A new poll from the Gallup organization, taken in the wake of last month’s Supreme Court ruling effectively upholding the use of race-based criteria in the college admissions process, found that a majority of Americans — including minorities — are opposed to the practice.
Seven out of 10 people polled by Gallup said merit, in the form of high school grades or test scores, should be the sole basis for admission to a University. More African-American respondents said they supported racially blind merit-based admissions (50%) than those who said race should be considered an important factor (44%).
The poll was commissioned following the Supreme Court’s June 23 decision in the Fisher v. University of Texas case that upheld the school’s use of race to determine who gets into college in the interest of promoting diversity. The plaintiff, a white female named Abigail Fisher, sued the school after she was denied a spot because of her race. She said the school’s policy violated the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment.
In a rare 7-1 ruling, the Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling in favor of the university, but largely on procedural grounds. Even conservative Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, both of whom strongly oppose government discrimination on the basis of race, concurred with the majority, concluding that the case did not ask the court the right questions. So the ruling effectively leaves the practice in place.
The Gallup poll suggests that a large majority of Americans do not support the decision, and have opposed government’s use of racial discrimination for some time. Similar polls in 2003, 2007 and 2013 came back with similar results.
While there were differences among racial groups, results from the polling suggest that most Americans — be they white, black or Latino — oppose the sort of policies upheld by the Supreme Court in the Fisher case and favor a more merit-based one. Only 4% of whites, 17% of blacks and 26% of Latinos said Hispanics say race and ethnicity should be a major factor in admissions.
