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

[ModernDayCato]

First you get the zip code of the city that matches yours, then you go to ESRI (they provide the data for Realtor.com), and plug it in. It's a two step process.

[Burkeman1]

Its by no means settled yet.

It is settled for at least another generation at least. What this decision did today is simply wink to would be racialists who want to maintain there racial admitting practices. It is telling them not to be so obvious. It tells them not to have formal "point" systems, or strict guidlines written down somewhere in admittance office guidlines and internal memos. In short- it is telling them to keep their quotas verbal and unofficial. That race can still be a "factor" is all that matters in this decision. The degree of the "factor" is anyone's guess and the court just made it easier for Colleges and Universities to hide these practices and make future litigation against them almost impossible to bring to court much less to prove and there will be virtually no written policies, guidelines, or procedures to bring into court. This actually has made "affirmitive action" far more entrenched.

This was a deeply corrupt and cynical ruling.

[Torie]

I read about half of the O'Connor decision and it is a mess. Diversity is grand, but the race element must be temporary, and used only if needed to achieve diversity, and other forms of diversity must also be sought, and the key is to take an individualized approach, and not use strict automatic formulas. What this decision means is a full employment act for admissions officers. They will need to bulk up to go through with papering the record to satisfy Sandra. On balance, this is a defeat, and a big one, for those who are against disguised quotas.

I support the law school approach at Michigan myself, but I would limit it to law schools. Sandra's approach can be applied anywhere.

Having said all that, take the case of California. If admissions were strictly on the basis of academic competence, the classes would be about 50% Asian, 45% Anglo, and 5% other, maybe. In a state where about half the residents are Hispanic or Black, the net result is that public support for elite public higher education would arguably be eviscerated over time, and these institutions really are a generator of economic growth. That might be a subtext to all of this.

I wish I had a good answer to it all, but I don't.

[Torie]

The problem with the "resource" is that it does not tell one how many Hispanics are in the zip code (who tend to call themselves "white"), so what good is it? :)

[jwalsh07]

O'Connor has just created a free 401K plan for all the lawyers and litigants that can be rounded up.

She should be impeached, disbarred and sent to the old justice home forthwith!

[Torie]

OK, now that that is off your chest, and I know it felt good, how about my penultimate paragraph? Any comments?

[Torie]

Any thoughts or comments?

[jwalsh07]

I can't do incisive analysis today. Due to internal testing requirements commensurate with my age, I am under the influence of drugs for the first time in many, many , many moons.

Moons (get it?)

However, I did ping you today to congratulate you on your skills at prognostication.

[Torie]

Yes, thanks. Good luck btw. Aging is annoying. I am against it. We need to pass a law to put a stop to it.

[rdf]

My side was creamed, and we got little help from the Olson brief.

The Administration's public statement is a sign that there is no energy to press colorblind law from that branch.

It's all up to the people and legislatures.

I'm not at all surprised, this is what I expected ... perhaps a little worse.

Cheers,

Richard F.

[Luis Gonzalez]

"Until a government is instituted among men that defines those rights and the means to defend them objectively...there are NO rights."

Rights have always been there, before the concept of government there were rights, because before governments there was God.

The government does not define those rights, not if you are to believe the Founders anyway, these rights are granted to ALL men by Our Maker. The fact that some government may not recognize these unalienable rights does not mean that these rights do not exist, they are simply being violated. The lowest member of the most oppresive society in the world has God given rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

God was creating man long before man began creating governments.

[Jorge]

The hysteria is running rampant over about 4 threads now. WHEW!!!

I haven't seen this many jerks performing knee-jerks in MONTHS!

Yes, from reading these posts you'd think it was the end of the world.

Sounds just like the frantic Dems..everytime something happens they don't like.

[CatoRenasci]

The vast majority came here either seeking their fortune, or escape from persecution.

Indeed, you make my case when you say the new immigrants come for the economic benefits or the benefit of liberty. And those benefits are precisely the distinctive aspects of our society that are so closely tied with the English philosophical, constitutional, legal, and religious heritage that defines the American expression of the high culture of the West.

Unfortunately, many of these immigrants wish to reap the benefits without accepting the worldview that makes them possible.

On a strict philosophical level, of course, I cannot know what you do or do not understand. All I can do is examine your words and draw conclusions, or surmises to be more precise, because they are not intended to be definitive. Your words suggest you do not indeed understand the dangers of "multiculturalism."

Be happy in your work.

[Torie]

Most of these immigrants work their butts off, because they want a better life. The idea that they are somehow hostile to Western values, is one not supported by the evidence. In part, that is because those that come here, are a non random sample of their home countries. The posited death of what is good about Western culture in this wonderful land of ours is way oversold. JMO.

[rb22982]

You and I both know that I'm no fan of Bush, but I don't see how you can fault Bush over this one at all

[Reagan Man]

I don't fault PresBush at all.

It was the Bush administration that took Michigan University to the Supreme Court and fought tooth and nail to get both affirmative action issues struck down. The SC split its decisions and sided with the MU on one and with the DoJ-Solicitor General Office, on the other.

[Luis Gonzalez]

""Constans et perpetua voluntas, jus suum cuique tribuendi."

Before the Magna Carta, there was Justinian.

[CatoRenasci]

I wish I could agree with you, but based on what I've seen over the past 50+ years, I cannot. So many of the immigrants I've known, and they are among the more educated and successful, have no clue about the ideas that this country was founded upon and which make its liberty and prosperity possible.

[Torie]

I assume you can do better than anecdotal evidence, based on your personal experience. If that were the standard, our experiences would be largely in disharmony. Maybe that is a function of where we live, or what we choose to see or not see.

[Luis Gonzalez]

There is not now, nor was there ever, an "American melting pot", there has always been an American tapestry, or if you prefer to stay with the whole food thing, an American stew.

The culture that was introduced to this piece of the Americas by the settlers of the original thirteen British colonies, did not survive the expansion undiluted.

It absorbed every culture it encountered along the way, and retained a bit of it, showing visible signs of that change in the celebration of culturally significant events such as Columbus Day, St. Patrick's Day, in a diverse cuisine where spaghetti or egg rolls are as common place as such American classics as meatloaf and hamburgers.