By the time you read this, President Bush already will have made
one of the most important decisions of his presidency. No, I'm not talking
about whether the president will give the order to oust Iraqi President
Saddam Hussein, though that clearly is at the top of the president's
priorities. By Thursday, the president must decide whether or not to disavow
unequivocally the use of racial and ethnic preferences in college
admissions.
On Jan. 16, briefs are due in the U.S. Supreme Court in a case
involving racial and ethnic preferences at the University of Michigan
undergraduate and law schools, and it is customary in a case of this
importance for an administration to file a brief with the Court stating its
position. This case has been 25 years in the making, ever since the Court
issued its infamous Bakke decision, which established a justification for
colleges to use race in selecting their students in the interests of
promoting "diversity."
It's inconceivable that the president would support Michigan's
program -- one of the worst in the nation. The Michigan affirmative action
plan actually awarded extra points to black and Hispanic applicants,
allowing students with significantly worse grades and test scores to be
admitted over better-qualified white and Asian students. The median test
scores of black students admitted to the University of Michigan
undergraduate program were 230 points lower and high school grades nearly a
half point lower (on a four-point scale) than that of whites in the
mid-1990s when my organization, the Center for Equal Opportunity (CEO),
analyzed admissions records for the school. Indeed, Michigan ranked second
worst in using racial preferences in selecting students among the 57 public
colleges and universities CEO analyzed.
But the administration must go further than simply criticizing
Michigan's program. Unless the Supreme Court once and for all throws out the
"diversity" rationale as the basis on which schools can elect to take race
into account in picking their students, this issue will continue to fester.
And the president should lead the way by urging the Court to abandon racial
discrimination in the name of "diversity."
The president is already on record supporting this view. When he
was running for re-election as governor of Texas in 1998, Bush filled out a
questionnaire from the nonprofit Campaign for a Colorblind America, in which
he said he disagreed with the statement: "For the sake of obtaining a
diversity of viewpoints and experiences, public educational institutions
should be allowed to consider the race and ethnicity of applicants." Bush
even appended his own comments on the questionnaire: "I do not support
race-based quotas or preferences," he said. "Public colleges and
universities have an affirmative duty to offer equal opportunity to all
applicants. Equal opportunity doesn't guarantee equal results -- but it
guarantees that every person will get a fair shot based upon their
potential, heart and merit," he added.
The president shouldn't let the administration's brief in the
Michigan case be the last word on expanding opportunity, however. One of the
reasons Bush was able to disavow racial preferences in the name of diversity
and still garner significant support in the black and Hispanic communities
in Texas was that he promoted greater access to college for all
disadvantaged students in the state by improving high school college
preparation programs in low-income schools.
He has an even greater opportunity to promote his vision of
"affirmative access" as president. He's already started with his "No Child
Left Behind" program by emphasizing higher standards and more accountability
in elementary and secondary schools, but there's more work to be done at the
higher education level.
Ending racial preferences is the first step, but making
colorblind equal opportunity a reality requires a renewed commitment to
closing the skills gap between black and Hispanic students and their white
and Asian counterparts. Pretending this skills gap doesn't exist by
promoting race-based "diversity" in college admissions, however, isn't the
answer -- and I'm betting the president knows it.
Notebook