PrepTest 151, Section 1, Question 6
The United States Supreme Court’s 1948 ruling in(440 more words not shown)
Which one of the following(9 more words not shown)
- AIf a judicial(18 more words not shown)
- BIf a private(19 more words not shown)
- CIf a judicial(26 more words not shown)
- DIf courts are(21 more words not shown)
- EIf the rationale(20 more words not shown)
Reading the passage
The author explains the broad consequences of Shelley's attribution rule, then observes that later courts did not apply it. Instead, they continued enforcing private agreements that would fail the rule's test. That behavior helps the author show why the rationale is problematic.
What we’re looking for
The principle should connect courts' reluctance to use a rationale with doubts about that rationale. We are identifying reasoning the author uses, not inventing a recommendation for what courts should do next.
Working the answers
- A
The author reports that later courts already avoid the approach and uses that fact as evidence against it. A instead tells courts to avoid a decision whenever scholars find it problematic. That recommendation, based on scholars' judgments, is not the step the author takes.
- B
Declaring an agreement unenforceable does not lead the author to recommend turning its content into a statute. In this case, the Court's logic runs through the opposite difficulty: the government could not constitutionally enact the racial restriction as a law.
- C
The author does identify a “genuine problem” that the decision failed to target: the covenants' content. But no argument follows about measures to prevent the practice from continuing in an altered form. C adds a proposed response that the author never makes.
- DCorrect
The author says later courts did not apply the attribution approach and illustrates their departure with speech-restricting settlement agreements. Their unwillingness to use the rationale supports the conclusion that it is questionable. This is the connection between court behavior and evaluation that we predicted.
- E
The author criticizes the reasoning but does not supply or recommend a replacement rationale. We cannot turn dissatisfaction with an explanation into a recommendation to offer a new one without support.
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