![]() It didn’t start with abortion and it won’t end with affirmative action.In light of that, Oklahoma's governor and attorney general asked the Supreme Court to reverse its earlier decision. This court will continue to steamroll through its past decisions where they stand as inconvenient roadblocks to its policy goals. In fact, using race-conscious criteria in admissions decisions to achieve racial diversity now violates both the United States Constitution and federal statutory law. In 2003, the court recognized that “ use of admissions decisions further a compelling interest in obtaining the educational benefits that flow from a diverse student body.” In the Supreme Court’s new world order, achieving a racially diverse student body is no longer a compelling government interest. Similar to its reasoning in the UNC case, in the Harvard case, the court concluded that race-conscious admissions policies constitute racial discrimination.ĭuring oral arguments in the University of North Carolina case, Justice Thomas stated, “I’ve heard the word ‘diversity’ quite a few times, and I don’t have a clue what it means.” If that’s true, perhaps it would be best to respect the court’s prior decisions and allow private and public institutions to attempt to remedy past harms and achieve racial diversity.īut for this court, even decisions by Republican-appointed justices like O’Connor stand in the way of their desire to remake our society in their vision. That federal law prohibits private entities, like colleges, that receive federal government funds from discriminating on the basis of race. In the other affirmative action case, brought against Harvard College, the court ruled that considering race in the private college admissions process violates Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. This is the perspective adopted by the majority of the Supreme Court, and this is why they concluded that public university admissions policies that take race into account actually undermine equality, and violate the Equal Protection clause. This would obviously mean that programs that take race into account to remedy past discrimination fly in the face of the Equal Protection Clause. Under this view, race-conscious laws amount to invidious discrimination, which is always a problem. If we adopt this perspective, affirmative action programs are plainly constitutional.īut from a different perspective, the Equal Protection clause instead requires that judges strike down any laws that take race into account. This could include remedying racial discrimination by implementing university admissions programs that take race into account. Meaning, the government can and should take actions to achieve equal opportunities and racial equality. ![]() ![]() What “equal protection of the laws” means in reality is that under one view, achieving equality will sometimes require the government to take affirmative steps. That constitutional provision bars states from denying “the equal protection of the laws.” In one case, brought against the University of North Carolina, the court concluded that considering race in the public university admissions process violates the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. ![]()
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