Supreme Court Justice Claims Elite Colleges Are Too Tough For Black Students

Justice Scalia made these statements during the oral arguments of Fisher v. University of Texas, where he also recommended that Black students might be better served in “slower” academic institutions.

Justice Antonin Scalia hinted the University of Texas may be admitting too many blacks, suggesting they belong in “slower track” schools.

Some academicians call such a theory “mismatch”, and Scalia noted an amicus brief in the case that said most black scientists do not come from the most highly selective schools.

“They come from lesser schools where they do not feel that they’re being pushed ahead in classes that are too fast for them”, Scalia said.

Justice Scalia is making the exhausted argument that admitting African-American students into white schools is akin to putting ponies in a horse race.

Justice Antonin Scalia, a longtime opponent of affirmative action, posited that application policies like UT’s might have harmful effects on black students.

Meanwhile, at the Austin campus, many African-American students said that Scalia’s comments have dominated their conversations. The Firth Circuit chose to rule in favor of the University of Texas, causing Fisher to appeal again and sending the case back to the Supreme Court. “Now is not the time and this is not the case to roll back student body diversity in America”.

The conservative justices such as Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. want affirmative action in admissions removed since it is unnecessary and unconstitutional. “What more do they need?” But Wednesday evening, a source familiar with the case clarified that Scalia was summarizing arguments from other cases, as opposed to candidly providing his own commentary on affirmative action.

Colleges and universities, Kennedy wrote, must demonstrate that “available, workable race-neutral alternatives do not suffice” before using race in admissions decisions.

Justice Elena Kagan, who usually votes with the liberals, recused herself from the case, presumably because she worked on the issue when she was President Barack Obama’s Solicitor General.

“Let me ask you about the 10 Percent plan itself, because it seems to me that that is so obviously driven by one thing only, and that thing is race”, The HP quoted Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg saying at the hearing.

Head over to Time’s website for a full rundown of the case. She went to community college for a semester, and then took two years off to take care of her disabled mother.

“Students with an interest in science who are admitted to a very competitive school via a large preference tend to drop out of the sciences at a much higher rate than do otherwise similar students who attend somewhat less competitive programs”, the brief said. And he is an animated questioner of lawyers during oral arguments, eliciting more laughter from the audience than any of his eight fellow justices.

At the University of Texas at Austin, most freshman are admitted under a program that guarantees places to the top 10 percent of high school graduating classes.

ESSENCE Poll: Do You Believe in Affirmative Action? Sotomayor said that if UT’s limited use of race did not pass muster, she doubted whether any holistic review would ever survive.