What is affirmative action?
IN JUNE 2023, the United States Supreme Court overturned a long-standing precedent that benefitted Black and Latino college students.
Justice Clarence Thomas, the nation's second Black justice, wrote a concurrence on the matter, describing affirmative action as “rudderless, race-based preferences designed to ensure a particular racial mix in their entering classes.”
What is affirmative action?
Discrimination in the United States is rooted in America's history, but affirmative action was looking to change that.
It is a collection of processes aimed at eliminating unlawful discrimination among applicants, redressing the consequences of earlier discrimination, and preventing it in the future.
It’s focused on including underrepresented groups in sectors such as education and employment based on their gender, ethnicity, sexuality, creed, or nationality.
Affirmative action supporters have worked to achieve goals such as bridging inequities in employment and salary, boosting access to education, fostering diversity, and redressing perceived past wrongs, damages, or hindrances both historically and worldwide.
It aimed to reverse previous patterns of prejudice based on a person's identity and assist groups that have previously been and continue to be discriminated against.
Policies frequently impose hiring quotas, award grants, and scholarships, and deprive institutions of government funds and contracts if they do not follow the policy requirements.
High program expenditures, employing less suitable individuals, and a lack of historical progress in equal representation are among the criticisms leveled towards affirmative action.
It is frequently used in government and educational contexts to guarantee that specific groups within a community have access to promotional, educational, and training opportunities.
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When did affirmative action arise in the US?
, signed by President John F. Kennedy on March 6, 1961, was the first time the term affirmative action was used in the US.
It required government contractors to "take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and employees are treated [fairly] during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin."
It was used to promote anti-discrimination initiatives.
President Lyndon B. Johnson then issued in 1965, requiring government employers to "take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin."
What has the US Supreme Court said about reexamining affirmative action policies?
In 2022, the Supreme Court justices said that they would hear challenges to policies at Harvard and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) that considered race as one of several factors in determining who gets a spot in an entering class.
The justices agreed in a short order to hear two cases in which they were asked to overturn their landmark 2003 decision in , which held that the University of Michigan may consider race in its attempts to recruit a diverse student population.
After hearing the cases, the justices struck down affirmative action in college admissions in June 2023 with a 6-3 decision, stating that race can no longer be a factor.
Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the , saying: "A benefit to a student who overcame racial discrimination, for example, must be tied to that student’s courage and determination.
"Or a benefit to a student whose heritage or culture motivated him or her to assume a leadership role or attain a particular goal must be tied to that student’s unique ability to contribute to the university. In other words, the student must be treated based on his or her experiences as an individual—not on the basis of race.
"Many universities have for too long done just the opposite. And in doing so, they 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 opinion continued.
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Justice Roberts was joined in this opinion by Justices Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote the main dissent and was joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.