The Supreme Court has invalidated affirmative action programs at the University of North Carolina (UNC) and Harvard. The court found that the programs, which had systematically considered race in the admissions process as a mechanism to counter historical discrimination against Black people and other minorities, violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution, rendering them unlawful.
The court’s decision resulted in a 6-3 vote in the UNC case and a 6-2 vote in the Harvard case. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was recused from the Harvard case. The ruling effectively overturns the 2003 decision Grutter v. Bollinger, which established that race could be considered in the admissions process. A 1978 ruling supporting limited consideration of race in university admissions, has also been overruled.
In the majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts pointed out that both programs “lack sufficiently focused and measurable objectives warranting the use of race, unavoidably employ race in a negative manner, involve racial stereotyping, and lack meaningful end points.” Justice Clarence Thomas, in his concurring opinion, noted that the Grutter case has been overruled “for all intents and purposes.”
The dissenting justices expressed their concerns regarding the ruling. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson labeled the ruling a “tragedy for us all,” while Justice Sonia Sotomayor criticized the court for “rolling back decades of precedent and momentous progress.”
Selective universities that have historically considered race to ensure diverse student bodies have been significantly impacted by the ruling. Schools with extremely competitive admissions programs, including Yale University, Brown University, Columbia University, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Chicago, and Dartmouth College, are among those affected. These institutions predict a significant drop in minority student enrollment and a need to experiment with new race-neutral plans to counteract the decision’s impact. The vast majority of colleges, which accept almost all applicants, will likely be less affected.
While the ruling has significant implications, it does not entirely rule out the consideration of race in admissions. Chief Justice Roberts suggested that colleges could consider the discussion of race in an individual student’s application, especially if the student personally encountered racial discrimination. He emphasized that a student “must be treated based on his or her experiences as an individual — not on the basis of race.”
The court’s decision does not cover the consideration of race in military academies, a point of concern raised by the Biden administration, which highlighted the military’s reliance on a “well-qualified and diverse officer corps” from military and civilian universities.
The ruling could increase pressure on colleges to develop workable race-neutral programs fostering racial diversity. Furthermore, it could lead to future challenges to racial diversity programs used by employers, as similar arguments could be made under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination in employment.
The challenges to the affirmative action programs were brought by a group called Students for Fair Admissions, led by Ed Blum. Following the ruling, Blum said in a statement that the “polarizing, stigmatizing and unfair jurisprudence that allowed colleges and universities to use a student’s race and ethnicity as a factor to admit or reject them has been overruled.”
The Supreme Court’s ruling marks a significant moment in the ongoing debate about affirmative action in higher education.
Photo by Anna Sullivan