The conservative-dominated Supreme Court’s decision to reject 45 years of precedent on race-based affirmative-action policies in higher education was expected.
When the high court heard arguments last year in the latest challenge to the practice, the majority signaled in its comments and its questions that it was not comfortable with the compromise fashioned by previous courts that said race could be considered in college admissions decisions, but it couldn’t be a main factor.
Even a scaled-back affirmative action is not compatible with the Constitution’s equal protection clause, the six-member majority found in Thursday’s ruling. Giving preference in college admissions to some groups based on their race means other groups are penalized because of theirs.
Affirmative action, it should be remembered, was established a half-century ago to make up for just such discrimination, though in reverse. Decades of preference to whites in college admissions, the argument went, could only be redressed by showing a similar preference to Black and brown applicants. The system has worked, as the Supreme Court’s own composition illustrates. It is unlikely that either Clarence Thomas, a longtime opponent of affirmative action, or Sonia Sotomayor, a proponent, would be on the nation’s highest court today if they hadn’t been beneficiaries of affirmative action policies at the colleges and law schools they attended.
The benefits of affirmative action have extended beyond those who received preferential consideration. Diversity in admissions has enriched the educational experience of other students by exposing them to peers from different backgrounds and life experiences.
Highly selective universities have already been thinking about how they would adapt after affirmative action to maintain that diversity. One obvious avenue — and it’s been suggested by the white and Asian plaintiffs who successfully challenged affirmative action — is to replace race with socioeconomic status as a consideration in admissions decisions. Giving some poor kids a leg up would still produce a relatively diverse student body, since Black and brown families on average make up a disproportionate share of low-income households. But it would have the potential to benefit bright students of all colors who couldn’t dream of getting into some of these colleges and universities without help.
America believes in upward mobility. A way to achieve that is to be sure that a top-flight education is available to anyone with the ability and desire to do the work, regardless of family income.
Race was a means, but an inexact one, to achieve that purpose. It made no distinction between the Black or brown child in suburbia and the one in the ghetto. That’s one of the reasons, for all its good intentions, race-based affirmative action also fostered some resentment.
Using a different approach might lessen that ire and avoid constitutional concerns.
