Split Decision: Supreme court upholds grad policy, strikes Undergrad

MSNBC Live | 06-23-03

[Brian S]

Supreme Court rules in favor of U. of Michigan Admissions Policy

[Luis Gonzalez]

"...it has to be based on skin color according to a majority of the justices..."

Read again, the SCOTUS is simply saying that race may be ONE of the criteria used by a Universiy when considering admitting a student, but it may not be the compelling factor.

[sweetliberty]

The Aborigines are black. They did not come from Africa. Parts of India and southern Egypt are predominantly black, as I understand it, and these people do not have African roots either. Admittedly, I do not know off hand the history of some of the island nations, but I do not believe they are all populated by people who were abducted from Africa to be slaves. Some of these islands are virtually all black.

[Havisham]

O'Connor wrote the majority opinion striking down the undergrad system under the Equal Protections clause.

[autoresponder]

It will if the take any state or federal money.

Hillsdale College in Hillsdale, MICHIGAN has never taken a penny of government money since 1844.

EDUCATING FOR LIBERTY SINCE 1844

Affirmative Action for any woman is another unconstitutional freevie; a woman naturally lives longer then a man and will collect substantially more Social Security upon retirement then a man who worked since he was 12, even if she only works her last 20 years before retirement.

How is it constitutional for 20 years of work and SS contributions to equal or exceed that of 53+ years of work?

All affirmative action is bugus!

Someone who jumps off a ship from Liberia gets 20 points, 40 points if he is 6'7" and can learn to play basketball sorta.

An illegal alien Mexican gets in-state tuition rates in CA; a white male native born US citizen from an ajoining state will not and pays full tuition in CA; in effect, literally subsidizing the illegal non-US citizens!

While they both do this, they collect welfare cash and get food stamps too!

Our wonderful politicians and court system!

[Dane]

Rush was right Bush wimped out on this one too

Actually, the people who voted for Perot also helped with this decision, since Clinton got to appoint two Justices.

[ModernDayCato]

Depends on whom you ask. I was born in 1964, which some people consider the last year of the Boomers, and some don't. Same with my wife.

All kidding aside, I looked into moving to the Carribean. There are really no places left to go. One of the few remaining places that offers economic and personal privacy is Belize. Forget the Carribean, Caymans or St. Maarten. All have been destroyed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which was designed to destroy tax havens. OECD was started by the greatest tax haven in the world (unless you are one of its citizens), the good old USA.

We were also very interested in Switzerland (my wife is of EU nationality), but when they joined the UN I threw that out the window.

Being 30 you may squeak in under the wire, but save your money anyway.

[HumanaeVitae]

I haven't read either opinion (probably won't for a day or so), but here's a little tidbit reported from NRO's Corner from Scalia's dissent in the decision upholding the Law School's AA policy:

“[T]he University of Michigan Law School’s mystical ‘critical mass’ justification for its discrimination by race challenges even the most gullible mind.”

Gee, I wonder who that was directed at.

[justshe]

I think it's possible to point to MANY conservative items this President has done/supported (and this is just a partial list):

Killed the Kyoto Global Warming Treaty.

Killed U.S. involvement in the International Criminal Court.

Killed the U.S. - CCCP ABM Treaty that was preventing the U.S. from deploying our ABM defenses.

Reversed Clinton's move to strike Reagan's anti-abortion Mexico Policy.

Killed Clinton's CO2 rules that were choking off all of the electricity surplus to California.

Killed Clinton's "ergonomic" rules that OSHA was about to implement; rules that would have shut down every home business in America.

Passed 2 tax cuts----1 of which was the largest tax-Dollar value tax cut in history

Pushed through TWO raises for our military.

Increased Defense Dept funding which had deteriorated during the previous 8 years

Signed TWO bills into law that arm our pilots with handguns in the cockpit

Currently pushing for full immunity from lawsuits for our national gun manufacturers.

Ordered Attorney-General Ashcroft to formally notify the Supreme Court that the OFFICIAL U.S. government position on the 2nd Amendment is that it supports INDIVIDUAL rights to own firearms, NOT a leftist-imagined "collective" right.

Supports and will sign legislation outlawing Partial Birth Abortion.

As I said.....only a partial list. You do NOT turn around 8 years of Clinton in just 30 months.

[Revolting cat!]

Congratulations Amerika! You've achieved legally what Communists could only do using tyranny!

Lemme 'splain. In European Communist countries the governments instituted admission policies at the universities (which were all state run) to correct past injustices and admit previously disadvantaged classes. The advantaged classes whose children were denied those extra points and often the admission were the sons and daughters of the despised "intelligentsia" and former aristocracy. These were in a manner perfect self-perpetuating policies - only a voiceless minority was against them, and those admitted and graduated from universities, that is the countries' new elites, would never admit to others or to themselves that they benefitted from discrimination. But in the end, many lives were broken. Somebody please explain to me the difference between then there and here now!

[HumanaeVitae]

s/b dummkopf. SDO needs the extra 'm' for moron.

[ModernDayCato]

So, you don't SEE people who are racially different than you are walking around this country day in and day out?

Actually, no...I see friends, neighbors and fellow Americans. You know -- people. I'm not fixated on race as a way to divide us, like you and the USSC are. Besides, I don't get out much.

The semantical microscope always tires and bores me. I didn't say not to discuss race. The USSC ruling is divisive and offensive to me. So are your personal insults.

Hmmm...the only part of my post you didn't microscopically examine was my suggestion on reading material. Mind like a steel trap...closed.

[xrp]

Belize, eh...good thinking. Thanks!

[george wythe]

O'Connor wrote the majority opinion striking down the undergrad system under the Equal Protections clause.

That's a big win for me, since that's exactly the main reason I found this UMichigan undergrad policy so unfair.

To get to law school, the students must first do undergraduate work. Let's see how many students will be able to benefit by the AA policy at the law school level.

It might become superfluous to have AA for the UMichigan law school if the minority applicants made it through a rigorous undergraduate selection process.

[Luis Gonzalez]

"However, what you -- and many people -- do not acknowledge is the singular importance in the development of those ideals into what has become the American vision of English philosophy and the classical liberal tradition which is almost exclusively the product of the British Isles. With respect to all of the other cultures and languages that go into the American melting pot, lose the essentially Anglo-Saxon attachement to individual rights and liberty, the Anglo-Saxon nonconformists suspicion of state religion, and the commitment to empiricism and an essentially Whig intepretation of history, and you will destroy this country."

"Continental philosophy - whether the Thomist synthesis, Cartesianism or the later German and French system-builders just don't do the same things, they are compatible with fascism and tyranny in a way English thought is not. Come ye from anywhere, be ye of any creed or color, but understand, for all our faults, we've got the basics right here -- don't mess with them."

"My point is that the arivees of diverse origins should not try to remake this country in the images of the places they left because this country was more attractive."

[TLBSHOW]

Sure it does the buck stops with Bush!

[B Knotts]

Justice Thomas wrote an excellent dissent in the law school case. Excerpts:

Like (Frederick) Douglass, I believe blacks can achieve in every avenue of American life without the meddling of university administrators. Because I wish to see all students succeed whatever their color, I share, in some respect, the sympathies of those who sponsor the type of discrimination advanced by the University of Michigan Law School (Law School). The Constitution does not, however, tolerate institutional devotion to the status quo in admissions policies when such devotion ripens into racial discrimination. Nor does the Constitution countenance the unprecedented deference the Court gives to the Law School, an approach inconsistent with the very concept of strict scrutiny.

A close reading of the Court's opinion reveals that all of its legal work is done through one conclusory statement: The Law School has a compelling interest in securing the educational benefits of a diverse student body. Ante, at 21. No serious effort is made to explain how these benefits fit with the state interests the Court has recognized (or rejected) as compelling, see Part I, supra, or to place any theoretical constraints on an enterprising court's desire to discover still more justifications for racial discrimination. In the absence of any explanation, one might expect the Court to fall back on the judicial policy of stare decisis. But the Court eschews even this weak defense of its holding, shunning an analysis of the extent to which Justice Powell s opinion in Regents of Univ. of Cal. v. Bakke, 438 U. S. 265 (1978), is binding, ante, at 13, in favor of an unfounded wholesale adoption of it.

Justice Powell's opinion in Bakke and the Court's decision today rest on the fundamentally flawed proposition that racial discrimination can be contextualized so that a goal, such as classroom aesthetics, can be compelling in one context but not in another. This we know it when we see it approach to evaluating state interests is not capable of judicial application. Today, the Court insists on radically expanding the range of permissible uses of race to something as trivial (by comparison) as the assembling of a law school class. I can only presume that the majority s failure to justify its decision by reference to any principle arises from the absence of any such principle. See Part VI, infra.

B

Under the proper standard, there is no pressing public necessity in maintaining a public law school at all and, it follows, certainly not an elite law school. Likewise, marginal improvements in legal education do not qualify as a compelling state interest.

[autoresponder]

I myself discrimate by shopping a a Korean Deli instead of close Islamic, black, and Mexican groceries.

Why?

Cleaner.

Fresher food.

Friendly.

No arrogance.

No "tricky" tape additions or always "forget" to put the grocery cash register tape in the bags.

Honesty.

All from experience, not prejudice.

I shall now selectively choose store salesmen, bank clerks, or officials, and business contacts based upon my prior experience above.

What you do is up to you.

The Supreme Court and no government can mandate or require me to do otherwise...

[Chairman_December_19th_Society]

Once again the RINOS and the liberals use the constitution as toilet paper

What the leftists said on yesterday's talk shows:

When I'm president, we'll do executive orders to overcome any wrong thing the Supreme Court does tomorrow or any other day, said Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri.

Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich also made a pledge to put affirmative action into federal law as president. If this president doesn't want to let us be one nation, then it's time to elect a president who will let us be one nation, Kucinich said.

The president has divided us, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean said. He's divided us by race by using the word 'quotas.' There's no such thing as a quota at the University of Michigan, never has been.

Al Sharpton said Democrats shouldn't be talking about getting more blacks in high places, but getting the right blacks. If we doubt that, just look at (Supreme Court Justice) Clarence Thomas, he said. Clarence Thomas is my color, but he's not my kind.

Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman said the decision would particularly affect minority-owned media, but predicted it will be temporary. It is wrong; it is un-American, he said.

Democratic Candidates Back Affirmative Action

[Luis Gonzalez]

"So are your personal insults."

Could you please point me out to one of these "personal insults"?

There are none, from me to you that is...there are plenty coming from you to me.

I'd say you're projecting here.

[ModernDayCato]

Take a look at Escape From America. It's a great site.

One last thing on the Gramsci vs. Tocqueville Culture War. This is a great quote from, believe it or not, Lew Rockwell, on John's piece:

Gramscians want to transform America, while the Tocquevillians want to transmit American values to the next generation. But in fact what his "Tocquevillians" too often do is transmit the transformations wrought by the Left.

I think it sums it up perfectly. It was discussed on FR here.