Two of the biggest cases before the Supreme Court next term weighing the legality of affirmative action will be heard by the justices on Halloween, Oct. 31.
The Supreme Court announced Wednesday that Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows at Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. University of North Carolina will be argued on Monday, Oct. 31.
A decision, though, could take months and would likely come by June 2023.
The legal battles involve Harvard University and the University of North Carolina and whether they discriminate against Asian American applicants in violation of the Constitution. The justices have been asked to toss affirmative action.
Defenders of the universities point to the 1978 case of Regents of University of California v Bakke, where the high court ruled that racial quotas were unlawful, but consideration of race as one part of an admissions factor is constitutional.
Subsequently, the Supreme Court also decided Grutter v. Bollinger in 2003 and Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin in 2016, reaffirming that affirmative action policies do not run afoul of the Constitution.
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Students for Fair Admissions argued the use of race in the evaluation of applications discriminates against Asian Americans who, the group contends, would be accepted to top colleges in much greater numbers under a race-blind, test-score-driven system.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said during her confirmation hearing that she planned to recuse herself from the case since she sat on Harvard’s Board of Overseers.
Originally the high court planned to hear the legal battle alongside another affirmative action dispute involving the University of North Carolina, but in a recent order, the justices have decided to hear them separately, allowing Justice Jackson to weigh in on the UNC dispute.
• Alex Swoyer can be reached at aswoyer@washingtontimes.com.
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