Justice Ketanji Brown Jacksonfirst black woman to serve in Supreme Courtno punches in criticizing her conservative counterparts on Thursday for ruling affirmative action is prohibited at American universities, saying they acted with “forgetfulness to let them eat cake.”
Jackson has made no secret of his anger that the court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, believes that the University of North Carolina’s affirmative action admissions policies are unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment. . Equal Protection Clause.
Jackson wrote: “Our country has never been so color blind. “Given the long history of race-based, state-funded priorities in the US, to say anyone is currently a victim if a university considers whether that legacy of discrimination has give their candidates an unequal advantage whether or not there is a well-documented ‘inequity transmission between generations’ that still affects our citizens.
The court also ruled against Harvard, saying it can no longer enact stricter admission standards for Asian-American students—an effort to help maintain diversity on campus. Jackson, who serves on Harvard’s Board of Supervisors, backed down from that ruling.
She was poignant in her objection to Thursday’s ruling, writing that “no one benefits from ignorance.”
She wrote: “With their indifference to feeding them cake, today the majority drags on the illegitimacy and claims ‘color blindness for all’ by legal decree. “But considering race irrelevant in the law doesn’t make it so in life. And by being so detached from the past and present practical experience of this country, the Court is now drawn into intervening in the vital work that UNC and other institutions of higher education are working on. do to solve real-world problems in the United States.”
Also obviously angry is Justice Sonia Sotomayor—the only justice left from the landmark court decision in 2016 was quick to uphold the legitimacy of affirmative action in American universities.
In his own dissent, Sotomayor wrote, “inherent racial inequality remains a reality to this day.” She also criticized a majority of the courts for having concluded that “racial indifference is the only constitutionally authorized means” for achieving racial equality in admissions.
She writes: “The Fourteenth Amendment interpretation is not only contrary to our historical precedent and doctrine, but is also based on the illusion that racial inequality is a matter of a single person. another generation.”
She added, “Ignoring race will not equalize a racially unequal society. What was true in the 1860s, and again in 1954, remains true today: Equality requires the recognition of inequality.”
Sotomayor and Jackson’s opinions were not enough to overcome the court’s 6-3 majority, which has recently backed some longstanding rulings, like abortion protection issued by court order in Roe sues Wade in 1973.
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Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and Chief Justice John Roberts.
Alex Wong/Getty
Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that a majority of courts felt colleges must accept the most qualified applicants without considering race, a potentially fatal blow to diversity in higher education.
Roberts wrote: “Students should be treated based on their personal experience—not race. “Many universities have been doing the opposite for too long. And in doing so, they erroneously conclude that the measure of an individual’s identity is not their superior challenge, in-built skill or lesson learned, but the color of their skin. Our constitutional history does not accept that choice.”
While Jackson criticized the ruling and its ability to exclude race from admissions decisions, conservative judges leaned toward making the country more color blind. Judge Clarence ThomasBlacks, pointed out in a concurrence opinion that color blindness was the whole problem.
Thomas wrote that the majority decision “sees what college admissions policies look like: a rudderless, race-based preference designed to ensure racially specific admixture within their admission classes.”
“Those policies go against our Color Blind Constitution and our Nation’s ideals of equality,” he added.
Jackson wrote that she couldn’t disagree further, saying affirmative action leveled the playing field for aspiring college students who face intergenerational inequality.
“It is that inequality that admissions programs like UNC help address, for the benefit of all of us,” she wrote. “Because majority judgment impedes progress without any basis of law, history, logic or justice, I disagree.”
