Affirmative action, for better or for worse, may come to an end in the United States during the Supreme Court's next term. On February 21, the Court agreed to hear arguments in the case of
Fisher v. University of Texas, in which Abigail Noel Fisher, a former applicant to the University of Texas, contends that her denial of admission was based on race (she is white) and that minority students with less-impressive academic credentials were admitted instead of her due to the influence of race-based affirmative action on the university's admissions process. The issue at hand is whether the Fourteenth Amendment's assurance of "equal protection under the law" supports or invalidates the system in place at the University of Texas in particular and race-based affirmative action in general, and whether standing jurisprudence on the issue should be re-affirmed or discarded as a consequence.
Obviously, this case has the potential to have a profound impact on higher education, since affirmative action could be definitively ruled unconstitutional, radically impacting admissions procedures at colleges and universities throughout the United States. Since the Supreme Court is much more right-leaning than it was the last time this issue was brought before the justices (in the 2003 case of
Grutter v. Bollinger which upheld, affirmative action at the University of Michigan, with minor alterations
), that potential is now much closer to a reality.
Fisher v. University of Texas may be the most important upcoming Supreme Court case after the challenge to the Affordable Care Act and President Obama's health care reform agenda.
Therefore, as you can imagine, everyone from established journalists to opinionated pundits have weighed in on affirmative action both in the aggregate and with respect to the specific case of Ms. Fisher. Here's a selection of some of the better pieces, all of which are worth reading if you're interested in understanding this important issue from all sides:
"Affirmative action review due next term"
Lyle Denniston, SCOTUSblog
SCOTUSblog, as always, is the best source for a summary of the case, a history of the issue at hand, and a discussion of the different sides, their arguments, and how the Court will likely react.
"Room for Debate: Beyond Race in Affirmative Action"
Various contributors, New York Times
The
New York Times provides a great collection of contributions from law professors, authors, and even a theoretical physicist in a special "Room for Debate" section devoted purely to the controversy surrounding
Fisher v. University of Texas and affirmative action in general. Six individuals comment on the politics, history, and merits of each side of the issue and provide a variety of unique perspectives.
"College diversity at risk"
Lee C. Bollinger, Washington Post
Bollinger is the president of Columbia University and served as a defendant in the 2003 affirmative action cases
Grutter v. Bollinger and
Gratz v. Bollinger. He argues in this op-ed, which came out before the Supreme Court decided to hear arguments in
Fisher v. University of Texas, that affirmative action is essential to preserving diversity in college campuses, and that the court should not only refuse to hear the case, but that it should re-affirm its prior rulings in favor of race-based affirmative action.
"Bad Marriage: Why the Supreme Court Should Stay Out of Affirmative Action"
Richard Thompson Ford, Slate Magazine
It's obvious that Ford supports affirmative action, but his argument that the Supreme Court should stay out of such a politically-charged and controversial issue is compelling nonetheless. He suggests that the Court's previous decisions on affirmative action "have been a disaster: They haven’t made university admissions any fairer, and they’ve sown confusion, resentment, and frustration," and, in comparing the debate to "a couples therapy session in a dysfunctional marriage," characterizes the Court as "an incompetent therapist, [which] has encouraged anger and distrust while making it harder to confront the root causes of disagreement."
"Will the Supreme Court End Affirmative Action?"
Dan Slater, The Daily Beast
Slater writes in reaction to the outcries from supporters of affirmative action over the Supreme Court's decision to hear the
Fisher case and argues that precedent and Court protocol suggest that the justices won't be so bold as to strike down something as influential and mainstream as affirmative action. He says that the combination of a lack of both disagreement among the lower courts and demonstrable harm to Ms. Fisher (she already attended and graduated from Louisiana State University upon being denied admission to the University of Texas and is, essentially, only seeking a refund of her $100 application fee) all but guarantee that the Supreme Court won't overturn decades of precedent to make a statement on affirmative action.
