Citing Brown v. Board of Education, Supreme Court Strikes Down Racial Discrimination in College Admissions

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled by a vote of 6-3 that Harvard University’s and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s racial preference admissions policies violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The main issue in the consolidated cases, Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. Presidents and Fellows of Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. University of North Carolina, was whether the Supreme Court should overrule Grutter v. Bollinger (2003) and hold that colleges and universities can’t use race as a factor in admissions.

The Supreme Court in Grutter upheld (5-4) the University of Michigan law school’s race-as-a-plus-factor system but narrowly struck down the undergraduate school’s points-for-race admissions system in companion case Gratz v. Bollinger (2003).

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, who wrote the majority opinion in Grutter, famously contended that race-based admissions policies must be limited in time and the “Court expects that 25 years from now, the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary to further the interest approved today.”

Well, that limit came five years early.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote (PDF) the majority opinion in Students for Fair Admissions and cited the Supreme Court’s seminal decision in Brown v. Board of Education (1954), which held that the right to a public education must be available to all on equal terms — “separate but equal” is unconstitutional.

“Immediately after Brown, we began routinely affirming lower court decisions that invalidated all manner of race-based state action,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote. “In the decades that followed, this Court continued to vindicate the Constitution’s pledge of racial equality.”

All the decisions cited “reflect the ‘core purpose’ of the Equal Protection Clause.”

To eliminate discrimination, the government must eliminate discrimination, without regard to race, color, or nationality. An exception to equal protection under the law must survive a strict scrutiny judicial review and show that the discriminatory law or policy furthers a compelling government interest — the highest standard of judicial review. Discriminating against individuals based on race for “diversity” on college campuses does not stand up to review.

“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,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote. “We have never permitted admissions programs to work in that way, and we will not do so today.”

Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett joined the majority opinion. Justice Thomas filed a concurring opinion, Justice Gorsuch filed a concurring opinion that Justice Thomas joined, and Justice Kavanaugh filed a concurring opinion.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor filed a dissenting opinion, in which Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson joined (in part — Brown Jackson recused herself in the Harvard case). Justice Brown Jackson also filed a dissenting opinion (in part), in which Justices Sotomayor and Kagan joined.