These allegations were never proved and were not even made in this case. If too many students list the same school as their first choice, the district employs a series of tiebreakers to determine who will fill the open slots at the oversubscribed school. No case of this Court has ever relied upon the de jure/de facto distinction in order to limit what a school district is voluntarily allowed to do. See Brief for Respondent at 13. as Amici Curiae 29. To Seattle School Dist. His resides school was only a mile from his new home, but it had no available spaceassignments had been made in May, and the class was full. The notion that a democratic interest qualifies as a compelling interest (or constitutes a part of a compelling interest) is proposed for the first time in todays dissent and has little basis in the Constitution or our precedent, which has narrowly restricted the interests that qualify as compelling. Parents Involved VII, supra, at 1166. That determination typically will not be nearly as difficult as the dissent makes it seem. It is reasonable to conclude that such resegregation can create serious educational, social, and civic problems. 1, supra, at 461; Complaint and Motion to Dismiss or Affirm in Seattle School Dist. as a matter of educational policy school authorities may well conclude that some kind of racial balance in the schools is desirable quite apart from any constitutional requirements. Then-Justice Rehnquist echoed this view in Bustop, Inc. v. Los Angeles Bd. In the 20002001 school year, for example, with the racial tiebreaker, the entering ninth grade class at Franklin High School had a 60% minority population; without the racial tiebreaker that same class at Franklin would have had an almost 80% minority population. [Footnote 3]. As the districts demographics shift, so too will their definition of racial diversity. Justice Thomas recoils at the suggestion that black students can only learn if they are sitting next to white students. v. Barksdale, 348 F.2d 261, 266 (CA1 1965). 05-915 v. JEFFERSON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION et al. 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. The context here is one of racial limits that seek, not to keep the races apart, but to bring them together. In Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle (2007), the United States Supreme Court found that the school district was using race in an unconstitutional manner in its assignment plan. Is it not a fact that the very strength and fiber of our federal system is local self-government in those matters for which local action is competent? Strict scrutiny applies to any government classification based on race. Source: Modified from E. Frankenberg, C. Lee, & G. Orfield, A Multiracial Society with Segregated Schools: Are We seattleschools.org/schools/aaa/history.htm (all Internet materials as visited June 26, 2007, and available in Clerk of Courts case file). Both school districts voluntarily used individualized racial classifications to achieve diversity and/or to avoid racial isolation through student assignment. Without the racial tiebreaker, the class would have been 39.6 percent Asian-American, 30.2 percent African-American, 8.3 percent Latino, 1.1 percent Native-American, and 20.8 percent Caucasian. 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? Here Roberts provides the following string citation: Here, Roberts provides the following string cite: Id., at 337, 123 S. Ct. 2325, 156 L. Ed. For decades now, these school boards have considered and adopted and revised assignment plans that sought to rely less upon race, to emphasize greater student choice, and to improve the conditions of all schools for all students, no matter the color of their skin, no matter where they happen to reside. Here Roberts provides the following string citation: quoting Gratz v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 244, 270, 123 S. Ct. 2411, 156 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. No State shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. U. S. I have no quarrel with the proposition that the Fourteenth Amendment sought to bring former slaves into American society as full members. 2528. 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? See N. St. John, School Desegregation Outcomes for Children 6768 (1975) (A glance at [the data] shows that for either race positive findings are less common than negative findings); Stephan, The Effects of School Desegregation: An Evaluation 30 Years After Brown, in Advances in Applied Social Psychology 183186 (M. Saks & L. Saxe eds. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the opinion of the court as to Parts I, II, III-A and III-C. Part I recounted the background of the plans of the two school boards. And the inquiry into less restrictive alternatives demanded by the narrow tailoring analysis requires in many cases a thorough understanding of how a plan works. In the Jefferson County case, the District Court found that the school district had asserted a compelling interest in maintaining racially diverse schools, and that its plan was, in all relevant respects, narrowly tailored to serve that interest. Court-Imposed Guidelines and Busing, 1972 to 1991. 05915, at 4, these ambiguities become all the more problematic in light of the contradictions and confusions that result. See, e.g., Cohens v. Virginia, 6 Wheat. Rather, race-based government decisionmaking is categorically prohibited unless narrowly tailored to serve a compelling interest. In particular, they emphasize that the children on whose high school admissions the case was originally based have since graduated high school, while the children of the other involved parents are not yet at the high school age. And it has its roots in preventing what gradually may become the de facto resegregation of Americas public schools. in Briggs v. Elliott, O.T. 1952, No. This is a fatal flaw under the Courts existing precedent. The Court has changed significantly since it decided School Comm. of Ed., 402 U. S. 1, 6 (1971); see also Monroe v. Board of Commrs of Jackson, 391 U. S. 450, 452 (1968). No. Past wrongs to the black race, wrongs committed by the State and in its name, are a stubborn fact of history. 2d 304: "[The law school's] policy makes clear there are many possible bases for diversity admissions, and provides examples of admittees who have lived or traveled widely abroad, are fluent in several languages, have overcome personal adversity and family hardship, have exceptional records of extensive community service, and have had successful careers in other fields." The dissent points to data that indicate that black and white students in desegregated schools are less racially prejudiced than those in segregated schools. Post, at 40 (internal quotation marks omitted). This Court then held that the initiativewhich would have prevented the Seattle Plan from taking effectviolated the Fourteenth Amendment. . Justice Breyer also tries to downplay the impact of the racial assignments by stating that in Seattle students can decide voluntarily to transfer to a preferred district high school (without any consideration of race-conscious criteria). Post, at 46. Similarly, the segregationists made repeated appeals to societal practice and expectation. In both cities, the school boards adopted plans designed to achieve integration by bringing about more racially diverse schools. See Gomillion v. Lightfoot, 364 U. S. 339, 343344 (1960) (admonishing that, in dealing with claims under broad provisions of the Constitution, which derive content by an interpretive process of inclusion and exclusion, it is imperative that generalizations, based on and qualified by the concrete situations that gave rise to them, must not be applied out of context in disregard of variant controlling facts). at 17. k12. The plan also established Parent Assistance Centers to help parents and students navigate the school selection and assignment process. Even apart from Grutter, five Members of this Court agree that avoiding racial isolation and achiev[ing] a diverse student population remain today compelling interests. We relied on the fact that the courts of last appeal of some sixteen or eighteen States have passed upon the validity of the separate but equal doctrine vis-a-vis the Fourteenth Amendment. 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. Id., at 328 (Our holding today is in keeping with our tradition of giving a degree of deference to a universitys academic decisions). Roberts cites to: "Id., at 330, 123 S. Ct. 2325, 156 L. Ed. 17, 48 (1978). The following notice, published in a Louisville newspaper in 1976, gives a sense of how the districts race-based busing plan operated in practice: Louisville Courier Journal, June 18, 1976 (reproduced in J. Wilkinson, From Brown to Bakke: The Supreme Court and School Integration 19541978, p. 176 (1979)). 1, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Parents_Involved_in_Community_Schools_v._Seattle_School_District_No._1&oldid=1137632337. School Bd., 195 F.3d 698, 701 (CA4 1999); Wessman v. Gittens, 160 F.3d 790, 809 (CA1 1998). Another 16% received an acceptable choice. Outside the school context, this Courts cases reflect the fact that racial mixing does not always lead to harmony and understanding. Statement in Davis v. County School Board, O.T. 1952, No. That plan, which took effect before 1996, is the very plan that in all relevant respects is in effect now and is the subject of the present challenge. To McDaniel? Because equal protection on the basis of race is at issue, the applicable standard of review to be applied in this case is strict scrutiny, as both parties agree, and as is well established in the Courts prior case law. (In my opinion, it is not necessary to find that the Board of Education has been guilty of racial discrimination in the past to support the conclusion that it has a legitimate interest in employing more black teachers in the future). The board opposed dissolution, arguing that the old dual system had left a demographic imbalance that prevent[ed] dissolution. In 2000, after reviewing the present plan, the District Court dissolved the 1975 order. Thus, the school districts must demonstrate that their use of such classifications is narrowly tailored to achieve a compelling government interest. of New Kent Cty., 391 U. S. 430, 441442 (1968). The plurality, by contrast, does not acknowledge that the school districts have identified a compelling interest here. 2. Jefferson County Public Schools operates the public school system in metropolitan Louisville, Kentucky. See, e.g., Powell, Living and Learning: Linking Housing and Education, in Pursuit of a Dream Deferred: Linking Housing and Education Policy 15, 35 (J. Powell, G. Kearney, & V. Kay eds. The dissent thus alters in fundamental ways not only the facts presented here but the established law. 1, pp. Accordingly, the plans are unconstitutional. 2, p. 76 ([A] State has power to establish a school system which is capable of efficient administration, taking into account local problems and conditions). VII, 1, ch. I do not know of any opinion which buoyed Marshall more in his pre-Brown days ). They were further persuaded that these plans differed from other race-based programs this Court has considered because they are certainly more benign than laws that favor or disfavor one race, segregate by race, or create quotas for or against a racial group, Comfort, 418 F.3d, at 28 (Boudin, C.J., concurring), and they are far from the original evils at which the Fourteenth Amendment was addressed, id., at 29; 426 F.3d, at 1195 (Kozinski, J., concurring). [Footnote 9] The Sixth Circuit affirmed in a per curiam opinion relying upon the reasoning of the District Court, concluding that a written opinion would serve no useful purpose. McFarland v. Jefferson Cty. of Boston v. Board of Education, 389 U. S. 572 (1968) (per curiam). There, a Georgia school board voluntarily adopted a desegregation plan. They asked the court to dissolve the desegregation order and to hold the use of magnet school racial guidelines unconstitutional. 1, 23 (1995); A. Siqueland, Without A Court Order: The Desegregation of Seattles Schools 10 (1981) (hereinafter Siqueland); D. Pieroth, Desegregating the Public Schools, Seattle, Washington, 19541968, p.6 (Dissertation Draft 1979) (hereinafter Pieroth). See Education Commission of the States, Open Enrollment: 50-State Report (2007), online at http://mb2.ecs.org/reports/Report.aspx?id=268. of Oral Arg. Given that state law had previously required the school board to maintain a dual school system, the county was obligated to take measures to remedy its prior de jure segregation. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 56061 (1992). . Law is not an exercise in mathematical logic. in No. Similarly, Jefferson Countys expert referred to the importance of having at least 20 percent minority group representation for the group to be visible enough to make a difference, and noted that small isolated minority groups in a school are not likely to have a strong effect on the overall school. App. 2. This approach is just as wrong today as it was a half-century ago. B1, B5. In this Courts finest hour, Brown v. Board of Education challenged this history and helped to change it. No. . It was about the nature of a democracy that must work for all Americans. See, e.g., Milliken, supra, at 746. Cf. The Court has jurisdiction in these cases. of Ed., 395 U. S. 225, 232 (1969) (approving a lower court desegregation order that provided that the [school] board must move toward a goal under which in each school the ratio of white to Negro faculty members is substantially the same as it is throughout the system, and immediately requiring [t]he ratio of Negro to white teachers in each school to be equal to the ratio of Negro to white teachers in the system as a whole). App. us/summary. Racial imbalance is not segregation, and the mere incantation of terms like resegregation and remediation cannot make up the difference. Preliminary Challenges, 1956 to 1969, Section 3. It is no answer to say that these cases can be distinguished from Brown because Brown involved invidious racial classifications whereas the racial classifications here are benign. For the next decade, annual program transfers remained at approximately this level. of Ed., 402 U. S. 1, 16 (1971), by then-Justice Rehnquist in chambers in Bustop, Inc. v. Los Angeles Bd. 2005), online at http://www.seattleschools.org/area/facilties&nbhyph;plan/Choice/05&nbhyph; Second, Seattle noted that it has ceased using the racial tiebreaker pending the outcome of this litigation. As a consequence, this separate opinion is necessary to set forth my conclusions in the two cases before the Court. But under the Seattle plan, a school with 50 percent Asian-American students and 50 percent white students but no African-American, Native-American, or Latino students would qualify as balanced, while a school with 30 percent Asian-American, 25 percent African-American, 25 percent Latino, and 20 percent white students would not. 6, 11 (on file with the University of Washington Library); see generally Siqueland 1215; Hanawalt 1820. 2d 876, 881882, 382 P.2d 878, 881882 (1963) (in bank). In the Seattle case, the school district has gone further in describing the methods and criteria used to determine assignment decisions based on individual racial classifications, but it has nevertheless failed to explain why, in a district composed of a diversity of races, with only a minority of the students classified as white, it has employed the crude racial categories of white and non-white as the basis for its assignment decisions. 05908, at 137a139a. Brief for Respondent at 2434. To Harris? Between 80% and 90% of all students received their first choice assignment; between 89% and 97% received their first or second choice assignment. at 116669. Yesterday, the plans under review were lawful. The Seattle public schools have not shown they were ever segregated by law, and were not subject to court ordered desegregation decrees. The Court made clear that [s]trict scrutiny does not trea[t] dissimilar race-based decisions as though they were equally objectionable. Ibid. For instance, a Texas appeals court in 1986 rejected a Fourteenth Amendment challenge to a voluntary integration plan by explaining: [T]he absence of a court order to desegregate does not mean that a school board cannot exceed minimum requirements in order to promote school integration. Most white families live north of the downtown area where four high schoolsBallard, Ingraham, Nathan Hale, and Rooseveltare located. Justice Kennedy sets forth two additional concerns related to narrow tailoring. In respect to Louisville, he says first that officials stated (1) that kindergarten assignments are not subject to the race-conscious guidelines, and (2) that the child at issue here was denied permission to attend the kindergarten he wanted because of those guidelines. 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. 5 Memorandum Opinion and Order, Haycraft v. Board of Ed. Id., at 525528 (Thomas, J., dissenting). But see ante, at 29. And, in any event, the histories of Seattle and Louisville make clear that this distinctionbetween court-ordered and voluntary desegregationseeks a line that sensibly cannot be drawn. The groups members have children in the districts elementary, middle, and high schools, App. The dissents assertion that these plans are necessary for the school districts to maintain their hard-won gains reveals its conflation of segregation and racial imbalance. This plan is in place as of 2017. 2d 290, 294 (1967); Booker v. Board of Ed. No. of Oral Arg. 1, supra, at 461; Seattle Public Schools Desegregation Planning Office, Proposed Alternative Desegregation Plans: Options for Eliminating Racial Imbalance by the 1979-80 School Year (Sept. 1977) (filed with the Court as Exh. of Ed., 102 F.Supp. Petitioner Parents Involved in Community Schools (Parents Involved) is a nonprofit corporation comprising the parents of children who have been or may be denied assignment to their chosen high school in the district because of their race. 2, 4, 5 (WD Ky. 1999) (Hampton I). Le Lys Rouge (The Red Lily) 95 (W. Stephens transl. See, e.g., n.1, supra. 137 F.Supp. On what legal ground can the majority rest its contrary view? See Tr. It is not one in which race-conscious limits stigmatize or exclude; the limits at issue do not pit the races against each other or otherwise significantly exacerbate racial tensions. Together with No. The Court recognized that seeking diversity and avoiding racial segregation in schools are compelling state interests. The dissent claims that the law requires application here of a standard of review that is not strict in the traditional sense of that word. Post, at 36. They are tied to each districts specific racial demographics, rather than to any pedagogic concept of the level of diversity needed to obtain the asserted educational benefits. To the extent the objective is sufficient diversity so that students see fellow students as individuals rather than solely as members of a racial group, using means that treat students solely as members of a racial group is fundamentally at cross-purposes with that end. In fact, the available data from the Seattle school district appear to undercut the dissents view. 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. The dissent rests on the assumptions that these sweeping race-based classifications of persons are permitted by existing precedents; that its confident endorsement of race categories for each child in a large segment of the community presents no danger to individual freedom in other, prospective realms of governmental regulation; and that the racial classifications used here cause no hurt or anger of the type the Constitution prevents. 1, pp. Choice, therefore, is the predominant factor in these plans. Compton, California, on the other hand, became over 99 percent black in the 1980s, while Buffalo, New York had a virtual 5050 split between white and minority students prior to its 1977 plan. Under that approach, the school districts have not carried their burden of showing that the ends they seek justify the particular extreme means they have chosenclassifying individual students on the basis of their race and discriminating among them on that basis. . See, e.g., Regents of Univ. Section 5. of Ed., 395 U. S., at 232. [Footnote 26], What was wrong in 1954 cannot be right today. Id., at 38a, 103a. Id., at 335336. in No. By finding the School Districts plan unconstitutional, districts will be limited in their ability to provide such benefits. Breyer, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Stevens, Souter, and Ginsburg, JJ., joined. I believe only that the Constitution allows democratically elected school boards to make up their own minds as to how best to include people of all races in one America. Nowhere is this more profoundly true than in the field of education); Tr. Accepting Justice Breyers approach would do no more than move us from separate but equal to unequal but benign. Metro Broadcasting, supra, at 638 (Kennedy, J., dissenting). If we look at cases decided during the interim between Brown and Adarand, we can see how a rigid adherence to tiers of scrutiny obscures Browns clear message. Brief for Petitioner at 79. Brief for Respondents in No. 2d 257 (2003) (quoting [***38] Fullilove v. Klutznick, 448 U.S. 448, 537, 100 S. Ct. 2758, 65 L. Ed. In Louisville, a federal court entered a remedial decree. Brief for Respondents in No. The group also asserted an interest in not being forced to compete in a race-based system that might prejudice its members children, an actionable form of injury under the Equal Protection Clause, see, e.g., Adarand Constructors, Inc. v. Peńa, 515 U. S. 200, 211. Id., at 39a40a. In due course, the Washington Supreme Court, the Federal District Court, and the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (sitting en banc) rejected the challenge and found Seattles plan lawful. No. PARENTS INVOLVED IN COMMUNITY See also C. Sumner, Equality Before the Law: Unconstitutionality of Separate Colored Schools in Massachusetts, in 2 The Works of Charles Sumner 327, 371 (1849) (The law contemplates not only that all be taught, but that all shall be taught together). Nor can I explain my disagreement with the Courts holding and the pluralitys opinion, without offering a detailed account of the arguments they propound and the consequences they risk. In 20002001, when the racial tiebreaker was last used, Ballards total enrollment was 17.5 percent Asian-American, 10.8 percent African-American, 10.7 percent Latino, 56.4 percent Caucasian, and 4.6 percent Native-American. If an educational interest that combines these three elements is not compelling, what is? 05908, 426 F.3d 1162; No. In Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle (2007), the United States Supreme Courtfound that the school district was using race in an unconstitutional manner in its assignment plan. "[5] He went on to say, "What the government is not permitted to do, absent a showing of necessity not made here, is to classify every student on the basis of race and to assign each of them to schools based on that classification. v. Brinkman, 443 U. S. 526, 531, n.5 (1979) (Racial imbalance is not per se a constitutional violation); Freeman v. Pitts, 503 U. S. 467, 494 (1992); see also Swann, supra, at 3132; cf. The dissent emphasizes local control, see post, at 4849, the unique history of school desegregation, see post, at 2, and the fact that these plans make less use of race than prior plans, see post, at 57, but these factors seem more rhetorical than integral to the analytical structure of the opinion. ); internal quotation marks omitted). And it is for them to debate how best to educate the Nations children and how best to administer Americas schools to achieve that aim.