The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday affirmed a Texas university’s use of race in considering applicants, a case that was widely watched by area universities.
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The court upheld the University of Texas’ affirmative-action admissions program that partially considers race.
“The Court’s affirmance of the University’s admissions policy today does not necessarily mean the University may rely on that same policy without refinement”. They may have a winning hand if Justice Anthony Kennedy joins the court’s four liberals against one or both restrictions. Thomas also wrote his own dissenting opinion.
In Georgia, if the seven-member state Supreme Court finds itself one justice short, it will appoint a lower-court judge to hear a case to ensure there will be no tie vote. The Supreme Court nears the finish line with the most contentious cases still to be resolved. Justice Elena Kagan recused herself from the case because she once dealt with it during her prior job as U.S. Solicitor General. But that’s not the case for the nation’s highest court; if a justice dies, becomes gravely ill or declines to hear a case because of a conflict of interest, there are no replacements.
“The decision itself is written quite narrowly, and tailored to the UT program specifically”, he added.
Georgia State University law professor Eric Segall, who closely follows the Supreme Court, predicted the court will not issue deadlocked opinions in the immigration and abortion cases.
Eight states prohibit the use of race in public college admissions: Arizona, California, Florida, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington.
The university has disputed whether Fisher would have gained admission under any circumstances.
Fisher didn’t qualify for automatic admission under a policy that guarantees a spot in the freshman class for students in the top 10 percent of their high school class. She contended that it was unfair for UT to reject her while accepting less qualified minority applicants from less competitive schools than hers in suburban Sugar Land. She was denied admission.
The court said officials can consider race in admissions but must do that in a limited way.
The Supreme Court previously ruled on Fisher v. Texas in 2013.
Lawyers for the school argued that the Top Ten Percent Program alone wasn’t enough to achieve racial diversity in the school. The school said Fisher, who did not graduate in the top 10 percent of her high school class, would not have been admitted with or without race as a factor.
– Abortion: Texas abortion clinics are challenging a state law and regulations that already have cut the number of abortion providers in half, to roughly 20. Those last factors are used to produce what the school calls “diversity within diversity” – a representative mix of minority students, rather than just those from segregated communities with similar backgrounds and experiences.
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At oral arguments in December Scalia drew controversy when he referred to an amicus brief filed in the case that suggests that affirmative action programs don’t always benefit minorities.
