Page:Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College.pdf/91

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Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023)

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Thomas, J., concurring

whether those benefits outweigh the burdens thrust onto other racial groups.

As the Court’s opinion today explains, the zero-sum nature of college admissions—where students compete for a finite number of seats in each school’s entering class—aptly demonstrates the point. Ante, at 27.^[1] Petitioner here represents Asian Americans who allege that, at the margins, Asian applicants were denied admission because of their race. Yet, Asian Americans can hardly be described as the beneficiaries of historical racial advantages. To the contrary, our Nation’s first immigration ban targeted the Chinese, in part, based on “worker resentment of the low wage rates accepted by Chinese workers.” U. S. Commission on Civil Rights, Civil Rights Issues Facing Asian Americans in the 1990s, p. 3 (1992) (Civil Rights Issues); Act of May 6, 1882, ch. 126, 22 Stat. 58–59.

In subsequent years, “strong anti-Asian sentiments in the Western States led to the adoption of many discriminatory laws at the State and local levels, similar to those aimed at blacks in the South,” and “segregation in public facilities, including schools, was quite common until after the Second World War.” Civil Rights Issues 7; see also S. Hinnershitz, A Different Shade of Justice: Asian American

↑ Justice Sotomayor apparently believes that race-conscious admission programs can somehow increase the chances that members of certain races (blacks and Hispanics) are admitted without decreasing the chances of admission for members of other races (Asians). See post, at 58–59. This simply defies mathematics. In a zero-sum game like college admissions, any sorting mechanism that takes race into account in any way, see post, at 27 (opinion of Jackson, J.) (defending such a system), has discriminated based on race to the benefit of some races and the detriment of others. And, the universities here admit that race is determinative in at least some of their admissions decisions. See, e.g., Tr. of Oral Arg. in No. 20–1199, at 67; 567 F. Supp. 3d 580, 633 (MDNC 2021); see also 397 F. Supp. 3d 126, 178 (Mass. 2019) (noting that, for Harvard, “race is a determinative tip for” a significant percentage “of all admitted African American and Hispanic applicants”); ante, at 5, n. 1 (describing the role that race plays in the universities’ admissions processes).

[1] Justice Sotomayor apparently believes that race-conscious admission programs can somehow increase the chances that members of certain races (blacks and Hispanics) are admitted without decreasing the chances of admission for members of other races (Asians). See post, at 58–59. This simply defies mathematics. In a zero-sum game like college admissions, any sorting mechanism that takes race into account in any way, see post, at 27 (opinion of Jackson, J.) (defending such a system), has discriminated based on race to the benefit of some races and the detriment of others. And, the universities here admit that race is determinative in at least some of their admissions decisions. See, e.g., Tr. of Oral Arg. in No. 20–1199, at 67; 567 F. Supp. 3d 580, 633 (MDNC 2021); see also 397 F. Supp. 3d 126, 178 (Mass. 2019) (noting that, for Harvard, “race is a determinative tip for” a significant percentage “of all admitted African American and Hispanic applicants”); ante, at 5, n. 1 (describing the role that race plays in the universities’ admissions processes).

[1]