WASHINGTON — The US Supreme Court reinstated the role of accreditation in the college admissions process. Ruling on Thursday that two prestigious colleges violated the US Constitution by considering race in admissions.
In a 6-3 decision, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the majority that the admissions process of Harvard. And UNC violated the equal protection clause of the Fourth Amendment.
“The registration system cannot compete because the admissions programs at Harvard. And UNC do not have a satisfactory and measurable purpose to prevent the use of race. The inevitably negative use of race, the racial discrimination. And the competition of the registration system without the last clause. Equal Protection With substance,” Roberts wrote.
“Many schools have long agreed that the personal touch is skin color, not competition won, skills developed, or lessons learned.” Roberts continued.
Since Harvard is a private institution and UNC is a public institution, this decision affects higher education generally. The three judges, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Kotangi Brown-Jackson, disagreed.
Sotomayor wrote a dissenting opinion, arguing that while the Equal Protection Clause “guarantees racial equality”. The Supreme Court “has long been equal in society and has never been blind.
“In such a decision, the Court established the principle of blind discrimination as a common law in a society characterized by racial discrimination, which is important and still problematic,” wrote. “The Court has abolished the law’s principle of equal protection by supporting racial discrimination in education, which is the foundation of our democratic and pluralist government.”
Sotomayor noted that Harvard and the Universities of North Carolina “have a bad history of apartheid.” He wrote that the UNC, led by slave owners and members of the freest organization of the Ku Klux Klan, resisted integration until 1963, when its first member recognized the black student. In student life,” he noted, many of the buildings still bear the name of later members of the Ku Klux Klan.
Sotomayor noted that slavery and racism were important to the founding of Harvard. It starts in context,” he wrote.
Jackson accepted the appeal but made Harvard part of the decision. Jackson participated in the debates in the UNC case, but not in the Harvard case, because he is a graduate of Harvard University and Harvard Law School and most recently served on the Harvard Oversight Board, one of Harvard’s two governing bodies.
The decision stems from a 2014 lawsuit against Harvard University and another lawsuit against the University of North Carolina. Two cases seeking to overrule Grutter v Bollinger is the way colleges consider race in admissions.
Harvard and UNC argue that race is one of the many factors that colleges consider in admissions, along with health and activities, making admissions decisions based on guidelines created by Groot. The two lawsuits were filed by a group called Students for Fair Education, funded by attorney Edward Bloom, who has filed several lawsuits because the school’s case was viewed as discrimination.
In Harvard case, the group argued that Harvard’s Civil Rights Act VI. Title VI prohibits racial discrimination by federally funded schools.
The University of North Carolina case argued that the university violated the Fourth Amendment’s anti-discrimination clause because it considered race in its admissions process.
Federal Court of dismissed the Student Fair Admission Coalition’s claims and joined colleges. Recognition has its roots in civil rights law of the 1960s, when President Lyndon B. Johnson issued an executive order prohibiting organizations from accepting government contracts and contracts by and by sex and after sex.
Nine states ban race-based admission to public schools:
Florida, California, Michigan, Nebraska, Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Idaho. Washington state plans to lift the ban in 2022 by influencing the decision on social media. The decision comes less than an hour after former President Barack Obama – the first black US president to hold office – and former First Lady Michelle Obama announced language that includes scholarships and focuses on minorities.
“While kids growing up like me have to compete against challenges, we often recognize that money, power, and authority are necessary standards of recognition,” said Michelle Obama.
“Today, the heart ache of young people wondering what their future will be and what opportunities are there for them. When I know that children have strength and courage deep down, they always want more, it takes a lot of time. We sweat to climb the same ladder, but the rest of us sweat a little more. I hope and wish he will.”
Former President Obama said verification was “not perfect”.
“But it has allowed generations of students like Michelle and me to prove that we belong here.” It now falls to all of us to give young people the opportunities they deserve and help students around the world benefit from new perspectives.
New York Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer described the decision as “misguided” and said it “causing serious problems in our country’s path to racial justice”.
“The consequences of this decision will be felt across the country immediately as students of color face next year’s entry cycle with less time to attend the same colleges and universities as their parents and older siblings. These negative consequences will continue for generations. Schumer said in a statement. He said the historical damage of discrimination and racism in education and society is getting worse. Former South Carolina governor and 2024 Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley welcomed the decision.
“The world admires America because we value freedom and opportunity. The Supreme Court reaffirmed these values today. Choosing winners and losers by race This decision will help all students have a better chance, regardless of their background. American To realize his dream,” he said in a statement right after the decision.
Oral debates
In last year’s oral debates, court members. Who now have a 6 to 3 majority, pointed to the 2003 issue. Asking whether it was legal for school newspapers to determine race and how long these rights should last. 25 Positive. The order will not expire next year.
Grutter v. Bollinger allows limited consideration of race in college admissions and sees race as only one of many factors considered by applicants. The document allows the University of Michigan Law School to consider race in the admissions process to help build a more diverse student body.
Conservative Judge Clarence Thomas US, the only black in the Supreme Court, urges lawyers to defend the school’s policy on how to differentiate education.
“I didn’t go to a very diverse school, but there are educational benefits there. When parents send their kids to college, they don’t send their kids to college to have fun. Or I want you to tell me straight. They send them to study chemistry or whatever they are studying.” “So tell me how good this is for learning?”
Affirmative action supporters protested in front of the Supreme Court during the debates last October.
