Pittsburgh reacts to Supreme Court’s overturning of Affirmative Action

communities throughout the Pittsburgh region are adamant about higher education for their young ones. The Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision on June 29 put a universal scrowl on the faces of those in Pittsburgh’s Black communities.

Congresswoman Summer Lee, a Pittsburgh native who graduated from Woodland Hills High School in 2005, loves education. She graduated from Penn State University, then Howard University for law school. The Supreme Court decision hit her like a ton of bricks.

“As a Black woman who had the audacity to attend college, I am disgusted that our country just enshrined racial inequity in higher education and economic immobility into law,” Congresswoman Lee said moments after the Supreme Court’s decision was made public. “Make no mistake — this decision by this corrupt and illegitimate Supreme Court was ‘designed’ to keep a generation of brilliant Black young people out of higher education and positions of power. The people whose great grandparents were enslaved are the young people who will be shackled by this decision. The cruelty is the point. And let’s not forget – The Supreme Court Justices who sold us today are unelected, shamelessly corrupt, and hold lifetime appointments with no code of ethics. We must hold them accountable.”

Supreme Court Chief

Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote for the majority opinion, in part, that “the student must be treated based on his or her experiences as an individual — not on the basis of race. Many universities have for too long done just the opposite. And in doing so, they have concluded, wrongly, that the touchstone of an individual’s identity is not challenges bested, skills built, or lessons learned but the color of their skin. Our constitutional history does not tolerate that choice.”

Longtime Justice Clarence Thomas, who is Black, sided with the conservative majority opinion. The lone Black female justice on the Court, Ketanji Brown Jackson, was among the three dissenters who completely disagreed with the ruling. The Supreme Court heard the case brought forth to them from Students For Fair Admissions, a group that sued Harvard University and the University of North Carolina. The group claimed that the two schools discriminated against Asian American students, even though Asian American students had higher SAT and grade point averages than any other racial group. Using Affirmative Action, in the group’s mind, kept more Asian Americans out, and more African Americans and Hispanics in.

“With let-them-eat-cake obliviousness,” Justice Jackson wrote, “today, the majority pulls the ripcord and announces ‘colorblindness for all’ by legal fiat. But deeming race irrelevant in law does not make it so in life.”

Interestingly, the High Court ruled that the nation’s military academies should keep its race-based admissions programs in place. “The Court has come to rest on the bottom-line conclusion that racial diversity in higher education is only worth potentially preserving insofar as it might be needed to prepare Black Americans and other underrepresented minorities for success in the bunker, not the boardroom,” Justice Jackson wrote in response.

Even with Affirmative Action, Black students at Predominantly-White Institutions are greatly outnumbered by Whites. At Penn State University, its own data showed that Black students accounted for only 5.6 percent of the undergraduates in 201920. Duquesne University reported about the same percentage of Black students. Take a paintbrush, and spread the new ruling across the collegiate landscape in the U.S...how far will those already-small percentages of Black students drop in the coming years?

“Duquesne University is disappointed in the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in SFFA v. Harvard/UNC, which overturned the nearly half-century-old ruling in Regents v. Bakke (1978) that recognized the value of thoughtful Affirmative Action type programs in enriching the educational environment on college and university campuses across the nation. Nonetheless, the university respects the decisions of the Supreme Court as an essential part of our democratic system,” said Duquesne’s president, Ken Gormley.

“Moreover, the Court’s ruling that the explicit consideration of race in the admissions process is unconstitutional will not affect our long-standing commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion as part of our university’s foundational principles and mission. Duquesne will remain dedicated to reviewing each potential student’s application by focusing on a range of factors, apart from race, that contribute to identifying students of all backgrounds who will succeed at Duquesne and become the next generation of leaders. Our commitment to attracting and creating a diverse and inclusive student body remains unwavering, despite the shifting winds of legal precedent.”

State Rep. La’Tasha Mayes, of the 24th District, which includes many East End neighborhoods, called the ruling “a significant setback for Black and brown students, but also civil rights in the U.S.” Representative Mayes, who is a graduate of Pitt and Carnegie Mellon University, said it’s her hope that “higher education institutions in Pennsylvania and the U.S. will continue to enhance their commitment to equity on their campuses as all students and higher education professionals can benefit from the learning opportunities available when there is a diverse and representative student body.”

State Rep. Aerion Abney, whose House District includes the Hill District, said that “although I am disappointed by the Supreme Court’s recent ruling striking down Affirmative Action, their decision comes as no surprise. The existence of structural and systemic racism in our country is an unfortunate reality that, while not revelatory, has become increasingly evident in the times we live in today.”