Ben Kosubevsky

Professor Alonso
American Experience
14 May 2014
Country of Equal Opportunity
On April 29, 2014, it was ruled by the Supreme Court that in the state of
Michigan, voters had a right to ban the use of race in college admission factors . In
other words, they decided that a college cannot give preferential admittance to an
African American student over a Caucasian, Asian, or Hispanic student . This style of
admittance goes against affirmative action. The United States of America is
supposed to be a country of freedom, where everyone is equal . Giving preferential
treatment to one race radically contradicts that idea . That is why the decision to
uphold the current legislature is a sound one .
Justice Sonia Sotomayors opinion is that bringing up the idea of race only
perpetuates the idea of racism in America, "In my colleagues' view, examining the
racial impact of legislation only perpetuates racial discrimination . This refusal to
accept the stark reality that race matters is regrettableAs members of the judiciary
tasked with intervening to carry out the guarantee of equal protection, we ought not

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sit back and wish away, rather than confront, the racial inequality that exists in our
society." She believes that race does play a huge part in admissions factors and she
is completely correct. Otherwise, why would an application form ask what ethnicity a
person is? Or, for that matter, why would there be special scholarships designated for
a particular race. By constantly mentioning race, racism is allowed to play an even
larger factor in America.
The vote has stopped any possible opportunities for minorities such as Latin
Americans, African Americans, and even women by allowing more bans against
affirmative action to be put into effect. The original case was called Schuette case,
Proposal 2, and its basis was to prohibit public universities from giving preferential
treatment to any individual based on ethnicity, gender, or national origin . This
proposal was found to be unconstitutional by a federal appeals court . The Supreme
Court has now overturned the lower court and passed this proposal . It has been a
belief of the Supreme Court for decades that the majority of voters may not alter the
political process in a way that infringes on the rights of the minorities . The Supreme
Court has upheld multiple instances of this ideal . Therefore, it is odd that they would
choose to finally uphold this vote. They cast aside a long held belief in order to pass
this proposal. This, though, does make sense from the viewpoint of the constitution .

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America is a democratic state, where majority is supposed to rule . In this way, how
can the minority outvote the majority? Justice Sotomayor goes as far as saying: Our
Constitution places limits on what a majority of the people may do . She is completely
correct in her statement, seeing as how that even though a majority of citizens may
want an idea to pass, the minority can still have it denied .
Justice Sotomayor holds firmly to the conviction that, The best way to stop the
discrimination of race is to stop discriminating based on race . Every time that a
person, or especially a university makes a decision based on ethnicity, they further
promote racism and the troubles with which it plagues todays society . She is
completely correct in dissenting her opinion as she is stating a popular opinion that
many average citizens are simply too afraid to say based on the fact that they might
be marked as racist. The word racism has lost its meaning from being a word that
truly described hating a race for no reason to something that is used to call upon
anything that refers to race in any way, shape, or form . One only needs to look as far
back as the Brown vs Board of Education to see what true racism represents . That
case was about whether African American children could be allowed to attend the
same public schools as Caucasian children. The main argument was that the quality
of education in the schools designated for African American children was severely
subpar to those schools for white children. That is the mark of true racism, where one

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race suffers compared to another when they could attend the same school and
receive equal education. The word racism is todays society has lost its meaning
completely and being called a racist is much more feared than it should be . This is
where Justice Sotomayors dissent comes in perfectly. She is not afraid to speak the
truth about how to finally end the idea of racism .
Justice Sotomayor understands that this case will open the door for other
courts to ban affirmative action. This is the first step in eliminating racism, by putting
everyone on equal ground. Minorities attend the same public schools and have the
same, non-financial based, opportunities as the majorities . That is not to say that
Caucasians cannot have financial difficulties, they may, but under todays society it is
much easier for an impoverished minority to receive financial aid than a Caucasian .
That is where racism truly shines, it is no longer against the minority, but against the
majority of people.
Justice Sotomayors dissent is the bridge between open discrimination and the
affirmative action ban that Michigan now has. Justice Sotomayor cites a few
examples where the state denies racial minorities the access to the political process,
and the courts were required to intercede . One of the examples she cites is: After
the landmark 1954 Brown v Board of Education ruling on school desegregation, the

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school board in Arlington County, Virginia, prepared a desegregation plan, prompting

the Virginia General Assembly to prevent the county from electing its school board,
making it an appointed body. In Louisiana, the legislature gave the governor the
authority to overrule any school boards decision to integrate . The state goes against
what the federal court has decided and promotes blatant discrimination . Giving the
governor, a state official, power to overrule the school board is ludicrous . America is
the land of equal opportunity and if the school board was willing to desegregate, what
say should the governor have? This is what, effectually, happened in Michigan,
where the voters chose to no longer allow the public universities to discriminate
based on ethnicity, gender, or race.
As a result of the ban, minority enrollment in the public universities of Michigan
has dropped by twenty-five percent, while the number of college ready African
Americans has increased (huffingtonpost.com). This fact goes to show just how
many African Americans were being accepted to a university just based on race .
With equality in place, this shows that they were not truly a good fit for the college,
but were admitted just to fill a quota. Otherwise, these people would be accepted just
the same after the ban on affirmative action. It is in this was that racism can be truly
eliminated from American society.