The term they mean to be using is ‘systemic’ because that’s the theory—the idea that the way the system works has flaws built into it that have gotten worse over time that end up affecting minorities.
This is deliberately confusing so people believe it is “systematic” meaning that white people are conspiring to disenfranchise minorities at every turn.
Fact is I’m too busy to be constantly figuring out how to prevent other people from succeeding, so that’s probably not right.
This issue came up during the debate over the ERA. One of the arguments against he ERA is that all citizens were already protected under the Equal Protections clause, so there was no need for an ERA, the problem was elsewhere.
That, ultimately, was the reason why the Constitution was not amended. Instead, Congress passed Title VII and Title IX of the Civil Rights Act, essentially requiring that, if the government spends money, it cannot discriminate against people based on sex, race, creed or color.
We can talk later about the ways those two laws have been abused.
The simple truth is, our laws on their face apply equally to all citizens. Implementing them has always been a problem, because individuals with a little bit of power are often inclined to abuse it.
Racial discrimination has been illegal in this country since at least 1865 (AMENDMENT XIII), as reinforced in 1868 (AMENDMENT XIV), and again in 1870 (AMENDMENT XV), and 1964 (AMENDMENT XXIV).
None of these Amendments have been sufficient to stop all acts arising out of racial prejudice: they do, however, form a structure for enforcing the rights people have. Having enforceable rights does not mean that other people will act like angels; it means that an offended person can seek redress in a court of law.