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The Ivy League university, Harvard, has been cleared of racial discrimination against Asian American applicants. On Thursday, a federal appeals court ruled in favor of the university, offering relief to Harvard and other colleges that take race into consideration regarding its admissions process.
According to the Associated Press, it will also allow for a potential review by a U.S. Supreme Court that is growing towards conservatism.
Two Judges at the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston heard the lawsuit that was brought on by an anti-affirmative-action group that alleged Harvard of imposing a “racial penalty” when it came to Asian Americans, but the judges rejected their claims, upholding a precedented ruling that also cleared the university of discrimination in its admission process.
Plaintiffs of the lawsuit are part of Students for Fair Admissions which is a nonprofit with a goal of tossing out race when it comes to college admissions, the news outlet reports. It is led by president Edward Blum who was disappointed with the judges’ ruling but said “our hope is not lost.”
“This lawsuit is now on track to go up to the U.S. Supreme Court where we will ask the justices to end these unfair and unconstitutional race-based admissions policies at Harvard and all colleges and universities,” Blum added.
A review of the case may head to the Supreme Court, and according to several legal scholars, the matter is strong enough to be reviewed.
There have been three lawsuits filed by Students from Fair Admissions, as they continue to fight for the elimination of race. It’s a hot topic in the nation, but multiple decisions for many decades by the U.S. Supreme Court have always ruled in favor of colleges who choose to use race as a limiting factor to encourage campus diversity.
A lot of colleges and universities use this practice to help applicants of a certain underrepresented race get an edge on campus. But some groups are just against it, including the Trump administration who opposed the practice and favored the plaintiff’s argument in this case.
Last month the Justice Department brought for a suit against Yale that was similar to the claims against Harvard, accusing the ivy league of discriminating against Asian Americans and white applicants.
As for Harvard, the Judges supported their decision, writing, “The issue before us is whether Harvard’s limited use of race in its admissions process in order to achieve diversity in the period in question is consistent with the requirements of Supreme Court precedent. There was no error,” the judges wrote.
Fortunately, Harvard’s admissions process is legal.
Some Asian American groups supported Harvard, while others filed briefs in opposition. Those against it say there is evidence that Harvard’s acceptance rate of Asian Americans is lower than any other racial group. And says that Black and Hispanic students who have lower grades were accepted over some Asian Americans.
There was another claim that the university continues to keep an ongoing racial breakdown among its new students, which the plaintiffs say adds to the illegal “racial balancing” cited in the suit.
In its defense, Harvard denies the allegations of discrimination, saying the race of an applicant is only taken into consideration in the narrow way allowed by the U.S. Supreme Court. Also admitting when it comes to close calls, a student may get a favorable outcome if they are underrepresented at the university. However, race is never a factor that is used to count out an applicant, officials say.
The three-week trial uncovered other reasons why Asian Americans were admitted at lower rates than other races, those reasons were not listed in the AP article.
District Judge Allison D. Burroughs ruled in 2019 that Harvard’s practice regarding admissions is “not perfect,” however, it did not find “evidence of any racial animus whatsoever.”
The appeal judges sided with a district court that also ruled in Harvard’s favor that its personal rating was not influenced by race. “Harvard has demonstrated that it values all types of diversity, not just racial diversity,” the judges wrote. “Harvard’s use of race in admissions is contextual and it does not consider race exclusively.”
But now that Donald Trump has appointed three Supreme Court Justices, America’s highest court is on its way to becoming more conservative, which makes it likely that there will be tighter boundaries on the use of race pertaining to admissions or could forbid the practice altogether.
