Affirmative Action

What about the alternative that we simply look at ability?

Interesting... Thanks for the info. I found another source that gave more detail and read. Yes, you are absolutely right.

Okay, forget points. Do you want those making the decisions to weigh whether or not you are white, and have an official, open bias towards accepting white applicants?

At issue: Whether race may be factor in admissions

By Bill Mears
CNN
Monday, June 23, 2003 Posted: 10:34 AM EDT (1434 GMT)



That ruling can only lead to another court challenge. In that it does not define what is permissable.IMO Whatever the school does it will be challenged
http://www.cnn.com/2003/LAW/06/23/scotus.affirmative.action/index.html

au, Yeah, it sounds like double-speak to me! c.i.

The press doesn't have access to the full text of the decision yet Au. It usually takes 3 or 4 days for that to be made public. At that point we'll get to see what the exact wording is, how they rationalized the decision and if they used existing tests or created new ones.

au - So you are saying that the court has effectively ruled that it is okay to consider race as one of many factors, but that you believe that any explicit method for doing so will run afoul of equal protection? Hmmm... Interesting point. You may be right.

If you are, I would argue that it would simply prove that today's decision was wrong.

Fishin
As usual you are correct. However, I am betting it will be confusing and indecisive.

Scrat, Glad to see somebody else saw this decision the same way I did. It's still "double-speak" in my books. c.i.

And I am tickled at how often you and I seem to agree on things lately. Every time I find myself surprised by this, it shows me that I have prejudged your point of view on an issue, and judged it wrongly. I think that's something a lot of us do here in A2K, and these discussions would be more productive if we all did it less.

quick post here....

No, there is no necessary reason why the finding will be confusing or indecisive, other than that when competing interests and principles are being weighed, simplicity is not going to be the result. It will be very interesting to read the findings when they are available. It's quite likely that Dworkin will write a follow-up piece in the NY Review. Linda Greenhouse will likely write (if she hasn't already) in the NY Times on this finding as well, and she's always worth reading.

I think Dworkin will not be too unhappy with this decision, and he suggested it was a possible outcome.

blatham, We are all looking forward to see how they will resolve the obvious conflict. c.i.

Seems like a pretty straight forward decision, from what I just heard. Allowing affirmative action with a couple of limitations...

Tartar, Those "limitations" are what we are interested in seeing. c.i.

Boy oh boy oh boy... Well, the decisions are published and can be found here:

http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/02-241.ZS.html (Law School Case)
and
http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/02-516.ZS.html (Undergrad Case)

What a mess these are. The justices agreeded and dissented all over the place with each other in parts so there are 4 or 5 statements on each and some of them repeat parts of others.. Trying to sort them out makes yer head spin. They would have been better off just publishing 9 complete opinions in each case. Yeash! lol

I always disagreed with a point system which deals with statistics and can be fatally flawed (like some software!) This gives the educational entity the freedom to decide how they want to handle affirmative action within the limitations. If one gets abysmally poor SAT scores, they're fresh out of luck no matter what. These criterias are also inexact so a minority person may get admitted and it will be difficult to say that is was unfair. So how many organizations has everyone tried to get into and was denied based on one rule or another? A country club, perhaps?

No matter how one looks at it, this decision was based on the conscious effort to follow the spirit of the law, not just binding one's views to the letter of the law. Some control freaks I realize would like it their way and their way only.

I'm going to wait for somebody to break through all the legaleze, because I'm too lazy, and legaleze is too hard on my grey matter. c.i.

I agree completely with your above stated assessment of the decision.

Now, at the risk of being labeled a "control freak" I would argue that it is not the proper function of a Supreme Court justice to consider what the "spirit" of the law is or is not. As I understand our system it is precisely--and only--the letter of the law which these men and women are to consider in their rulings. Allowing for the consideration of such subjective concepts as the "spirit" of the law simply allows justices to play at legislating, which is not--as I understand our system--their function.

The Constitution is an extraordinarily brieft document meant by the forefathers to be built upon, perhaps even being rewritten. They almost all believed, at least when they were sober which was seldom, that their could be over a hundred amendments by or time frame. Didn't happen -- are we to believe that there haven't been any political geniuses since the founders of the country? Weren't they considered the intellegentsia of their time? I think everyone should sit down and write their own intepretation of what they intended -- hmmm...sounds like a Supreme Court decision, doesn't it?

LW - I think we are courting a region of agreement here. I agree that they believed we would have more amendments than we do. (Leaving area of agreement...?) I think this is largely attributable to the fact that we stopped obeying the black-letter law of the document--which would have (should have) necessitated further amendments to allow for new powers the government has taken on over time.

I think I understand (and please correct me if I am wrong, as I do not want to wrongly put words in your mouth) that you believe it is either correct or at least acceptable for the federal government to take on powers not enumerated in the Constitution (or amendments thereto) in order to facilitate new functions deemed desirable in the times in which we live.

If that is an accurate assessment of your position, then here is my question:

If we allow the government broad powers to do what they think is best for society, without regard to whether the Constitution provides them such powers, have we not effectively authorized them to ignore the issue of Constitutionality at will? And while this may not be a cause for concern when you favor the policies or actions they choose to take, have we not also ceded to them the de facto power to do things we may not wish them to do? If the Constitution does not limit their power to do the things we like, how can it limit their power to do things we would rather they not do?

Again, I would offer Ashcroft's challenge to the sovereign right of Oregon to legislate on the question of assisted suicide as that state sees fit as an example here. The Constitution is mute on the issue, which means that--absent amendment to change this--the right to decide this issue lies with each state. The federal government has no right to attempt to assert control in this issue, yet does so precisely because Ashcroft and others on the right are placing their opinion on the issue above consideration of the role the Constitution allows them to play in the issue (or the lack thereof).

How was this labeled Supreme Court decision or indecision.
I like C.I. wait for the some articles that will explain the brief in laymans terms. However, from what little I see it can only lead to more infighting. Who is now responsible for determining the weight that being a minority carries. Does it now depend on the bias of the examiner?
As usual the court has taken the making of law unto themselves.