With their extremely ridiculous endowment, they could tell the federal government to keep their funds and do what they want more freely. Unfortunately, Harvard likes those dollars more.

There are federal strings that come with federal dollars... but race isn't one of them.

They could finance their own financial aid if they wanted to and then do what they want with admissions.

Individuals have first amendment rights. Do you think that means individuals should be allowed to discriminate on the basis of race? Religion? Gender?

Maybe the lawyers are better versed in the law than you think.

Has nothing to do with my own position(s), and I don't see why you asked.

I answered.

If they can discriminate as they see fit, they could just choose not to admit blacks or Muslims or men or ...


Men's organizations in the '70s were forced to open up not because they took federal money--they seriously did not--but because they were a kind of public accommodation--they weren't just social organizations for the social benefit of the men that were members, giving them some place to go, talk, hang, talk, and drink--and not much else. They were organizations that had workplace benefits, networking for the members' mutual benefit--tossing work in one man's direction, letting somebody else know that there's an opening that his son would be good for, saying there was going to be a contract and letting other members know that bids would be accepted and maybe the members should submit a bid.

That strikes me as the kind of argument where it might suit a given context, but in most others the results are highly wrong.


BTW, lots of things are corporations. The cactus and succulent society I was a member of in Los Angeles in the '90s was a registered non-profit ... corporation. My church in the '80s was a non-profit ... corporation. The DNC is one. Unions are corporations.

Harvard can’t argue that forbidding them to discriminate is compelled speech.

Or am I misunderstanding you?

See Ginsburg in Bakke (on edit - that's Grutter of course... not Bakke) - or ask yourself how California ended affirmative action in UC admissions.

Or just consider what the word means - which is essentially just making choices. That’s why we outlaw “discrimination on the basis of…(insert banned criteria here)” and not all discrimination.

It was legal discrimination, based on race and against Asians in this case. Harvard was reportedly scoring Asians lower in the personal traits part of their application, things like personality, likability, courage, etc. in an effort to impact their very high academic and extracurricular activities scores.

30% of Harvard admissions are Asian now. I remember reading that if admissions were based on academics alone Harvard would be 60-70% Asian.

That’s the bad part of affirmative action, in order to favor or give an artificial advantage to one group, they must negatively impact another group.

The fact that it’s a form of discrimination that we approve of doesn’t change the fact that it’s discrimination.

Promoted here. Just odd.

They keep growing that money while charging their students insane amounts of tuition. They should be ashamed and called out for it by the media.