05-908 v. SEATTLE SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. Accepting racial balancing as a compelling state interest would justify the imposition of racial proportionality throughout American society, contrary to our repeated recognition that [a]t the heart of the Constitutions guarantee of equal protection lies the simple command that the Government must treat citizens as individuals, not as simply components of a racial, religious, sexual or national class. Miller v. Johnson, 515 U. S. 900, 911 (1995) (quoting Metro Broadcasting, 497 U. S., at 602 (OConnor, J., dissenting); internal quotation marks omitted). of Ed etal., on certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. See id., at 342; see also Croson, 488 U. S., at 498; Wygant, 476 U. S., at 275 (plurality opinion). . It simply recognizes that judges are not well suited to act as school administrators. of Cal. Four basic considerations have led me to this view. Not everyone welcomed this Courts decision in Brown. The tenth high school, West Seattle, is located west of downtown. And what of laws concern to diminish and peacefully settle conflict among the Nations people? Although racial imbalance can result from de jure segregation, it does not necessarily, and the further we get from the era of state-sponsored racial separation, the less likely it is that racial imbalance has a traceable connection to any prior segregation. Narrow tailoring requires "serious, good faith consideration of workable race-neutral alternatives", Grutter, supra, at 339, 123 S. Ct. 2325, 156 L. Ed. These and related considerations convinced one Ninth Circuit judge in the Seattle case to apply a standard of constitutionality review that is less than strict, and to conclude that this Courts precedents do not require the contrary. Similarly, Jefferson County admits that its use of racial classifications has had a minimal effect, and claims only that its guidelines provide a firm definition of the goal of racially integrated schools, thereby providing administrators with authority to collaborate with principals and staff to maintain schools within the desired range. Race-conscious objectives to achieve diverse school environment may be acceptable. The pluralitys claim that Seattle was never segregated by law is simply not accurate. Over a period of several months in 20072008, JCPS developed a diversity plan based upon social economic and minority status (income of parents), a plan suggested by school board members Steve Imhoff and Larry Hujo in 2002. http: //www.seattleschools.org/area/siso/disprof/2005/DP05 all.pdf. Brief for Respondent at 24, 30, 33. 1, p. 51 (The delicate nature of the problem of segregation and the paramount interest of the State of Kansas in preserving the internal peace and tranquility of its people indicates that this is a question which can best be solved on the local level, at least until Congress declares otherwise). 2, pp. Bd. See also Richmond v. J. at 116669. On June 28, 2007, the United States Supreme Court, in Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. As a matter of social experimentation, the laws in question must satisfy the requirements of the Constitution. A. Croson Co., 488 U. S. 469, 493 (1989) (plurality opinion). And it adjusted its alphabet-based system for grouping and busing students. The Founders meant the Constitution as a practical document that would transmit its basic values to future generations through principles that remained workable over time. But the district vigorously defends the constitutionality of its race-based program, and nowhere suggests that if this litigation is resolved in its favor it will not resume using race to assign students. Written by: Cecelia Sander & Breanne Atzert, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, Seattle Public Schools Transportation Service Standards, Full History of Grutter v. Bollinger & Gratz v. Bollinger, Standard Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Affirmative Action, Parents Involved in Community Schools Website, Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. From almost the beginning, the Supreme Court contended that under this article it was unconstitutional for federal courts to issue mere advisory opinions; rather, the federal courts jurisdiction is restricted to deciding actual cases and controversies. 6, 39 Ill. 2d 593, 237 N.E. 2d 498 (1968). Section 5. different school zones are paired together and, as a result, all students at a certain grade level attend school in the same school building). of Oral Arg. The Court in the seminal case Roe v. Wade made a jurisdictional ruling that although the plaintiff was no longer pregnant and thus technically the issue before the court was moot, given the short nature of pregnancy as compared to the length of the appellate process, requiring a continuing pregnancy for the satisfaction of the case or controversy requirement would effectively deny appellate review. See, e.g., App. See Part I, supra, at 221. Space was available at Bloom, and intercluster transfers are allowed, but Joshuas transfer was nonetheless denied because, in the words of Jefferson County, [t]he transfer would have an adverse effect on desegregation compliance of Young. of Ed. Swann, supra, at 6; see also Green v. School Bd. But see ante, at 29. [4], The Parents Involved decision was a "split decision." Although the Constitution almost always forbids the former, it is significantly more lenient in respect to the latter. In a footnote the Justice added a personal mention of Justice Breyer: "Justice Breyer's good intentions, which I do not doubt, have the shelf life of Justice Breyer's tenure. The dissent elides this distinction between de jure and de facto segregation, casually intimates that Seattles school attendance patterns reflect illegal segregation, post, at 5, 18, 23,[Footnote 15] and fails to credit the judicial determinationunder the most rigorous standardthat Jefferson County had eliminated the vestiges of prior segregation. The principal interest advanced in these cases to justify the use of race-based criteria goes by various names. Furthermore, it was only used in a limited number of schoolsthose that were both over subscribed and relatively unintegrated. Was it de facto? See Part IB, supra. 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. Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration and No one here disputes that Louisvilles segregation was de jure. See also, e.g., Darville v. Dade County School Bd., 497 F.2d 1002, 10041006 (CA5 1974); State ex rel. The plurality tries to draw a distinction by reference to the well-established conceptual difference between de jure segregation (segregation by state action) and de facto segregation (racial imbalance caused by other factors). Until today, this Court understood the Constitution as affording the people, acting through their elected representatives, freedom to select the use of race-conscious criteria from among their available options. Id. Most of the dissents criticisms of todays result can be traced to its rejection of the color-blind Constitution. See, e.g., Henderson, Greenberg, Schneider, Uribe, & Verdugo, High Quality Schooling for African American Students, in Beyond Desegregation 166 (M. Shujaa ed. Sociological Rev. The fact that the controlling opinion would make a school districts use of such criteria often unlawful (and the pluralitys colorblind view would make such use always unlawful) suggests that todays opinion will require setting aside the laws of several States and many local communities. What does the plurality say in response? 1 of King Cty., Washington, and the OCR (June 9, 1978) (filed with the Court as Exh. Cf. of Ed. Students could also apply to attend magnet elementary schools or programs. Is racial diversity a compelling interest that can justify the use of race in selecting students for admission to public high schools? To use race in this way is not to set a forbidden quota. See id., at 335 (Properly understood, a quota is a program in which a certain fixed number or proportion of opportunities are reserved exclusively for certain minority groups (quoting Croson, 488 U. S., at 496)). How could the plurality adopt a constitutional standard that would hold unconstitutional large numbers of race-conscious integration plans adopted by numerous school boards over the past 50 years while remaining true to this Courts desegregation precedent? 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. Post, at 5862. The dissents characterization of Swann as recognizing that the Equal Protection Clause permits local school boards to use race-conscious criteria to achieve positive race-related goals isat besta dubious inference. In 1998, it adopted the plan at issue in this case for assigning students to these schools. in McFarland I, at 190 (Dec. 8, 2003) (Q. 2d 358, 359, 363, 370, 377 (WD Ky. 2000) (Hampton II). 05908, at19. 2d 304 (quoting Bakke, supra, at 315, 98 S. Ct. 2733, 57 L. Ed. For the 2005-2006 school year, seven out of ten of the high schools had racial balances that varied more than 15 percent from the racial balance of the school district as a whole. at 17. Schools argue that a diverse environment teaches students tolerance and respect, and the exposure to diverse viewpoints enhances education and dispels stereotypes. As to tracking enrollments, performance and other statistics by race, tracking reveals the problem; it does not cure it. The Constitution is not that malleable. "[26] An interest "linked to nothing other than proportional representation of various races . Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1 At issue were efforts for voluntary school desegregation and integration in Seattle, Washington, and Louisville, Kentucky. Navigating around that inconvenient authority, the dissent argues that the racial balancing in these plans is not an end in itself but is instead intended to teac[h] children to engage in the kind of cooperation among Americans of all races that is necessary to make a land of three hundred million people one Nation. Post, at 3940. There are again studies that offer contrary conclusions. In fact, they are even more narrowly tailored than the Grutter plan, which withstood strict scrutiny. As the districts demographics shift, so too will their definition of racial diversity. Here, in contrast, the schools worked backward to achieve a particular type of racial balance, rather than working forward from some demonstration of the level of diversity that provides the purported benefits. Other amici dispute these findings. The Court emphasized that education is perhaps the most important function of state and local governments. 347 U. S., at 493. Remediation of past de jure segregation is a one-time process involving the redress of a discrete legal injury inflicted by an identified entity. Where there has been de jure segregation, there is a cognizable legal wrong, and the courts and legislatures have broad power to remedy it. There must be at least 15 percent nonwhite students under Jefferson Countys plan; in Seattle, more than three times that figure. The statute establishing MSAP permits granting federal grants to magnet programs that seek to decrease minority group isolation. 20 U.S.C. The Current Lawsuit, 2003 to the Present. Le Lys Rouge (The Red Lily) 95 (W. Stephens transl. 1986). See supra, at 12. After discussing the democratic element, the dissent repeats its assertion that the social science evidence supporting that interest is sufficiently strong to permit a school board to determine that this interest is compelling. Post, at 40. He adds that this confusion illustrates that Louisvilles assignment plan (or its explanation of it to this Court) is insufficiently precise in respect to who makes the decisions, oversight, the precise circumstances in which an assignment decision will be made; and which of two similarly situated children will be subjected to a given race-based decision. Ante, at 4. These decisions illustrate well how lower courts understood and followed Swanns enunciation of the relevant legal principle. 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. On the other hand, if the Court chooses not to give deference to the School District, school boards may lose some of their decision-making discretion, which could result in diminished community support. area/siso/disprof/2005/DP05all.pdf; Brief for Respond- The plans before us base school assignment decisions on students race. What do the racial classifications do in these cases, if not determine admission to a public school on a racial basis? 3 Seattle School Dist. Likewise, a district may consider it a compelling interest to achieve a diverse student population. the Chief Justice, joined by Justice Scalia, Justice Thomas, and Justice Alito, concluded for additional reasons in Parts IIIB and IV that the plans at issue are unconstitutional under this Courts precedents. United States v. Fordice, 505 U. S. 717, 745 (1992) (Thomas, J., concurring). Yet neither of those briefs contains specific details like the magnitude of the claimed positive effects or the precise demographic mix at which those positive effects begin to be realized. The reasons for rejecting a motives test for racial classifications are clear enough. 05915, p.7, n.4; Tr. PARENTS INVOLVED IN COMMUNITY SCHOOLS v. SEATTLE SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. I have no quarrel with the proposition that the Fourteenth Amendment sought to bring former slaves into American society as full members. Many parents, white and black alike, want their children to attend schools with children of different races. Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1 Consequently, regardless of the perceived negative effects of racial imbalance, I will not defer to legislative majorities where the Constitution forbids it. Brief for Respondent at 1617. 1.9 In Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. See Hallinan & Williams, Interracial Friendship Choices in Secondary Schools, 54 Am. The 2007 Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. In 1969, about 2,200 (of 10,383 total) of the districts black students and about 400 of the districts white students took advantage of the plan. I fear the consequences of doing so for the law, for the schools, for the democratic process, and for Americas efforts to create, out of its diversity, one Nation. Pp. v. Rodriguez, 411 U. S. 1, 4950 (1973) (extolling local control for the opportunity it offers for participation in the decisionmaking process that determines how . The respondents raised this issue in their brief opposing the grant of certiorari. This cannot be justified in the name of the Equal Protection Clause. Regardless of the constitutional validity of such remediation, see Croson, supra, at 524525 (Scalia, J., concurring in judgment), it does not apply here. Between 80% and 90% of all students received their first choice assignment; between 89% and 97% received their first or second choice assignment. 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. On what legal ground can the majority rest its contrary view? Again, neither school board asserts that its race-based actions were taken to remedy prior discrimination. Losing the Dream?, p. 30, fig. 1 that the racial classifications used by school districts in Seattle and Louisville to create diverse schools were unconstitutional. 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). Compare ante, at 39 (It was not the inequality of the facilities but the fact of legally separating children on the basis of race on which the Court relied to find a constitutional violation in 1954), with Juris. Subsequent to the District Courts dissolution of the desegregation order (in 2000) the board simply continued to implement its 1996 plan as modified to reflect the courts magnet school determination. Whenever the board finds that racial imbalance exists in a public school, it shall give written notice to the appropriate school committee, which shall prepare a plan to eliminate imbalance and file a copy with the board. At that time the school district did not provide transportation from the childrens neighborhoods to Ingraham; the children would have had to take three public buses for a commute of two hours in each direction. Todays opinion reveals that the plurality would rewrite this Courts prior jurisprudence, at least in practical application, transforming the strict scrutiny test into a rule that is fatal in fact across the board. Harvard Club of Washington, DC 1 is an important case to educators, parents and students. Although the Court has certified three separate questions in this case, all three questions essentially involve the same inquiry: in light of the Courts rulings in Grutter and Gratz, does the Seattle School Districts use of race in high school admissions violate the Equal Protection Clause? It contends that race was used in a narrow way because the race tiebreaker determined the placement of only about ten percent of incoming high school students and was one of several factors under consideration.
