190190 Chapter 5 | Civil RightsThe landmark decision for affirmative action in higher education was Regents of
the University of California v. Bakke (1978).^105 Allan Bakke, a white student, sued when
he was denied admission to medical school at the University of California, Davis, in
successive years. Bakke’s test scores and GPA were significantly higher than those
of some minority students who were admitted under the school’s affirmative action
program. Under that program, 16 of the 100 slots in the entering class were reserved
for minority or disadvantaged students. The Supreme Court agreed with Bakke that
rigid racial quotas were unconstitutional but allowed race to be used in admissions
decisions as a “plus factor” to promote diversity in the student body. This standard was
largely unquestioned until 1996, when the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals held that it
was unconstitutional to consider race in law school admissions at the University of
Texas. In 2000, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Seattle, however, reached the
opposite conclusion and ruled that race could be considered in admissions to promote
educational diversity.^106
In 2003, the Court affirmed Bakke, saying that the University of Michigan
law school’s “holistic approach,” which considered race as one of the factors in
the admission decision, was acceptable. However, the more rigid approach for
undergraduate admissions at Michigan, which automatically gave minority students
20 of the 100 points needed to guarantee admission, was unacceptable.^107 This was
the first time that a majority of the Court clearly stated that “student body diversity is
a compelling state interest that can justify the use of race in university admissions.”^108
In 2006, voters in Michigan passed Proposal 2, an initiative to make it illegal for state
bodies to consider race in admissions and hiring decisions; this policy was upheld by the
Supreme Court in 2014.^109 This means that states will be able to decide on an individual
basis whether to consider affirmative action in higher education, because the policy is
neither prohibited nor required by the Constitution.
In 2008, a white student, Abigail Fisher, claimed she was a victim of reverse
discrimination and sued the University of Texas at Austin. Texas had achieved a
racially diverse student body by extending offers of admission to the top 10 percent of
every graduating high school class in the state (in recent years, this policy was changed
to the top 7 percent). This approach worked because most high schools in Texas were
still segregated. In June 2016, the Court upheld Texas’s affirmative action policy
by a 4–3 vote.^110 Despite this ruling, documents leaked in August 2017 revealed that
the Justice Department was going to “investigate, and potentially sue, colleges and
universities over admissions decisions that are perceived as discriminating against
wh ite ap pl ic a nt s .”^111 For more on affirmative action in college admissions, see the Take
a Stand feature.Multicultural and Immigration Issues
A host of issues involving the multicultural, multiracial nature of American society will
become more important as whites cease to constitute the majority of the population
by mid-century. At its core, these issues are rooted in the fact that the United States is
a nation of immigrants. Will that history continue, and if so, what shape will it take? Is
our country a “melting pot,” focused on the assimilation of new groups, or is it more
like a “tossed salad,” in which each immigrant group maintains its cultural identity
but creates a new, better collective whole? Groups who favor one or the other of these
conceptions of American society often clash over issues such as whether English
should be our official language (31 states have such laws) and whether bilingual
education should be offered in public schools. But the biggest area for debate on this
topic in recent years concerns immigration reform and border security.Abigail Fisher sued the University of
Texas over its affirmative action policy.
She is shown talking to reporters
outside the Supreme Court after the
case was heard in 2016.Full_06_APT_64431_ch05_148-197.indd 190 16/11/18 1:31 PM