2023-06-30 02:45:24
The Supreme Court of the United States put an end this Thursday to positive discrimination programs in universities, in a historic ruling that provokes visions found in the society of that country.
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Its six conservative justices ruled, contrary to the opinion of the three more liberal court, that procedures for admission to university centers based on applicants’ skin color or ethnic origin are unconstitutional.
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“The student should be treated based on their experiences as an individual, not based on their race,” argued Chief Justice John Roberts.
Conservative magistrates believe that universities are free to consider an applicant’s personal experience, for example, if he suffered racism, when weighing his application against others more academically qualified.
But “deciding, mainly based on skin color, is not allowed, it is in itself racial discrimination,” they said. “Our constitutional history does not tolerate that option,” Roberts added.
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The student should be treated based on their experiences as an individual, not based on their race
Following the nation’s civil rights movement of the 1960s, several highly selective universities introduced racial and ethnic criteria into their admissions procedures to address inequalities stemming from America’s segregationist past.
This policy, known as “positive discrimination,” allowed for an increase in the proportion of African, Hispanic, or American Indian students in classrooms, but it has always been criticized in conservative circles as opaque and racist.
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Demonstrators for and against affirmative action at universities in the United States.
The Supreme Court has ruled against the quotas on several occasions since 1978, but it had always authorized universities to take into account racial criteria, among others.
Until now, he had considered the search for greater diversity on campus “legitimate”, even if it meant breaking the principle of equality among all Americans.
However, this Thursday he made a 180 degree turn, as he had already done on June 24, 2022 by annulling the federal right to abortion, which he had guaranteed since 1973.
Positions on the Court’s decision
“This is a great day for the United States (…). Let’s go back to everything based on merit. And this is how it should be! ”, Wrote former Republican President Donald Trump (2017-2021) on his social network, who during his tenure leaned the composition of the Court towards a more conservative wing.
For his part, in a televised speech, Democratic President Joe Biden said he “strongly disagreed”. “Discrimination still exists in the United States,” he stated.
“Today’s decision (Thursday) does not change that. It is a simple fact that if a student has had to overcome adversity on their path to education, universities should recognize and value it.”
“We cannot allow this decision to be the last word,” added the president, for whom “this is not a normal court.”
The harshest criticism came from within the court itself, from the mouths of the three judges who voted against. The court is “reversing decades of case law and immense progress,” Judge Sonia Sotomayor wrote on her behalf.
“In doing so, the court cements a superficial norm” of indifference to skin color “as a constitutional principle in an endemically segregated society,” he wrote.
Although universities are allowed to take applicants’ “personal experiences” into account, this is tantamount to putting “carmine on a pig,” he said, a phrase translated from English that means that no matter how hard you try to disguise something, it will always remain true. what it is.
Supporters of affirmative action in the United States.
For The New York Times, the decision could change the admission process at the country’s elite universities and make them “more subjective and mysterious.” “The Court’s ruling against the two universities could lead to an admissions system that is even more subjective and mysterious, since the universities will try to comply with the law, but also to admit a diverse class of students,” says that medium. .
But Harvard University has hinted that it will use this opening of the sentence, which could minimize its impact.
The Court’s ruling against the two universities could lead to an admissions system that is even more subjective and mysterious.
The Court ruled that “an applicant’s comments on how his color has affected his life, whether in terms of discrimination, inspiration or otherwise, may be taken into account. We will undoubtedly abide by this decision,” the prestigious university declared yesterday.
Mayan McClinton, a young black woman attending summer school at Harvard, told AFP that minorities continue to be underrepresented.
“And it is unfair to think that we are occupying the seats of the richest white students,” he protested.
The ruling stems from a lawsuit filed in 2014 against the oldest private and public universities in the United States: Harvard and the University of North Carolina.
AFP
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