![\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/answer-sheet\/files\/2012\/10\/abigail.jpg\"](\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/answer-sheet\/files\/2012\/10\/abigail.jpg\")
<\/strong><\/p>\nThe Fisher v. University of Texas case has put the debate over affirmative action front and center among discussions of racial justice…again. This debate has found its way into the spotlight repeatedly since the SCOTUS ruling on Bakke v. University of California made racial quotas illegal in 1978. I thought I’d reference that to remind us that racial quotas are, <\/em>in fact, illegal.<\/em><\/p>\n There is much to say about the affirmative action debate. So much, in fact, that I’ve decided to respond in two parts. Part one is a discussion of some of the historical context for Affirmative Action. Part two will address the thorny issue of what many are calling anti-Asian quotas in articles like this,<\/a> and this<\/a>, and this<\/a>. The perception of quotas limiting the number of Asian American students attending the most elite institutions is inspiring a minor Asian-American backlash against affirmative action that, though blown out of proportion by the media, is nonetheless troubling.<\/p>\n Here’s part one:<\/p>\n Today, as a result of a 2003 SCOTUS ruling, race can be considered among other factors but not as the only<\/em> factor nor<\/em> in association with quotas in order to achieve diversity goals in college admissions. In 1978, McGeorge Bundy, former president of the Ford Foundation, (quoted in a terrific Colorlines<\/a> piece) summed up the diversity rationale for race conscious admissions.<\/p>\n If I am a qualified black…(c)an my presence and participation enlarge the educational experience of others?…If the answers to these questions, or some of them, is ‘yes,’ are not my qualifications that much improved, and improved precisely because by my blackness?”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n According to SCOTUS, the answer is, yes, in certain cases your qualifications are improved by your race. But, that’s just one qualification. Many other qualifications may also apply, such as gender, age, disability, grades, test scores, where you’re from, speaking more than one language, or, in some more banal cases, being a celebrity, or having played football in high school, even to a college with no football team but a strong bias toward athletic participation (though probably not one’s ability to get through school days hungry, study through urban noise and cold in poorly insulated housing, or juggling school, part-time work, and babysitting) as an indication of discipline and balance.<\/p>\n\n