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Justice Breyer, concurring separately, did not sign the Rehnquist opinion. The dissenters were Justices Ginsburg and Souter, who said the majority opinion was incorrect on the merits, and Justice Stevens. He said the case should have been dismissed because the plaintiffs, two white students who had failed to win admission under an earlier version of the undergraduate admissions policy, lacked standing to challenge the current policy that the university adopted in 1998.
The rulings today came as an enormous relief to the civil rights community, as well as to public and private colleges and universities around the country, dozens of which had joined briefs supporting Michigan. Although the constitutional issue applied directly only to public institutions, federal law has given private colleges an equal stake in the outcome by forbidding racial discrimination by educational institutions that receive federal money.
President Bush issued a statement praising the court "for recognizing the value of diversity on our nation's campuses." He added, "Like the court, I look forward to the day when America will truly be a color-blind society."
The statement made no reference to the fact that the administration had asked the court to invalidate both Michigan programs as thinly disguised quota systems that violated the holding of the Bakke decision. Mr. Bush had personally announced in a televised address in January that his administration was siding against the university.
"A reader would never know that the administration's brief derided the law school's goal of having a critical mass of underrepresented students in each class," the liberal advocacy group People for the American Way said in a statement.
The administration's brief faulted the university for having failed to consider "race-neutral alternatives" before adopting its affirmative action plans. The only example the brief offered as an acceptable alternative was the plan now used in Texas, California and Florida, where admission is offered automatically to high school graduates above a particular class rank.
In her majority opinion today, Justice O'Connor was close to dismissive of the administration's analysis. She said the brief did not explain "how such plans could work for graduate and professional schools." She added: "Moreover, even assuming such plans are race-neutral, they may preclude the university from conducting the individualized assessments necessary to assemble a student body that is not just racially diverse, but diverse along all the qualities valued by the university."
The court's precedents, including the Bakke decision, made clear that any official consideration of race must survive a standard of judicial review known as strict scrutiny, meaning that the policy must serve a compelling state interest and be narrowly tailored to achieve that interest. Consequently, Michigan faced two analytical hurdles in defending its programs in lawsuits brought by three disappointed white applicants, Barbara Grutter in the law school case and Jennifer Gratz and Patrick Hamacher in the undergraduate case, Gratz v. Bollinger, No. 02-516. The university had to persuade the court that racial diversity was a compelling interest that was appropriately served by the challenged programs.
Justice O'Connor's opinion in the law school case embraced the diversity rationale. "Effective participation by members of all racial and ethnic groups in the civil life of our nation is essential if the dream of one nation, indivisible, is to be realized," she said. She added that law schools, in particular, served as gateways to economic and political leadership.
"Access to legal education (and thus the legal profession) must be inclusive of talented and qualified individuals of every race and ethnicity," she said, "so that all members of our heterogeneous society may participate in the educational institutions that provide the training and education necessary to succeed in America."
Her opinion cited a number of briefs from businesses, colleges and, with particular emphasis, two dozen retired senior military officers and former commandants of the service academies, who told the court that affirmative action was essential to maintaining an integrated officer corps.
The real debate came down to whether either program was narrowly tailored enough. With its 20-point formula, the undergraduate program had always appeared more vulnerable. The Federal District Court in Detroit had invalidated both programs. On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati, upheld the law school program but never issued an opinion after hearing arguments on the undergraduate program.
In concluding her opinion, Justice O'Connor noted that 25 years had passed since Bakke and said affirmative action should "no longer be necessary" 25 years from now. That led Curt A. Levey, director of legal and public affairs at the Center for Individual Rights, the law firm representing the plaintiffs, to observe that universities would start facing new lawsuits 20 years from now if they did not heed the court's advice.
"The court says affirmative action is not timeless, and it had better not be," Mr. Levey said in an interview.
