A compelling interest exists in avoiding racial isolation, an interest that a school district, in its discretion and expertise, may choose to pursue. In the context of public schooling, segregation is the deliberate operation of a school system to carry out a governmental policy to separate pupils in schools solely on the basis of race. Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. Regardless of its name, however, the interest at stake possesses three essential elements. denied, 546 U. S. 1061 (2005). [Footnote 24], The similarities between the dissents arguments and the segregationists arguments do not stop there. What other numbers are the boards to use as a starting point? I cannot endorse that conclusion. After decades of vibrant life, they would all, under the pluralitys logic, be written out of the law). Whats your understanding of when a school suffers from racial isolation? About 68% received their first choice. But what about Seattles? If the Court defers to the district, this will reaffirm local autonomy and give districts broad discretion to develop educational policy. Rather, the Court has insisted upon some showing of prior discrimination by the governmental unit involved before allowing limited use of racial classifications in order to remedy such discrimination. The Courts decision in Croson, supra, reinforced the difference between the remedies available to redress de facto and de jure discrimination: To accept [a] claim that past societal discrimination alone can serve as the basis for rigid racial preferences would be to open the door to competing claims for remedial relief for every disadvantaged group. Both school districts voluntarily used individualized racial classifications to achieve diversity and/or to avoid racial isolation through student assignment. Second, "the interest in diversity in higher education", as upheld in, This page was last edited on 5 February 2023, at 17:43. Is it not of all the activities of government the one which most nearly approaches the hearts and minds of people, the question of the education of their young? of Oklahoma City Public Schools v. Dowell, 498 U. S. 237, 249250 (1991); Green v. School Bd. 1, 127 S. Ct. 2738 (U.S. 2007) Brief Fact Summary. Public Schools, 416 F.3d 513, 514 (2005) (McFarland II). 2001) (describing President Nixons lobbying for affirmative action plans, e.g., the Philadelphia Plan); White, Affirmative Actions Alamo: Gerald Ford Returns to Fight Once More for Michigan, Time, Aug. 23, 1999, p. 48 (reporting on President Fords support for affirmative action); Schuck, Affirmative Action: Past, Present, and Future, 20 Yale L. & Poly Rev. Race-based government measures during the 1860s and 1870s to remedy state-enforced slavery were therefore not inconsistent with the color-blind Constitution. Jefferson County has failed to present any evidence that it considered alternatives, even though the district already claims that its goals are achieved primarily through means other than the racial classifications. In 20002001, with the racial tiebreaker, it was 17.9 percent Asian-American, 13.3 percent African-American, 7 percent Latino, 58.4 percent Caucasian, and 3.4 percent Native-American. Justice Breyers good intentions, which I do not doubt, have the shelf life of Justice Breyers tenure. More recently, the school district sent a delegation of high school students to a White Privilege Conference. See Equity and Race Relations White Privilege Conference, https://www.seattleschools. of Ed., 402 U. S., at 16far more heavily than the school districts themselves. ospi. The justification for race-conscious remedies in McDaniel is therefore not applicable here. That interest was not focused on race alone but encompassed all factors that may contribute to student body diversity, id., at 337, including, e.g., having overcome personal adversity and family hardship, id., at 338. In addition, the Court stated that [a]ttending an ethnically diverse school, id., at 473, could help prepare minority children for citizenship in our pluralistic society, hopefully teaching members of the racial majority to live in harmony and mutual respect with children of minority heritage. Ibid. First, the histories of Louisville and Seattle reveal complex circumstances and a long tradition of conscientious efforts by local school boards to resist racial segregation in public schools. 3 Seattle School Dist. JEFFERSON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION etal. The next Term, we accordingly stated that full compliance with Brown I required school districts to achieve a system of determining admission to the public schools on a nonracial basis. Brown II, 349 U. S., at 300301 (emphasis added). The Constitution generally prohibits government race-based decisionmaking, but this Court has authorized the use of race-based measures for remedial purposes in two narrowly defined circumstances. And it has its roots in preventing what gradually may become the de facto resegregation of Americas public schools. In support, the dissent unquestioningly cites certain social science research to support propositions that are hotly disputed among social scientists. Brief for Respondent at 3342. Not even the school districts go this far, and for good reason. 05908, 426 F.3d 1162; No. 5 (Jan. 2003), online at http://www.civilrightsproject.harvard.edu/research/reseg03/AreWeLosingtheDream.pdf (Frankenberg, Lee, & Orfield) (using U. S. Dept. 2002), but then withdrew its opinion, finding that the appeal turned on an unsettled question of state law which the state courts would best be able to answer in the first instance. Regents of Univ. Fourth, the pluralitys approach risks serious harm to the law and for the Nation. Some have concluded that black students receive genuine educational benefits. The dissents reliance on this Courts precedents to justify the explicit, sweeping, classwide racial classifications at issue here is a misreading of our authorities that, it appears to me, tends to undermine well-accepted principles needed to guard our freedom. of Ed. Ibid. Voluntary cessation does not moot a case or controversy unless subsequent events ma[ke] it absolutely clear that the allegedly wrongful behavior could not reasonably be expected to recur, Friends of Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Environmental Services (TOC), Inc., 528 U. S. 167, 189 (2000) (quoting United States v. Concentrated Phosphate Export Assn., Inc., 393 U. S. 199, 203 (1968) (internal quotation marks omitted)), a heavy burden that Seattle has clearly not met. 05908, p.9, n. 9. 2, p. 50 ([T]he state is deprived of any power to make any racial classifications in any governmental field). After he had enrolled and after the academic year had begun, he then applied to transfer to his preferred school after the kindergarten assignment deadline had passed, id., at 21, possibly causing school officials to treat his late request as an application to transfer to the first grade, in respect to which the guidelines apply. Indeed, in its brief Seattle simply assumes that the educational benefits track the racial breakdown of the district. 05915, at 31. Both cities once tried to achieve more integrated schools by relying solely upon measures such as redrawn district boundaries, new school building construction, and unrestricted voluntary transfers. One of those plans, which involved using race as a factor in assigning students to high schools, is the subject of this litigation. Stevens, J., filed a dissenting opinion. Id. The conclusions he has set forth in Part IIIA of the Courts opinion are correct, in my view, because the compelling interests implicated in the cases before us are distinct from the interests the Court has recognized in remedying the effects of past intentional discrimination and in increasing diversity in higher education. 10 on Reargument in Brown I, O.T. 1953, p.15 (Summary of Argument). 1, 2007, p. B1 (describing racial issues in Seattle schools). . in No. At that time, about 20% or 12,000 of the districts students were black. certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the ninth circuit, No. Finally, it argues that race-neutral techniques, such as a lottery or taking into account many forms of diversity in a holistic approach, would be as effective as the racial tiebreaker. Most of the dissents criticisms of todays result can be traced to its rejection of the color-blind Constitution. Justice Kennedys second concern is directly related to the merits of Seattles plan: Why does Seattles plan group Asian-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, Native-Americans, and African-Americans together, treating all as similar minorities? After ninth grade, students can decide voluntarily to transfer to a preferred district high school (without any consideration of race-conscious criteria). This case was brought by a non-profit organization, Parents Involved in Community Schools (PICS), representing parents of students in the Seattle School District (District) who objected to the school districts use of race as a tiebreaker for admission to schools as violating the Equal Protection Clause. Dawkins & Braddock 401403; Wells & Crain 550. In Louisville, a federal court entered a remedial decree. A. Croson Co., 488 U. S. 469, 504 (1989). More specifically, the Court stated that race could be used as a plus, but not in such a way that isolates the applicant from the pool of those being considered. 693, 227 N.E.2d 729. 547 U. S. __ (2006). We have found many. See, e.g., Federal Maritime Commn v. South Carolina Ports Authority, 535 U. S. 743, 770 (2002) (Stevens, J., dissenting). [S]chool districts themselves retain a state-law obligation to take reasonably feasible steps to desegregate, and they remain free to adopt reassignment and busing plans to effectuate desegregation (emphasis added)); School Comm. . Parents Involved, the Court noted that: Seattle and Louisville had not demonstrated that they seriously considered race-neutral alternatives; the individual racial classifications used had a minimal impact that cast doubt on their necessity; the districts defined ante, at 1517 (opinion of Thomas, J.) 1977 (1961) (President Kennedy); Exec. These other meanse.g., where to construct new schools, how to allocate resources among schools, and which academic offerings to provide to attract students to certain schoolsimplicate different considerations than the explicit racial classifications at issue in these cases, and we express no opinion on their validitynot even in dicta. 2002). In each city the school board modified its plan several times in light of, for example, hostility to busing, the threat of resegregation, and the desirability of introducing greater student choice. The segregationists also relied upon the likely practical consequences of ending the state-imposed system of racial separation. KORRELL ON BEHALF OF PETITIONER MR. KORRELL: Mr. Chief Justice, and may it please the Court. 1986) (citing Swann and North Carolina Bd. 3, p. 71 ([T]o make such a transition, would undo what we have been doing, and which we propose to continue to do for the uplift and advancement of the education of both races. See ante, at 1112 (Thomas, J., concurring); ante, at 3, 17 (opinion of Kennedy, J.). 2d 834 (WD Ky. 2004); McFarland v. Jefferson Cty. Segregation at the time of Brown gave way to expansive remedies that included busing, which in turn gave rise to fears of white flight and resegregation. Andy was accepted into this selective program but, because of the racial tiebreaker, was denied assignment to Ballard High School. The en banc Ninth Circuit declared that when a racially diverse school system is the goal (or racial concentration or isolation is the problem), there is no more effective means than a consideration of race to achieve the solution. Parents Involved VII, supra, at 1191. According to the dissent, integration involves an interest in setting right the consequences of prior conditions of segregation. Post, at 37. The Ninth Circuit affirmed. The Seattle school district classifies children as white or nonwhite; the Jefferson County school district as black or other. In Seattle, this racial classification is used to allocate slots in oversubscribed high schools. For the 20002001 school year, five of these schools were oversubscribedBallard, Nathan Hale, Roosevelt, Garfield, and Franklinso much so that 82 percent of incoming ninth graders ranked one of these schools as their first choice. But that distinction concerns what the Constitution requires school boards to do, not what it permits them to do. Dawkins & Braddock 403. Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. The only support todays dissent can draw from Grutter must be found in its various separate opinions, not in the opinion filed for the Court. Politics 987, 991 (1976) (similar in Georgia); McDaniel v. Barresi, 402 U. S. 39, 40, n. 1 (1971) (Clarke County, Georgia). The Chief Justice states that the Massachusetts racial imbalance Act did not require express classifications. Racial imbalance is the failure of a school districts individual schools to match or approximate the demographic makeup of the student population at large. in No. . Next, the dissent argues that the interest in integration has an educational element. 426 F.3d 1162, 1166 (9th Cir. The present cases are not governed by Grutter. Indeed, in 1968, the Illinois Supreme Court rejected an equal protection challenge to a race-conscious state law seeking to undo de facto segregation: To support [their] claim, the defendants heavily rely on three Federal cases, each of which held, no State law being involved, that a local school board does not have an affirmative constitutional duty to act to alleviate racial imbalance in the schools that it did not cause. Louisvilles plan was created and initially adopted when a compulsory district court order was in place. The suggestion that our decision today is somehow inconsistent with our disposition of that appeal is belied by the fact that neither the lower courts, the respondent school districts, nor any of their 51 amici saw fit even to cite the case. 539 U. S., at 328. The Nations schools strive to teach that our strength comes from people of different races, creeds, and cultures uniting in commitment to the freedom of all. That, too, strongly supports the lawfulness of their methods. The districts here invoke the ultimate goal of those who filed Brown and subsequent cases to support their argument, but the argument of the plaintiff in Brown was that the Equal Protection Clause prevents states from according differential treatment to American children on the basis of their color or race, and that view prevailedthis Court ruled in its remedial opinion that Brown required school districts to achieve a system of determining admission to the public schools on a nonracial basis. Brown v. Board of Education, 349 U. S. 294, 300301 (emphasis added). To Crawford? To begin with, Justice Breyer seeks to justify the plans at issue under our precedents recognizing the compelling interest in remedying past intentional discrimination. On appeal, a three-judge panel the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed, but upon en banc rehearing the court affirmed the lower court decision. The OCR and the school board entered into a formal settlement agreement. 3, p.8 ([W]e take the unqualified position that the Fourteenth Amendment has totally stripped the state of power to make race and color the basis for governmental action); Tr. I have explained why I do not believe the Constitution could possibly find compelling the provision of a racially diverse education for a 23-year-old law student but not for a 13-year-old high school pupil. Section 5. 3, p. 76 (The question is a practical one for them to solve; it is not subject to solution in the theoretical realm of abstract principles); Tr. Asian, Hispanic, White, etc. A non-profit group, Parents Involved in Community Schools, sued the District, arguing that the racial tiebreaker violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment as well as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Washington state law. At that time one high school, Garfield, was about two-thirds minority; eight high schools were virtually all white. 1, No. Cf. See Seattle School District, Middle School and High School 2006-2007 Enrollment Guide for Parents, at 40. 2. Government action dividing us by race is inherently suspect because such classifications promote notions of racial inferiority and lead to a politics of racial hostility, Croson, supra, at 493, reinforce the belief, held by too many for too much of our history, that individuals should be judged by the color of their skin, Shaw v. Reno, 509 U. S. 630, 657 (1993), and endorse race-based reasoning and the conception of a Nation divided into racial blocs, thus contributing to an escalation of racial hostility and conflict. Metro Broadcasting, 497 U. S., at 603 (OConnor, J., dissenting). (explaining why dicta is not binding). Supra, at 1920. Adarand, supra, at 227. App. When questioned about the close timing, Gordon stated that all the District had to do was "push a button" to change things over to a plan compliant with the Court's ruling. of Boston v. Board of Education, 389 U. S. 572 (1968) (per curiam). Yet the Seattle public schools have not shown that they were ever segregated by law, and were not subject to court-ordered desegregation decrees. http://reportcard. It applied that label to 26 schools, including 4 high schoolsCleveland (72.8% minority), Franklin (76.6% minority), Garfield (78.4% minority), and Rainier Beach (58.9% minority). Contrary to the dissents rhetoric, neither of these school districts is threatened with resegregation, and neither is constitutionally compelled or permitted to undertake race-based remediation. The Seattle School District allowed students to apply to any high school in the District. Some districts, such as Richmond, California, and Buffalo, New York, permitted only one-way transfers, in which only black students attending predominantly black schools were permitted to transfer to designated receiver schools. The constitutional problems with government race-based decisionmaking are not diminished in the slightest by the presence or absence of an intent to oppress any race or by the real or asserted well-meaning motives for the race-based decisionmaking. The Seattle Plan: Mandatory Busing, 1978 to 1988. See Beard v. Banks, 548 U. S. ___, ___ (2006) (Thomas, J., concurring in judgment) (noting that two were killed and hundreds were injured in race rioting subsequent to this Courts decision in Johnson). [Footnote 7] Although Louisville once operated a segregated school system and was subject to a Federal District Courts desegregation decree, see ante, at 7; Hampton v. Jefferson Cty. While the government is not required to take race into account to address problems arising from racial discrimination, it is constitutionally permitted to do so. And, as an aspiration, Justice Harlans axiom must command our assent. See also Brief for Appellees in Brown v. Board of Education, O.T. 1952, No. v. Swann, 402 U. S. 43, 46 (1971) (no absolute prohibition against [the] use of mathematical ratios as a starting point); Swann, 402 U. S., at 2425 (approving the use of a ratio reflecting the racial composition of the whole school system as a useful starting point, but not as an inflexible requirement). The distinction between government and private action, furthermore, can be amorphous both as a historical matter and as a matter of present-day finding of fact. To School Committee of Boston? For the purpose of this section, racial imbalance shall be deemed to exist when the per cent of nonwhite students in any public school is in excess of fifty per cent of the total number of students in such school. 352 Mass., at 695, 227 N.E. 2d, at 731. 05908, at 224a225a, 253a259a, 307a. of Boston in 1968. v. Seattle Sch. 05915, at 38 (Decisions to assign students to schools within each cluster are based on available space within the [elementary] schools and the racial guidelines in the Districts current student assignment plan); id., at 82 (acknowledging that a student may not be assigned to his or her resides school if it has reached the extremes of the racial guidelines). One schoolGarfieldis more or less in the center of Seattle. See supra, at 27. Nonetheless, Bakke was used to uphold the validity of affirmative action programs that fostered diversity in higher education for a quarter of a century. Times, June 11, 2006 (quoting David Armor as commenting [w]e did find the [racial] achievement gap changing significantly and acknowledging that he did find a modest association for math but not reading in terms of racial composition and achievement, but theres a big state variation (emphasis added)). Between 80% and 90% of all students received their first choice assignment; between 89% and 97% received their first or second choice assignment. 1996). Electoral district lines are facially race neutral so a more searching inquiry is necessary before strict scrutiny can be found applicable in redistricting cases than in cases of classifications based explicitly on race (quoting Adarand, 515 U. S., at 213)). v. Barnette, 319 U. S. 624, 637 (1943) (The Fourteenth Amendment protects the citizen against the State itself and all of its creaturesBoards of Education not excepted). Under the Supreme Court's precedents on racial classification in higher education, Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Bollinger, race-based classifications must be directed toward a "compelling government interest" and must be "narrowly tailored" to that interest. See Part IB, supra. I join Part IIIC of the Courts opinion because I agree that in the context of these plans, the small number of assignments affected suggests that the schools could have achieved their stated ends through different means. What does the plurality say in response? The subsequent statements by the unanimous Court in Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. For his part, Justice Thomas faults my citation of various studies supporting the view that school districts can find compelling educational and civic interests in integrating their public schools. Regardless, the plurality cannot object that the constitutional defect is the individualized use of race and simultaneously object that not enough account of individuals race has been taken. The first tiebreaker selects for admission students who have a sibling currently enrolled in the chosen school. Compare, e.g., App. But unlike the plurality, such a judge would also be aware that a legislature or school administrators, ultimately accountable to the electorate, could nonetheless properly conclude that a racial classification sometimes serves a purpose important enough to overcome the risks they mention, for example, helping to end racial isolation or to achieve a diverse student body in public schools. See Gratz v. Bollinger, 539 U. S. 244, 301 (2003) (Ginsburg, J., dissenting); Adarand Constructors, Inc. v. Peńa, 515 U. S. 200, 243 (1995) (Stevens, J., dissenting). This fundamental principle goes back, in this context, to Brown itself. Narrow tailoring requires serious, good faith consideration of workable race-neutral alternatives, Grutter, supra, at 339, and yet in Seattle several alternative assignment plansmany of which would not have used express racial classificationswere rejected with little or no consideration. The plan paired (or triaded) imbalanced black schools with imbalanced white schools. Past allegations in another case provide no basis for resolving these cases. Parents in Louisville, Kentucky and Seattle, Washington argued that those districts' school integration programs - each of which was voluntarily adopted by local school boards to promote racial integration - violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. 1, 2, and 4 and for Respondents in No. Justice Breyer, with whom Justice Stevens, Justice Souter, and Justice Ginsburg join, dissenting. 2d, at 360. The U.S. Constitution in Article III 2 specifies the scope of matters on which the federal courts can issue decisions. See id., at 152 (opinion of Stewart, J.). See Parts IIIIV, supra, at 3757. 2d, at 1289. In doing so, the plurality parts company from this Courts prior cases, and it takes from local government the longstanding legal right to use race-conscious criteria for inclusive purposes in limited ways. In concurrence with the majority opinion Justice Clarence Thomas restated his view, in agreement with Justice Harlan's dissent in Plessy, that the Constitution is "color-blind." See also ante, at 15 (opinion of Kennedy, J.). This argument that different rules should govern racial classifications designed to include rather than exclude is not new; it has been repeatedly pressed in the past, see, e.g., Gratz, 539 U. S., at 282 (Breyer, J., concurring in judgment); id., at 301 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting); Adarand, supra, at 243 (Stevens, J., dissenting); Wygant, 476 U. S., at 316317 (Stevens, J., dissenting), and has been repeatedly rejected.