In a remarkably united decision the Court kicked this case back to the lower court with the instruction that the breadth of affirmative action was narrower than previously thought, but more or less intact. They could be hinting that the policy of diversifying a student population may be sustained if it is being implemented in good faith. I think they are leaving the door open to a revised affirmatie action scheme by which race is but one factor in allowing lesser qualified students to have places at major universities....social class, background and other things like that may be added into the mix.

Since the Affordable Care Act decision, Roberts seems to have taken the reins of the court away from Scalia...not a bad thing...and they seem to be compromising and showing a more united front than in recent years. It will be interesting to see if they do something similar on DOMA and Voting Rights.

They may be sending a message about compromising that is lost on the legislative branch these days.

DT, I disagree. What SCOTUS opined was that the 5th circuit court errantly presumed that UT acted in good faith and that the Circuit Court should have examined the substance of that good faith effort.

OLI that is exactly what they said, meaning that the 5th could kick it back to the trial court using the newlay announced standard, which in turn could mean eons of litigation over what the standard means, and how it is applied. It also means affirmative action is not going anywhere any time soon.

I haven't read the decision, but I'd have to agree that the majority is not inclined to disturb affirmative action by virtue of a remand.

I'm kind of confused as to what that means. They kicked it back to the lower court to do what??




TIS

I think what they are saying is just because the University said it was acting in good faith, that the lower courts should not have taken them at their word, and that they need to demonstrate what they did to act in good faith. Whatever that will mean is anybody's guess.

Exactly.

Affirmative action has always been a total BS, hypocritical idea. What happened to "being judged by the content of their character and not by their skin?" I guess that goes out the window when the tables are turned, huh? Minorities lost the moral high ground when affirmative action came into being. The desire for "diversity" at a university should not mean a less qualified minority getting in over a more qualified person.

Did you even read what MLK had to say on affirmative action? If you're going to quote him you should do it in context.

From what I know about him, he wouldn't be for it. If he was, it would demonstrate he didn't really believe what he preached.

It would take a special sort of "chutzpah" to say that someone who spent over a decade in danger being threatened, beaten, arrested, stabbed, shot at, spied upon, and assaulted without lifting a finger in retaliation all before he was finally murdered didn't really believe what he preached.

Whenever the issue of compensatory treatment for the Negro is raised, some of our friends recoil in horror. The Negro should be granted equality, they agree; but he should ask nothing more. On the surface, this appears reasonable, but it is not realistic.
-From "Why We Can't Wait".


Now there's another myth that I want to mention, because if we are going to have action programs that will prod the forces in power so that they will make the necessary concessions, we are going to have to understand why the forces in power need to be prodded. Now this leads me to say that we've got to get rid of the myth of over-exaggerating the bootstrap philosophy. I guess that it is all right to tell a man to lift himself by his own bootstraps, but it is a cruel jest to say to a bootless man that he ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps. Through centuries of denial, centuries of neglect, and centuries of injustice many, many Negroes have been left bootless. This does not mean that we do nothing for ourselves. It does not mean that we should not amass our economic and political resources to reach our legitimate goals. It simply means recognizing, the nation recognizing, that it owes a great debt on the basis of the injustices of the past.
-1968 Speech to Ohio Northern University


Within common law, we have ample precedents for special compensatory programs, which are regarded as settlements. American Indians are still being paid for land in a settlement manner. Is not two centuries of labor, which helped to build this country, as real a commodity? Many other easily applicable precedents are readily at hand: our child labor laws, social security, unemployment compensation, man-power retraining programs. And you will remember that America adopted a policy of special treatment for her millions of veterans after the War—a program which cost far more than a policy of preferential treatment to rehabilitate the traditionally disadvantaged Negro would cost today.

The closest analogy is the GI Bill of Rights. Negro rehabilitation in America would require approximately the same breadth of program—which would not place an undue burden on our economy. Just as was the case with the returning soldier, such a bill for the disadvantaged and impoverished could enable them to buy homes without cash, at lower and easier repayment terms.
-1965 Playboy Interview

There's much more of course but the point is made. MLK not only believed in affirmative action but practiced it via Operation Breadbasket which identified and pressured companies that did not hire black people. It's really important that people know the history.

Of coourse affirmative action was and is necessary. In fact I think it should be expanded to include people who are of a certain low income bracket, and people who live in isolated places. Anyone who thinks african americans were getting an unfir shot at college admission before affirmative action simply does not know history.

Is there some threshold in these posts that people have to know what they are talking about? Also is there a requirement that if somone names himself after a group of colleges that he had to have attended one of them?

My question also DT. The vehemance, adamancy, and vituperation of some posters would be less offensive if those posters' statements were based on accurate knowledge.

This is 2013. Slavery ended how long ago? Segregation how long ago? How long are we going to play this game? Martyr or not, King can't say two conflicting things and be consistent at the same time. I'm all for giving "boots" to minorities or other less fortunate but not at the unfair cost of putting a less worthy minority ahead of a more worthy individual, simply because they are male and/or white, in schooling, jobs, etc. That's manifestly unfair. It just goes to show that, for all their talk about justice, fairness, equality, etc., liberals (and their usually sheep-like minority followers) throw that out the window real quick when the tables are turned.

Right. Because King was a sheep like minority follower. You should read what he and other people wrote then and now on the issues you raise but obviously you haven't done that and likely won't. So if you're not even familiar with what King wrote, discussion is pointless.

As far as ad hominem attacks I have yet to see any prominent white conservative raise a voice in outrage over any current day public or private practices which negatively impact black people, whether it be job discrimination in hiring, pay and promotion, unemployment stats, harsher sentences for the same crime, disparities in wealth and education, housing segregation and so on. All those pass without conservatives saying anything. But when it comes to any sort of affirmative action they howl in outrage. On this issue conservatives are full of s***.

That's my point. You knock these prominent white conservatives for "not raising their voice" but you and other supporters of affirmative action are just as bad as they are. You're essentially saying, "Well, since they discriminate, we will too." That's where minorities lost the moral high ground. You don't achieve justice and equality by simply adding additional wrongs to the equation. It doesn't balance things out, as much as you'd like to believe it does. A more qualified white person, trying to go to college or get a job, has done nothing to deserve being passed over. They have nothing to do with past wrongs committed by others. But that's what affirmative action does; it penalizes them. It's wrong and it's racist. But it's racism against whites so you and other liberals are fine with that.

I do not accept that in every situation that the white person is automatically more qualified. The assumption that that is indeed the case is in part why affirmative action was and is needed. Again you go with the ad hominems because you don't have any facts. If your assumption is that there's no such thing as racism in hiring, promotion, firing, etc then of course affirmative action would seem to be unfair. But the facts, whether it's employers throwing out resumes with black sounding names, real estate steering, or blacks running into very real barriers to promotion in the workforce or any other number of unpleasant current day realities indicate otherwise.

I never said that whites are always more qualified. I'm talking about the instances where a less qualified minority will be accepted into a college or hired by a company ahead of a more qualified white simply in order to meet some bogus affirmative action-inspired quota about "diversity." You can't defend that.

Also, I never said there isn't still racism today. But it's nowhere near the widespread institutionalized racism of decades ago. But liberals, as well as their minority followers, act like it is in order to milk the race card for all it's worth.

It's not like they would give them higher grades in school once they get admitted, or that they can work less and not get fired. They would have to work hard just as everybody else to graduate and/or to maintain their jobs. If they are not qualified to get in, I suppose they wouldn't be able to stay. I think there always has to be a mechanism to let the underprivileged get a chance at a better education/job. That's how you level the field for the less fortunate in a capitalist system.

You're changing the subject. They shouldn't "get in" in the first place if it means displacing a more qualified white person. Affirmative action doesn't "level" any playing fields, as much as liberals like to think it does. And, even if it did, it still wouldn't justify screwing over a qualified white person who has nothing to do with whatever disadvantages the ancestors of some minority suffered. Like with certain other issues, the phoniness and hypocrisy of the left is really shown here. Racism is bad, bad, bad....until it benefits them.

You can't tell me that when a college is admitting students and when it's all white, that there was not one case of a colored person who didn't get admitted simply because he wasn't as qualified as the rest. It could simply mean that the staff were racists. And as I see, racism is alive and well. So that law should be there to level the field as I said.

I'm not sure if you have an actual real life example in mind or you're just talking hypothetically. How diverse a college student population is shouldn't be put ahead of qualifications of individual students. A diversified student body is fine but not by putting a less qualified minority ahead of a more qualified white. That's bogus and it can't be justified or defended. It's hilarious how the same people who are constantly whining about racism are the very ones who support affirmative action, which is just reverse-racism.

You keep repeating what you said before. You didn't address my concern. It's obviously hypothetical. Do you think being smart or having good grades is limited to white people and the rest are just making their way through affirmative action? I said you can't have an all white class and then tell me there was not a racist agenda behind it. Affirmative action with its mandatory quota makes sure of that. It's not just the race. It makes sure women are let in boys clubs as well. You can't tell me there are not women who are qualified but would be slighted if affirmative action did not exist. Oh wait, you can. You think women should stay in the kitchen from what I remember from past discussions. Affirmative action is necessary when there are mindsets like yours.

The fact that so many students are able to buy their way into Universities through their parents' money and influence shows how capricious and arbitrary the University admittance system is, and why affirmative action is still a necessity.

That percentage of required minorities is rather small, too, especially if you look at the school in question, UT-Austin, whose law school only admitted 54 African Americans out of a class of around 700 last year. http://texas.lawschoolnumbers.com/

And BTW: the state of Texas has a top 10% rule, meaning any high school student in the top 10% of their graduating class is automatically eligible for admittance at any state University. Thus, the student in question obviously didn't meet this criterion, and is probably not as qualified as she would like to think.

I'm not sure how common it is in this day and age that any public university is going to have a policy that let's it be nearly all white. But you keep bringing up this hypothetical, rather unlikely, worst case scenario in order to justify your support of affirmative action across the board. I'm talking about public policy in the over all picture. And diversity of a student body should not be used as an excuse to let certain women and/or minorities, who are less qualified, go ahead of those whites/men who are more qualified. It should be based on qualification alone. Not on race or gender.

Laws are there to ensure that worst case scenarios won't happen. As for your assumption that someone less qualified would get ahead of a white male, I refer you to Frank's post.

Diversity is not the excuse. It's normal to assume there are bright talents among minorities and among women who would be discriminated against if not for affirmative action.

But it's not based on qualification alone, not by a long shot. Studies have shown that legacy students are twice as likely to be admitted as students without legacy status because if the school rejects the legacy student, the parent's good will is likely to evaporate as will the gifts. Some lawmakers are even trying to make legacy admissions illegal, for they do, in fact, result in less qualified students being admitted over more qualified students.

Yet another reason affirmative action is still very much necessary; not just along racial and gender lines, but socioeconomic lines as well.

So a less qualified woman or minority should automatically be put ahead of a more qualified man/white just so we can make sure there is no racism? What a bunch of bunk. You're entire argument is based on assumption, which is a big reason why the 5 justices punted on this case. There's too much assuming in regards to race by people who act and think it's still the 1960's because it benefits them.



That's simply a reason to do away with "legacy" as a qualification too, since that also has nothing to do with qualifications. By supporting affirmative action, all you're doing is going the other route in some kind of misguided attempt to "balance" the playing field. You're adding one wrong on top of another. No matter how you try to justify it, nothing excuses the average white person who, despite being more qualified, gets passed over for a spot at a university or a company by a less qualified minority and/or woman.

I agree with Frank. There are multiple factors that are considered to determine what constitutes a qualified student for purposes of admission, and most colleges and universities rightly believe that diversity is a factor that benefits the student body as well as the school. Standardized tests, high school grades, school activities and athletics, community and religious involvement, awards and family history with the school are some of the other considerations. It does not mean that each consideration carries the same weight or that each school must afford the same weight.