Posted on 07/28/2014 7:40:38 AM PDT by Academiadotorg
The issue of affirmative action may soon find itself again before the Supreme Court of the United States. university of texas-austin
Court watchers will remember that it was just recently (a little more than a year ago) that the Court took up the issue, in the case of Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin. Despite what some may have been looking for in a broad, sweeping denunciation or approval of using race-based factors in college admissions, the Court decided to remand, or send the issue back down to the circuit court so that the case could be “considered and judged under a correct analysis.”
And the deliberations of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit have just come to an end.
In a lengthy, 41-page opinion, the majority composed of Patrick Higginbotham and Carolyn King, rendered an interesting (and for the non-lawyerly classes, mightily tiresome) reading.
At its essence, the 2-judge majority rejected the challenge by Fisher, upholding the University’s admissions regimen. The Court found that “to deny UT Austin its limited use of race in its search for holistic diversity would hobble the richness of the educational experience” at the flagship institution.
The Fifth Circuit concluded that “universities may use race as part of a holistic admissions program where it cannot otherwise achieve diversity. This interest is compelled by the reality that university education is more the shaping of lives than the filling of heads with facts – the classic assertion of the humanities.”
Indeed, the majority reaffirmed Justice Kennedy’s sentiments in the Fisher case: “Attainment of a diverse student body … serves values beyond race alone, including enhanced classroom dialogue and the lessening of racial isolation.”
The trend (since the famous Grutter decision) in cases that have made their way through the federal pipeline up to the Supreme Court is that a court’s judicial calculus should be largely deferential to the university’s expertise in trying to enrich the collegiate environment.
This type of respect for the university may be well-justified; after all, no judge is trained to evaluate the efficacy of an admissions program, but an appeal to the entire Fifth Circuit en banc, or to the Supreme Court itself will shed light on whether the Fifth Circuit arrived at the right conclusion.
The advantage of a university to have a racially diverse student body is beneficial in which ways? How does it manifest itself? Is it mystical like the unicorn or pixies?
Racism in this country has never waned, it just jumped from one group to another. In this case, academics who want an ideologically monolithic student body using the trojan horse called “Diversity”.
So by the court’s logic institutional racism is OK in a state run organization if it furthers the goals of the university? By that reasoning couldn’t a university claim it’s goal is to be the top acedimic school in the country and deny entry to everyone but Jews and Asians?
Sadly what the court really meant is that the law means whatever it has to mean so that the politically pre-determined outcome can be legal.
It would appear that by issuing this chirpy feel-good summary, this court is begging for a blunt and brutal overturning by the Supremes.
Ridiculous “victory” for the Left who are now practically genetically disposed to both lie and cheat to advance their cause for lying and cheating in society.
Then they'd have to over turn themselves but saying the Brown decision wasn't written all that well, opening that bottomless can of racist worms.
The USSC has been punting the issue for years.
When my youngest child unit was still in HS we journeyed to the second world city of Austin for the state debate tournament held at UT. This generated a question among us———Do any white students and/or any US citizens go to this school?
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