as evidence for denying its findings would be an error in logic. After all, even if a study is flawed, it does not follow that the denial of its conclusion is thus true.
As liberals predicted, in 17 states where data is available, black motorists are 1.2 (Connecticut) to 2.8 (Cook County, Illinois) times more likely than white motorists to be pulled over. Interestingly, there are 3 states (for which there is data) that whites are more likely to be stopped than blacks. These states are Texas (1.2 times more likely), Colorado (1.3) and Tennessee (1.4). This evidence supports the claim that blacks are, in general, more likely to be stopped than whites. A critical question is, of course, why this disparity exists.
One stock explanation is that blacks commit more crimes than whites and hence they are stopped, searched and arrested more. However, the data shows that blacks are no more likely than whites to have contraband in their possession when stopped. Also, there is the standard problem with the usual argument used here: if one argues that blacks are arrested more because they commit more crime and the evidence is that they are arrested more, then one has run the argument in a circle. This is a fallacy known as begging the question or circular reasoning in which one assumes as true what needs to be proven. As such, the claim that blacks commit more crimes than whites does not explain the disparity.
Another stock explanation is racism—the police discriminate against minority drivers. A study in Connecticut used an interesting approach to assess the role of race in stops: it compares day and night stops. It was found that Hispanic drivers were stopped 2.3 times more often during the day than at night. The reasonable explanation for the disparity is that the police could see the driver better during the day than at night, thus making race more of a factor during the day. If stops were not influenced by the race of the driver, the day and night statistics should have been the same. There do not seem to be plausible alternatives, unless one wants to claim that Hispanics drive better at night.
This study also found that when white drivers were stopped and searched, 42.9% of them had contraband. Blacks who were stopped had contraband only 8.3% of the time. While this could be taken as evidence of racism, there is a reasonable alternative explanation: blacks know that they are likely to be targeted by the police, so they are less likely to carry contraband. Whites know that they are not a prime target, so they are more likely to risk carrying contraband. Of course, this explanation serves as indirect evidence of possible racism since it is based on the claim that people know how the police target their stops and searches.
A third explanation is to claim that the results are due to chance—it just so happens that in 17 states for which there is data blacks are 1.2-2.8 times more likely to be stopped. Proponents of this view will point out that, as noted above, in 3 states whites are 1.2-1.4 times more likely to be stopped than blacks—and surely this is not because the police in Texas, Tennessee and Colorado are racist towards whites. Some states, they would say, stop more blacks. Some stop more whites. So, there is clearly no racism.
This argument rests, of course, on the fact that disparities can be due to chance and one can always raise that possibility. The challenge is, obviously, sorting out whether the difference is due to chance or some other factor, such as racism. Without getting into the technical details, the difference between chance and causal connections is sorted out by considering the difference in the results, the size of the study population, and the methodology of the study. To us a simple example, imagine someone wanted to determine whether their 20-sided die (a d20 in gamer jargon) rolled randomly or had a flaw that caused it to roll certain numbers more often. If the person rolled it 20 times and rolled some numbers twice (or more) and some not at all, this could still be due to chance rather than a flaw in the die. After all, a small sample size will tend to not be very representative. As the person rolls more and more, the data gets better and better—as the sample size increases, the more likely it is that a flaw would be revealed. So, rolling 20 times without rolling a 20 would be unlikely, but not unexpected. Rolling 200 times without a single 20 would not be impossible but would be good evidence that there is something wrong with the die. After all, as the number of rolls increase, the results should match the statistical expectation of one 20 for every 20 rolls.
Likewise, a disparity between whites and blacks over a small number of stops could be purely a matter of chance; but as the numbers increase, a persistent disparity would be evidence of some other factor at play, such as racism. Given the size of the study, it would be unreasonable to attribute the results to chance and bias would be a likely factor. It should not be concluded that all or even most police are racist. It has been claimed that everyone is affected by their implicit biases, so it is certainly possible that this accounts for some of the disparity in stops. That is, some officers are not explicitly racist, but their implicit bias leads them to believe that minority motorists are more likely to be breaking the law. Of course, racism should not be dismissed entirely and is likely to be a factor in some cases.
While the disparity in stops is a problem, the fact that some departments are modifying their training to address the matter is encouraging. Assuming, of course, that such training works.
From the Wikipedia article on Cook County:
The county has more Democratic Party members than any other Illinois county and it is one of the most Democratic counties in the United States. Since 1932, the majority of its voters have only supported a Republican candidate in a Presidential election three times, all during national Republican landslides–Dwight Eisenhower over native son Adlai Stevenson II in 1952 and 1956, and Richard Nixon over George McGovern in 1972. Since then, the closest a Republican has come to carrying the county was in 1984, when Ronald Reagan won 48.4 percent of the county’s vote.
The 1970 Illinois Constitution allows the party controlling the state legislature to redraw voting districts. The Democrats won complete control of state government in 2003; since then redistricting combined with demographic changes resulted in the party winning additional seats in the U.S. House of Representatives from Republicans in 2012. Analysts say the redistricting better represented the demographics of the state.[14][15][16] Republicans are well established in certain districts, where they elect Republican candidates of their choice.[17]
The Cook County Democratic Party represents Democratic voters in 50 wards in the city of Chicago and 30 suburban townships of Cook County. The organization has dominated County, city, and state politics since the 1930s. The last Republican mayor of Chicago was William Hale “Big Bill” Thompson, who left office in 1931 with a record of corruption. The high-water mark for Republican candidacies for mayor since then was that of Republican candidate Bernard Epton, who in 1983 came within 3.3 percentage points of defeating Democrat Harold Washington.[18]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cook_County,_Illinois
Mike, care to comment?
I have a few problems with your post, and the way you present your arguments. Maybe it would be more accurate to say “the way you don’t present your arguments”. Here’s what I mean –
I am a white male, 63 years old. I have been driving for 46 years. During this time I have been pulled over by police far more times than I’d like to remember. Some of those times I’ve been let go with a warning, other times I haven’t been so lucky. My offenses include running red lights, speeding, “rolling through” stop signs when no one is around, outdated registration, problems with my equipment (low tires, malfunctioning lights, etc). Once, driving home from a gallery opening, I was pulled over for speeding on a highway and, smelling the single glass of wine I had on my breath, had to endure the humiliating ordeal of a roadside sobriety test (I passed). Once, in a particularly harrowing experience, I matched the description of someone who had committed a crime – I was pulled over and ordered (through bullhorns by cops hiding behind the open door of their vehicle) to “Stay in the car. Put your hands on the wheel. Do not make any sudden moves!”. When I was 17, I was in my car with a friend – I pulled into the parking lot of an electronics store, only to be set upon by three police cars. The reason? The store had been robbed recently, and the cops were keeping an eye on the place.
So what’s the point?
“Likewise, a disparity between whites and blacks over a small number of stops could be purely a matter of chance; but as the numbers increase, a persistent disparity would be evidence of some other factor at play, such as racism. “
You have written nine full paragraphs on this issue and not once have you brought up any reasons why people, black, white, or Hispanic, get pulled over by the police. The undercurrent of your essay is that we live in a world where innocent people, minding their own business, are suddenly pulled over for no reason – and since some statistics say that blacks are more likely to be pulled over than whites, the suggestion is made and/or the conclusion is drawn is that the reason is racism. You said so yourself.
Police stops are not random. They are not the same as rolling dice.
Understand, I am not disputing anything here – although I think we need to be very cautious about drawing the conclusions that we do. It is very, very common to find the kind of emotional appeal mentioned in your linked article, and call it racism …
““It’s been more times than I care to remember,” said Robert F. Smith, 55, a private equity titan and philanthropist, when asked how often he thinks he has been racially profiled. Smith, with a net worth of more than three billion dollars, is listed by Forbes as the nation’s wealthiest African American. Yet he still dreads being pulled over.
“A very familiar feeling comes each time I’m stopped,” he said. “And that’s the same feeling I got the first time I was stopped, when I was 17 years old.”
Is he a victim of racism? Or is he, himself, the racist? The question posed to him is how often he thinks he has been racially profiled. (and by the way, I have that same feeling when I’m pulled over. And it’s the same as when I was 17. Powerless in the face of authority, with no recourse but to submit completely.)
“Shaken by cases in which seemingly routine traffic stops turn deadly, many black parents rehearse with their children what to do if they are pulled over: Lower your car window so officers have a clear line of sight, turn on the interior lights, keep your hands visible, have your license and registration accessible, and for God’s sake, let the officer know you are reaching for them so he doesn’t shoot you.”
We have already talked ad infinitum about the first part of that sentence – that the apparent proliferation of “white-cop-black-driver” stops that go bad is as likely to be just a proliferation of reportage and social media posts – but the second part is exactly what my own parents told me!. And if I didn’t heed them then, I certainly learned my lesson that time I was pulled over because I looked like a criminal. There is no doubt in my mind that, had I not obeyed the officers’ commands immediately and to the letter, shots may have been fired. Tensions were very, very high.
This brings up another problem I have with this post. In your first paragraph, you have an embedded link: “the data from the Stanford study”. Maybe I shouldn’t assume so much, but I thought that link would bring me to the Stanford study. Instead, it links to an emotionally charged opinion piece that has drawn its own conclusions before the outset of the article, and cherry-picks data from the Stanford piece, presenting it completely out of context or worse – presenting it within the context of the emotional impact of the non-white people talking about their fear of being pulled over.
This is the kind of thing that one would expect from someone belonging to that political tribe, but not from an academic. It is a painfully easy next step to scroll to the bottom of the article, see the line that says, “SOURCE: STANFORD UNIVERSITY OPEN POLICING PROJECT”, and then Google that source.
Here, at least, all the data is presented – at least by that study. Anyone in academia knows that a single study does not provide a broad enough dataset to draw any kind of conclusion – but at least this data is presented in context. And many, if not most, of the downloadable datasets include the reason for the stop in the first place.
Those who seek truth, rather than simple agreement, will note the point made in the very first paragraph –
“…the most common police interaction — the traffic stop — has not been tracked, at least not in any systematic way.”. Meaning, “this is only a start”.
Here’s something that was omitted from the National Geographic article, and from your post as well –
“Examining stop rates is a natural starting point, but they can be hard to interpret. For example, driving behavior and time spent on the road likely differ by race or ethnicity. The racial composition of the local population also may not be representative of those who drive through an area, especially when dealing with stops on highways.”
Stanford says that stop rates can be hard to interpret. Not for Michael Fletcher they’re not. Looking back over all the interviews and quotes contained in his article – about the fear of “Driving While Black” and asking the question about whether that fear has any rational foundation, I suspect that articles like his contribute as much to that fear as statistics do.
I am not disputing that bias may exist in traffic stops – even in the Stanford study they say,
“The project has found significant racial disparities in policing. These disparities can occur for many reasons: differences in driving behavior, to name one. But, in some cases, we find evidence that bias also plays a role.”
How much of a role, and under what circumstances, would be a good place to begin a deep dive, but to too many people in this country, that’s enough to charge “RACISM”. This solves nothing, and makes the problem worse.
Of course, that’s a hypothesis, not a conclusion – but I should be very careful about where and when I pose this hypothesis. If it goes against the conventional wisdom of calling out “Racism”, I might be called a racist myself. (It’s why I deleted my Facebook account, which I’ve talked about here).
The missing factor here, and one that I think may be impossible to obtain, is how many violations do the police let slide? There is some data regarding whether or not a ticket or a warning is issued – but do police see white drivers speeding, and decide not to pull them over because of their race? No cop will cop to that.
True; there are many alternative hypotheses to racism that can explain the statistical disparity. I do note this in the essay and doing good social science requires considering and eliminating plausible competing explanations.
“,,,I do note this in the essay…”
Yes, you do. What is concerning to me is that in your essay, as in most essays like this, is that the single most obvious reason for traffic stops of any kind, i.e., violations, if it is brought up at all, is mentioned almost in passing as an “alternative hypothesis”. It would seem to me that the very first question on this topic would be, “is there a difference in driving habits among these populations?” This should be followed by factors such as the amount of time spent on the road, average time of day spent on the road, and maybe the kind of equipment/licensing questions I posed in my second post. However, the first – and sometimes last – hypothesis posed is racism.
“…even if a study is flawed, it does not follow that the denial of its conclusion is thus true…”
Yes, of course. The inverse of this statement should also be noted – that if a study is flawed, we must be very cautious about the merits of its conclusions.
” If stops were not influenced by the race of the driver, the day and night statistics should have been the same. There do not seem to be plausible alternatives, unless one wants to claim that Hispanics drive better at night.”
This reminds me of a popular brain teaser about a hypothetical study done about traffic accidents in the US, questioning if there were certain times of day or times of the year where accidents might be predictably fewer or greater. After compiling a huge set of data points and spending much time parsing through and analyzing them, researchers discovered something very unusual – that during the entire year, there was one single hour where traffic accidents consistently hit a low point – so low, in fact, as to be statistically insignificant. They went over their data again and again, and every time they got the same conclusion. For a long time they could find no reason for this outlier.
So that’s the puzzle – it’s not one hour a day over the course of the year, it’s only one hour for the entire year. What hour is it, and what’s the reason for the drop in traffic incidents?
The answer, of course, is not Christmas Eve or New Year’s day, It’s the hour between 2:00 and 3:00 AM in the spring when we move our clocks forward. That hour effectively does not exist – except in Arizona and Hawaii, where they don’t observe daylight savings time.
So when you say that “there do not seem to be plausible alternatives”, it’s because you have already drawn your conclusion, and are not thinking out of the box. Maybe Hispanics don’t drive as much at night. In fact, this is a stated area of contention in the very study from which you have drawn your conclusion, and for which you say there seems to be no other plausible alternative:
…”One point of contention for Cox was the way researchers determined the number of drivers in a given municipality.
“The use of population-based benchmarks and descriptive statistics to approximate towns’ driving populations has weaknesses and are not recommended to be used nor presented in these reports,” Cox wrote.”
I think this would fall into the category of “Fallacy of Presumption” – presuming that all conditions are equal between the day/night driving habits of a population, and drawing a conclusion from that false (or unproven) premise.
But the real issue is that, when reading the research, it is obvious and appropriate that the researchers understand the limitations of the data and the difficulties in interpretation – and invariably state that the data, while sometimes troubling, must be rigorously analyzed with all possible alternatives considered. In the hands of people like Michael Fletcher and others who have already drawn their conclusions, however, these limitations and difficulties simply do not exist.
By citing the Stanford and other research, the argument falls under the fallacy of “Appeal to Authority”
This may have some validity, but any possible validity is undermined by the (A) stated incompleteness of the research itself, and (B) the careful selection of only those elements that seemingly prove the point.
This would commit a second fallacy, that of a “False Premise”. The research may point to a disturbing trend that requires more in-depth study, but the trend is presented as fact.
And by quoting African Americans who express fear and discomfort whenever they are stopped, regardless of the outcome, a third fallacy is used, the “Appeal to Pity”.
Q.E.D.
Thank you again for a well researched and well presented response. One would think that our media and such (emphasis on “and such” IYKWIM) would apply this sort of effort to reporting, challenging, critically thinking about much of the hype coming from certain quarters in this regard. But how popular would that make them, eh?
In my first post, towards the end, I made a statement, “Of course, that’s just a hypothesis … “, but there’s no hypothesis given. My bad – it was an editing error.
The hypothesis is this –
We know for a fact that blacks and Hispanics are disproportionately represented in poverty demographics – i.e., there is a disproportionate number of poor black and Hispanics relative to total population.
As a function of this poverty, I would want to investigate the incidents of traffic stops relative to poverty-related violations – equipment, registration, insurance, etc. If I only have $50 to last me to the end of the week, and I have a choice between heading to the DMV to renew my registration or taking a chance on that and heading to the supermarket instead, I think I’d choose the supermarket. Car insurance is expensive – and many poor simply cannot afford it, and take their chances. Further, those living in poverty cannot afford lawyers to get them out of other violations, and are therefore more likely to be driving while suspended or revoked. Driving is a necessity – and if given the choice, many will drive to work while suspended rather than give up a day’s wages.
There’s also the fact that many who live in poverty either have no permanent address or use a PO box, and have no checking accounts to facilitate a mail-in registration. There is no doubt that maintaining proper documentation, registration, insurance, and license is very difficult for the poor.
A cop can very easily see if a registration or inspection sticker is expired. It’s also a pretty easy thing (and probably standard procedure) to call in the plate and check out the owner. This will reveal their drivers’ license info.
I would therefore hypothesize that, at least for stops related to license plates, registration, and inspection, we are likely to see data that is skewed toward the poor. Since blacks and Hispanics are disproportionately represented within that economic strata, we will see a disproportionate number of blacks and Hispanics stopped by the police for those reasons.
Looking at the spreadsheet I downloaded for Illinois only, the numbers seem to bear that out. I sorted the spreadsheet first on “Reason for Stop” (License/Registration), and then on “Race”. Between 2004 and 2006, there were 46,000 stops that indicate “License/Registration” as the reason. Of these, 65% of the drivers were Caucasian, 24% were African American, 9% were Hispanic, and 1% were Asian/Pacific Islander. Native American and “Other” are statistically insignificant.
Compare that to the overall demographics of Illinois – 74% white, 15% black, 12% Hispanic, and you can easily see the skewed numbers. FAR more black/Hispanic violations than their representation in population.
So is this, in fact, a function of economic status? Or is it the case that a racist police force sees an expired plate, notes that the driver is white, and lets him go? Or that a racist cop sees that a driver is black and looks for a handy excuse to pull him over?
Without looking into the data, it’s very easy to just look at the numbers and cry “Racism!”, which is a very popular trend in this country. Further, anyone who does want to look more deeply at the numbers runs the risk of being tagged with that name himself. Especially if the data points to the possibility that it’s something else.