The Supreme Court Just Shot Down a Big Challenge to Affirmative Action. Read the Decision Here.

The court upholds the University of Texas’ ability to use race as one of several factors in selecting its students.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, center, wrote the majority opinion.Evan Vucci/ZUMA

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The Supreme Court delivered a major victory for affirmative action on Thursday, rejecting a challenge to a University of Texas admissions system that uses race as a factor to ensure diversity for a portion of its student body. The case, Fisher v. University of Texas, concerns the school’s use of a “holistic” system for 25 percent of its class—the rest of the class as admitted purely on the basis of high school grades—that includes race among other factors. A white applicant who was rejected by the school challenged the system.

On Thursday, the Supreme Court sided with the university in a 4-3 decision. Read the full ruling here:

 

Read more about the man who brought this case to the Supreme Court and statements by the late Justice Antonin Scalia earlier in the case suggesting that black students belong at “slower” colleges.

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In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

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