Quotas by any other name

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Reverse discrimination is alive and well in the United States, judging by what transpired at the Supreme Court last Thursday and a bill that recently passed New York’s state assembly.

In a 4 to 3 ruling, the Court upheld the University of Texas’s affirmative action program to admit minorities over similarly or more qualified white applicants.

Abigail Noel Fisher, who is white, had sued over her rejection in 2008. Her case reached the Supreme Court in 2013, was remanded to the Fifth Circuit, and re-emerged this term.

Writing for the majority, Justice Kennedy denied her claim that the university’s race-conscious policy violates the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause.

Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas issued fiery dissents, with Justice Alito saying the ruling allows the university to “justify systematic racial discrimination simply by asserting that such discrimination is necessary to achieve ‘the educational benefits of diversity.’”

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