Unless we believe that the Constitution enforces one legal standard for the South and another for the North, this Court should grant Seattle the permission it granted Clarke County, Georgia. Today, the Court holds that state entities may not experiment with race-based means to achieve ends they deem socially desirable. Seattles racial tiebreaker results, in the end, only in shifting a small number of students between schools. This brings us to the dissents reliance on the Courts opinions in Gratz v. Bollinger, 539 U. S. 244 (2003), and Grutter, 539 U. S. 306. See, e.g., n.1, supra. R. Kluger, Simple Justice: The History of Brown v. Board of Education and Black Americas Struggle for Equality, p. x (1975) (arguing that perhaps no other Supreme Court case has affected more directly the minds, hearts, and daily lives of so many Americans); Patterson, Brown v. Board of Education xxvii (2001) (identifying Brown as the most eagerly awaited and dramatic judicial decision of modern times). 1, 149 Wash. 2d 660, 689690, 663, 72 P.3d 151, 166, 153 (2003) (en banc) (Parents Involved V). The present cases are not governed by Grutter. were race-neutral) does not indicate the decline in black achieve- In each case, the school district relies upon an individual students race in assigning that student to a particular school, so that the racial balance at the school falls within a predetermined range based on the racial composition of the school district as a whole. 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. When a students first choice cannot be accommodated, the District uses race as a tiebreaker in order to achieve a desired racial balance in each individual school. None of these elements is compelling. 3, p. 76 (As time passes, it may well be that segregation will end), with post, at 19 ([T]hey use race-conscious criteria in limited and gradually diminishing ways); post, at 48 ([E]ach plans use of race-conscious elements is diminished compared to the use of race in preceding integration plans); post, at 55 (describing the historically-diminishing use of race in the school districts). The order required the school board to create and to maintain schools with student populations that ranged, for elementary schools, between 12% and 40% black, and for secondary schools (with one exception), between 12.5% and 35% black. See id., at 1032 (discussing other successful black schools); Walker, Can Institutions Care? . In light of this, the Seattle School District . In an increasingly plural society, exposure to other points of view promotes understanding and cohesiveness. 1 Hampton v. Jefferson Cty., Bd. This litigation was commenced in July 2000, and the record in the District Court was closed before assignments for the 20012002 school year were made. in Davis v. County School Board, O.T. 1952, No. Finally, it lists several race-neutral alternatives that were considered (such as a lottery system, the use of poverty as a proxy for race, and regional assignments) and argues that they would not have been as effective as the plan that is the subject of this litigation. 426 F.3d 1162, 1166 (9th Cir. School authorities concerned that their student bodies racial compositions interfere with offering an equal educational opportunity to all are free to devise race-conscious measures to address the problem in a general way and without treating each student in different fashion based solely on a systematic, individual typing by race. Diversity, depending on its meaning and definition, is a compelling educational goal a school district may pursue. The Seattle district, which has never operated legally segregated schools or Read More(2007) Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School . Arkansas, for example, provides by statute that [n]o student may transfer to a nonresident district where the percentage of enrollment for the students race exceeds that percentage in the students resident district. Ark. The Chief Justice delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Parts I, II, IIIA, and IIIC, concluding: 1. The dissents proposed testwhether sufficient social science evidence supports a government units conclusion that the interest it asserts is compellingcalls to mind the rational-basis standard of review the dissent purports not to apply, post, at 36-37. Most worked at unskilled jobs. As the panel majority in Parents Involved VI concluded: [T]he tiebreakers annual effect is thus merely to shuffle a few handfuls of different minority students between a few schoolsabout a dozen additional Latinos into Ballard, a dozen black students into Nathan Hale, perhaps two dozen Asians into Roosevelt, and so on. See 377 F.3d 949, 10051006 (CA9 2004) (Parents Involved VI) (Graber, J., dissenting). PICS counters that, far from accomplishing these lofty goals, the Districts plan is simply making trivial changes in pigmentation diversity in just a few of the schools that are actually imbalanced. As well, the District points out that it is no longer using the admission system that serves as the basis of this suit, and has not for several years, further demonstrating that any future injury is far from imminent. CitationParents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School Dist. Any classification based strictly on race, as the majority notes, still must be predicated on a demonstration that it is necessary. 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. The plurality opinion is too dismissive of the legitimate interest government has in ensuring all people have equal opportunity regardless of their race. For the foregoing reasons, this conclusory argument cannot sustain the plans. The Courts misuse of the three-tiered approach to Equal Protection analysis merely reconfirms my own view that there is only one such Clause in the Constitution. 2d 304, and yet in Seattle several alternative assignment plansmany of which would not have used express racial classificationswere rejected with little or no consideration. The upshot is that myriad school districts operating in myriad circumstances have devised myriad plans, often with race-conscious elements, all for the sake of eradicating earlier school segregation, bringing about integration, or preventing retrogression. The Constitution does not permit race-based government decisionmaking simply because a school district claims a remedial purpose and proceeds in good faith with arguably pure motives. PICS counters that neighborhood demographics are the result of individuals voluntary choices, and that parents tend to choose schools near their home. In 1973 a federal court found that Jefferson County had maintained a segregated school system, Newburg Area Council, Inc. v. Board of Ed. Rather, race-based government decisionmaking is categorically prohibited unless narrowly tailored to serve a compelling interest. 1 and Meredith v. Jefferson County Board of Education ( PICS ). No. May a school district that is not racially segregated and that normally permits a student to attend any high school of her choosing deny a child admission to her chosen school solely because of her race in an effort to achieve a desired racial balance in particular schools, or does such racial balancing violated the. (b)Despite the districts assertion that they employed individual racial classifications in a way necessary to achieve their stated ends, the minimal effect these classifications have on student assignments suggests that other means would be effective. See, e.g., Hallinan 745; Quillian & Campbell, Beyond Black and White: The Present and Future of Multiracial Friendship Segregation, 68 Am. Thus about 2,000 students out of a total district population of about 60,000 students were involved in one or the other transfer program. at 12. In dozens of subsequent cases, this Court told school districts previously segregated by law what they must do at a minimum to comply with Browns constitutional holding. The dissent overreads Grutter, however, in suggesting that it renders pure racial balancing a constitutionally compelling interest; Grutter itself recognized that using race simply to achieve racial balance would be patently unconstitutional, 539 U. S., at 330. The decision was a 5-4 split on the Court, with both sides claiming that their position was truest to the precedent set in Brown v. The NAACPs First Legal Challenge and Seattles Response, 1969 to 1977. No. This refers back to a time when public schools were highly segregated, often as a result of legal or administrative policies that facilitated racial segregation in public schools. Id. If Gratz is to be the measure, the racial classification systems here are a fortiori invalid. PARENTS INVOLVED IN COMMUNITY It is reasonable to conclude that such resegregation can create serious educational, social, and civic problems. By 1984, after several schools had fallen out of compliance with the orders racial percentages due to shifting demographics in the community, the school board revised its desegregation plan. In such cases, race-based remedial measures are sometimes required. Narrow tailoring requires serious, good faith consideration of workable race-neutral alternatives, Grutter, supra, at 339, and yet in Seattle several alternative assignment plansmany of which would not have used express racial classificationswere rejected with little or no consideration. Elementary school students are assigned to their first- or second-choice school 95 percent of the time, and transfers, which account for roughly 5 percent of assignments, are only denied 35 percent of the timeand presumably an even smaller percentage are denied on the basis of the racial guidelines, given that other factors may lead to a denial. One will search Grutter in vain for similarly persuasive evidence of narrow tailoring as the school districts have presented here. The District has not met its burden of proving these marginal changes outweigh the cost of subjecting hundreds of students to disparate treatment based solely upon the color of their skin. 377 F.3d, at 984985 (footnote omitted). Justice Breyer makes much of the fact that in 1978 Seattle settled an NAACP complaint alleging illegal segregation with the federal Office for Civil Rights (OCR). Sometimes Members of this Court have disagreed about the degree of leniency that the Clause affords to programs designed to include. At the time, the districts public school population was approximately 30% black. Each plan embodies the results of local experience and community consultation. Conversely, to take another example, evidence from a district in Norfolk, Virginia, shows that resegregated schools led to a decline in the achievement test scores of children of all races. It is even more difficult to accept the pluralitys contrary view, namely that the underlying plan was unconstitutional. See also Brief for Appellees in Brown v. Board of Education, O.T. 1952, No. Today, they do not. See Tr. As these programs demonstrate, every time the government uses racial criteria to bring the races together, post, at 29, someone gets excluded, and the person excluded suffers an injury solely because of his or her race. on writ of certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the ninth circuit. Both districts also considered elaborate studies and consulted widely within their communities. In a separate conference, JCPS Representative Pat Todd emphasized that the current assignment plan would remain in effect for the 20072008 school year, citing the finalization of budgets, staffing, assignments and busing as prevailing reasons for no change being logistically possible. Others have been more circumspect. The Seattle school districts Website formerly contained the following definition of cultural racism: Those aspects of society that overtly and covertly attribute value and normality to white people and whiteness, and devalue, stereotype, and label people of color as other, different, less than, or render them invisible. 1, this Court struck down a state referendum that effectively barred implementation of Seattles desegregation plan and burden[ed] all future attempts to integrate Washington schools in districts throughout the State. Id., at 462463, 483. In 1995 and 1996, the Louisville School Board, with the help of a special Planning Team, community meetings, and other official and unofficial study groups, monitored the effects of Project Renaissance and considered proposals for improvement. Percentage of Students in Minority Schools by Race, 20002001. To the extent the plurality opinion suggests the Constitution mandates that state and local school authorities must accept the status quo of racial isolation in schools, it is, in my view, profoundly mistaken. For example, prior to our decision in School Comm. . At the same time, all students were free subsequently to transfer from the school at which they were initially placed to a different school of their choice without regard to race. 1 ET AL. These and related considerations convinced one Ninth Circuit judge in the Seattle case to apply a standard of constitutionality review that is less than strict, and to conclude that this Courts precedents do not require the contrary. "It is not often in the law that so few have so quickly changed so much," Justice Breyer said of the Court's decision. Are courts really to treat as merely de facto segregated those school districts that avoided a federal order by voluntarily complying with Browns requirements? Thus, the opinions reasoning is long. As the Court explained, [t]he importance of this individualized consideration in the context of a race-conscious admissions program is paramount. Ibid. De jure? [1][2] Chief Justice Roberts wrote in his plurality opinion that The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.[1] Some have credited this decision as contributing to schools resegregating in the United States, and it's been noted that American schools are more racially segregated now than in the late 1960s.[3]. Changes in the Percentage of White Students in Schools Attended by the Average Black Student by State, 19702003 (includes States with 5% or greater enrollment of black students in 1970 and 1980), % White Students in School Justice Breyer also suggests that other means for achieving greater racial diversity in schools are necessarily unconstitutional if the racial classifications at issue in these cases cannot survive strict scrutiny. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 56061 (1992). 3:02CV00620JGH; Doc. University of Texas v. Camenisch, 451 U. S. 390, 393 (1981). Approximately half the districts public school enrollment was black; about half was white. In 1968 our mandatory jurisdiction was defined by the provision of the 1948 Judicial Code then codified at 28 U. S.C. 1257, see 62 Stat. 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 Brief for Petitioner at 21. 1, 2, 4, 18 (1978 Memo & Order). Hence, I conclude that the plans before us pass both parts of the strict scrutiny test. See Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae Brief for Petitioners at 27. This is made for the. Breyer, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Stevens, Souter, and Ginsburg, JJ., joined. Nor is it likely to find such a case. No. 1, a case decided by the United States Supreme Court in 2007, established the Seattle School District's racial tiebreaker plan as unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. See Appendix A, infra. 05-915 v. JEFFERSON COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION et al. To Crawford? Although all governmental uses of race Upon realizing that the litigation would not be resolved in time for assignment decisions for the 20022003 school year, the Ninth Circuit withdrew its opinion, 294 F.3d 1084 (2002) (Parents Involved III), vacated the injunction, and, pursuant to Wash. Rev. The first tiebreaker selects for admission students who have a sibling currently enrolled in the chosen school. For the reasons discussed above, however, I disagree with Justice Kennedy that Seattle and Louisville have not done enough to demonstrate that their present plans are necessary to continue upon the path set by Brown. And, in Seattle, the disadvantaged student loses at most one year at the high school of his choice. Accord, post, at 61 (At a minimum, the pluralitys views would threaten a surge of race-based litigation. The wide variety of different integration plans that school districts use throughout the Nation suggests that the problem of racial segregation in schools, including de facto segregation, is difficult to solve. 3, p. 57 ([T]he historical background that exists, certainly in this Virginia situation, with all the strife and the history that we have shown in this record, shows a basis, a real basis, for the classification that has been made); id., at 69 (describing the potential abolition of segregation as contrary to the customs, the traditions and the mores of what we might claim to be a great people, established through generations, who themselves are fiercely and irrevocably dedicated to the preservation of the white and colored races). 2. However, Seattle did not have a history of racially segregated schools. School boards may pursue the goal of bringing together students of diverse backgrounds and races through other means, including strategic site selection of new schools; drawing attendance zones with general recognition of the demographics of neighborhoods; allocating resources for special programs; recruiting students and faculty in a targeted fashion; and tracking enrollments, performance, and other statistics by race.