Private papers reveal the tactics that helped SCOTUS uphold the use of affirmative action in higher education.
A federal appellate court has sided with the University of North Carolina, ruling in a 5-3 vote that the college can admit students based on the race of their parents.
For years, the university has used a “multiracial admissions policy” to comply with the University of California’s Proposition 227, which restricts the use of race as a factor in university admissions. The court ruled that the university can use “the race by which a qualified applicant was admitted as a factor” in admission.
But the court ruled that the university can continue using race in its admissions process, even if it is the same race-by-which-a-qualified-applicant.
The ruling is the most sweeping affirmative action overturning in recent history.
University of North Carolina, Raleigh, NC. Photo: John David Mercer/The State
University of North Carolina (UNC) student and reporter Andrew P. Miller at UC’s College of Music and Drama. Photo: David Goldman/The State
This photo is part of the photo essay ‘Injustice, at a university where minorities are accepted just as others are,’ by photographer David Goldman.
It’s been an odd week in the history of affirmative action—it was the Wednesday after the decision, and the campus remained in a daze. It didn’t take long for the decision to go viral on social media, and then to be tweeted by the Supreme Court’s Chief Justice, John Roberts.
This was a powerful affirmation that can make a difference: the Supreme Court affirmed in part that the use of race is permissible for universities, even when the racial disparities in universities are the same as in society as a whole.
“This is a victory for our country,” said Justice Elena Kagan, who wrote the Court’s majority opinion in University of North Carolina, v. United States of America.
The Court’s
