A Supreme Court decision recently concurred with an appellate court decision stating that an affirmative action program at the University of Texas’ law school at Austin discriminated against whites. The case, Texas vs. Hopwood, questioned whether higher education institutions should consider race in their admissions policies. Based upon the court's ruling, affirmative action programs in Texas higher education institutions are now illegal, and a race-neutral admissions process should be implemented.
This decision was the right one. Colleges and universities should admit students based on skills, experience and qualifications. If two students apply to a university, one white and one minority, whoever is more qualified should be accepted. Just like in the working world, the most qualified individual gets the job. To force an institution to accept less-qualified people because of their skin color makes any previous academic standards obsolete.
Affirmative action is just a face created by the government to ensure minorities that actions are being taken to alleviate discrimination. The reality is that discrimination is strongly-rooted in American business, and no program aimed at graduating more minorities can change that. Guaranteeing a minority’s chances for admission does nothing more than lower the expectations of that institution and the individual. The American public is told that color shouldn’t matter; why then, is that philosophy abandoned when the usual colors change?
In Texas vs. Hopwood, four white students sued the law school in 1994 for reverse discrimination. In 1996, a Louisiana appellate court ruled that the admission policy discriminated against the four students. In 1996, Texas Attorney General Dan Morales notified Texas higher learning institutions that all affirmative action programs were illegal and advised the universities to use equal-admission policies for financial aid, scholarships, recruitment and retention programs.
Even though the Hopwood decision affects only the Texas higher education system and, specifically, UT Austin’s law school’s 1992 admissions policy, most universities abandoned their affirmative action programs after the appellate court ruling. Many institutions dismantled their affirmative action programs based upon this ruling, even if their policies were not similar.
UT Austin President Larry Faulkner told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram he was disappointed in the court’s decision and that he would look for legal ways to create a diverse student body. His aims are high and noble, but creating a diverse student body by manipulating equality hardly creates a good pool of scholars.
As with Faulkner’s intentions, it is important to remedy the long-standing historical plague of discrimination, but affirmative action programs are admitting less-qualified students. When minority students pass through the biased system, using discrimination laws as their crutch, they alleviate from themselves the responsibility of succeeding on their own merits. By treating minorities unequally, the system is saying they are unequal. In a race for equality, making the standards uniform could be the best effort for creating an equal society.
By Aaron Lalic
The Shorthorn (U. Texas-Arlington)
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