Volume 4: Issue 2
The Diversity Lie
Last term, the Supreme Court mulled over the legality of the University of Michigan’s consideration of race in deciding which applicants it admits to its undergraduate college and to its law school. As is now well known, the University ranked undergraduate applicants on a 150-point scale, and it awarded 20 points to applicants who are black, Hispanic, or Native American by mere virtue of their skin color; white and Asian applicants get no such points. By contrast, a perfect SAT score merited only 12 points on the 150-point scale. The law school similarly granted preference to black, Hispanic, and Native American applicants over white and Asian applicants, but did so in a less conspicuous fashion.