The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that colleges and universities must stop considering race in admissions, forcing institutions of higher education to look for new ways to achieve diverse student bodies.
In a decision split along ideological grounds, the court's conservative majority struck down admissions plans at Harvard and the University of North Carolina, the nation's oldest private and public colleges, respectively.
Writing for the majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts said that the high court has "permitted race-based admissions only within the confines of narrow restrictions. University programs must comply with strict scrutiny, they may never use race as a stereotype or negative, and — at some point — they must end."
The Harvard and UNC programs, "however well intentioned and implemented in good faith, fail each of these criteria."
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Roberts said that for too long universities have “concluded, wrongly, that the touchstone of an individual’s identity is not challenges bested, skills built, or lessons learned but the color of their skin. Our constitutional history does not tolerate that choice.”
The only institutions of higher education explicitly left out of the ruling are the nation's military academies, Roberts wrote, suggesting that national security interests could affect the legal analysis.
Justice Clarence Thomas, the nation's second Black justice who had long called for an end to affirmative action, wrote separately that the decision “sees the universities’ admissions policies for what they are: rudderless, race-based preferences designed to ensure a particular racial mix in their entering classes.”
The court's three liberal justices, Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, dissented.
"Today's decision rolls back decades of precedent and momentous progress," Sotomayor wrote. "It holds that race can no longer be used in a limited way in college admissions to achieve such critical benefits....In so holding, the Court cements a superficial rule of colorblindness as a constitutional principle in an endemically segregated society."
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Both Thomas and Sotomayor, who have acknowledged affirmative action played a role in their admissions to college and law school, took the unusual step of reading a summary of their opinions aloud in the courtroom.
In a separate dissent, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson — the court’s first Black female justice — called the decision “truly a tragedy for us all.”
Jackson, who sat out the Harvard case because she had been a member of an advisory governing board, wrote, “With let-them-eat-cake obliviousness, today, the majority pulls the ripcord and announces ‘colorblindness for all’ by legal fiat. But deeming race irrelevant in law does not make it so in life.”
The vote was 6-3 in the North Carolina case and 6-2 in the Harvard case.
In remarks from the White House, President Joe Biden said he strongly disagreed with the court's decision and called out the Supreme Court for "once again walking away from decades of precedent."
"Discrimination still exists in America and today's decision doesn't change that," Biden said, adding that colleges shouldn't let Thursday's ruling "be the last word. While the Court can render a decision, it cannot change what America stands for."
Former President Barack Obama said in a statement that affirmative action “allowed generations of students like Michelle and me to prove we belonged. Now it’s up to all of us to give young people the opportunities they deserve — and help students everywhere benefit from new perspectives.”
Former President Donald Trump had a starkly different take. Trump, the current GOP presidential frontrunner, wrote on his social media network that the decision marked “a great day for America. People with extraordinary ability and everything else necessary for success, including future greatness for our Country, are finally being rewarded.”
The court took up affirmative action in response to challenges at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina. Lower courts upheld admission systems at both schools, rejecting claims that the schools discriminated against white and Asian-American applicants.
The cases are brought by conservative activist Edward Blum, who also was behind an earlier affirmative action challenge against the University of Texas as well as the case that led the court in 2013 to end the use of a key provision of the landmark Voting Rights Act.
Blum formed Students for Fair Admissions, which filed the lawsuits against both schools in 2014.
The group argues that the Constitution forbids the use of race in college admissions and has called for overturning earlier Supreme Court decisions that said otherwise. Roberts' opinion effectively did so, both Thomas and the dissenters wrote.
Colleges and universities can use other, race-neutral ways to assemble a diverse student body, including by focusing on socioeconomic status and eliminating the preference for children of alumni and major donors, Students for Fair Admissions argues.
The schools contend that they use race in a limited way, but that eliminating it as a factor altogether would make it much harder to achieve a student body that looks like America.
In an emailed letter to the school community, Harvard said it will comply with the court's decision.
"We write today to reaffirm the fundamental principle that deep and transformative teaching, learning, and research depend upon a community comprising people of many backgrounds, perspectives, and lived experiences," the letter read. "That principle is as true and important today as it was yesterday."
Kevin Guskiewicz, UNC's chancellor, said in a statement to NBC News, the university "remains firmly committed to bringing together talented students with different perspectives and life experiences and continues to make an affordable, high-quality education accessible to the people of North Carolina and beyond. While not the outcome we hoped for, we will carefully review the Supreme Court’s decision and take any steps necessary to comply with the law.”
The Biden administration had urged the court to preserve race-conscious admissions. The Trump administration had taken the opposite position in earlier stages of the cases.
UNC says its freshman class is about 65% white, 22% Asian American, 10% Black and 10% Hispanic. The numbers add to more than 100% because some students report belonging to more than one category, a school spokesman said.
White students are just over 40% of Harvard’s freshman class, the school said. The class also is just under 28% Asian American, 14% Black and 12% Latino.
Nine states already prohibit any consideration of race in admissions to their public colleges and universities: Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington.
In 2020, California voters easily rejected a ballot measure to bring back affirmative action.
Public opinion on the topic varies depending on how the question is asked. A Gallup Poll from 2021 found 62% of Americans in favor of affirmative action programs for racial minorities. But in a Pew Research Center survey in March, 74% of Americans, including majorities of Black and Latino respondents, said race and ethnicity should not factor into college admissions.
The chief justice and Jackson received their undergraduate and law degrees from Harvard. Two other justices, Elena Kagan and Neil Gorsuch, went to law school there, and Kagan was the first woman to serve as the law school’s dean.
Every U.S. college and university the justices attended, save one, urged the court to preserve race-conscious admissions.
The Supreme Court has upheld race-conscious college admissions programs dating back to 1978, weighing in favor of the practice just six years ago. But that was before the three appointees of former President Donald Trump joined. Jackson was chosen this year by President Joe Biden.
