Affirmative Action Questioned on Two Levels

The President presented his position in a nationally broadcast speech.

He accused the University Of Michigan law school of setting minority quotas in its law school admissions policy.

And President Bush called that policy wrong.

This means that students are being accepted or rejected primarily on the color of their skin. The motivation for such an admissions policy may be very good. But its result is discrimination, and discrimination is wrong.

With that speech, the President engaged the Administration in what could be one of the most far reaching affirmative action cases in 25 years.

The Bush Administration has joined a lawsuit brought by three students against the University of Michigan.

They claim they were qualified to go to the Law School, but were not admitted.

Instead, the suit alleges, minority applicants with lower qualifications were admitted.

The University of Michigan responds that its admissions system made preferences for minorities.

But the University insists it did not set quotas.

Alfred P. Carlton Junior is president of the American Bar Association, or ABA.

The ABA filed briefs on behalf of the university.
30 114 a quota is a percentage requirement. What we're dealing with here is an assignment of a value, numerically to race. That's a completely different subject, I believe. 30 129

Essentially, the Michigan Law School added extra value to a students ethnicity.

The idea is that diversity would broaden all students' academic experiences.

The University of New Hampshire also has a program in place to increase the diversity of its student and faculty populations.

And last year several lawmakers unsuccessfully targeted that program for elimination.

But they are back again this year.

Several lawmakers have sponsored legislation aimed at ending preferences in State hiring and university admissions.

Representative Michael Harrington of Stratford is the prime sponsor of the bill.

He says state hiring and college admissions should be based on merit.
03 202 so, when we hire a professor, we don't care what their relgion, what their race, what their sex is, their national origin is, we care if they're a good professor or not. 03 211 we decide which students to accept, we base it on the most quailified students, based on academic achievements, standardized testing, extra curricular activities, etc. the standard things that one would use. ....03 229

Officials of the state's public universities say no quotas are used in hiring and admissions.

Stephen Reno is Chancellor of the State College and University System.

He is also a member of NHPR's Board of Directors.

Reno says despite the fact that no target numbers are set, race and other factors can't be entirely ignored.
19 26 I would say that the admissions processes at the admissions process institutions are, and I believe this is actually a strength, are so individualized, and could be described as ones where we seek to get to know the candidates for application as much as and as fully as we possibly can, that its almost inescapable that race can become a dimensions of a candidate's application that is known to the admission's committee. 19 103

Even in the 1978 Bakke case, which threw out the use of racial quotas, the Supreme Court Justices noted that diversity is a worthy goal.

Despite efforts to enroll more students of color New Hampshire's public colleges and universities still look very much like the state in general.

At the University of New Hampshire, for example, just over 4%, or about 550 degree seeking students, are non-white.

But while that number is small, it represents an improvement of about 20% over last year.