RACIAL PREFERENCES: Travesty.

The legislators of 1868 were masters of brevity. The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution guarantees "equal protection of the laws" to "all persons." It turns out that what that amendment really means is that state governments may discriminate on the basis of race, so long as they do not employ mathematical formulas in doing so. It is "permissible" for state universities to set "goals" for the racial composition of their student bodies, but "quotas" are impermissible. It is okay to seek a "critical mass" of minority students, so long as the students are not admitted on a "separate admissions track." Race can be a "plus factor," but there must also be an "individualized, holistic review of each applicant's file, giving serious consideration to all the ways an applicant might contribute to a diverse educational environment." Universities that practice racial discrimination must be subject to "strict scrutiny," but at the same time their judgment that discrimination is necessary deserves "deference." All of this is what Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, writing for the Supreme Court, has made of the Fourteenth Amendment. This is what President Bush, to his shame, has applauded.

The Court upheld the University of Michigan's preferential treatment of black, Hispanic, and American Indian applicants to its law school-its admissions policies being judged suitably "individualized" and "holistic"-but struck down the university's racially discriminatory treatment of undergraduate applicants for being rigid and formulaic. Justice O'Connor's jurisprudence, leery as it is of articulating clear legal principles, has here become self-parodic. Once again, she has issued a decision that necessitates further litigation to clarify its meaning. When is a review "holistic" enough? When does a goal become a quota? Some future court will have to explain, because O'Connor's Court has not deigned to.

In their dissents and concurrences, justices to O'Connor's left and to her right pick her logic apart. O'Connor says that state universities have a "compelling interest" in the educational benefits that supposedly come from racial diversity. It is this compelling interest that justifies racial discrimination that would otherwise be forbidden; and it is the granting of constitutional status to this interest that constitutes the most substantial legal development in O'Connor's decision. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg asks why, if this interest is compelling, the state university is forced to pursue racial balance without using mathematical formulas. Why use "camouflage" instead of "candor"? It's a good question. Judging from the modern history of racial preferences, the answer appears to be that the preference regime requires deception, and self-deception, to survive. Too much candor about its operations would be fatal.

Justice Clarence Thomas asks why the university could not find non- discriminatory ways to achieve racial diversity. It could, he suggests, admit students by lottery rather than by looking at test scores and GPAs: That method would have a strong likelihood of producing a diverse student body. The university says that any such method would unacceptably compromise its educational standards. Racial diversity therefore must bring educational benefits so great that they justify discrimination, but also so small that they cannot make up for the decline caused by lowered admissions standards. In other words, says Thomas, what the Court is saying is that the discrimination is justified to advance the university's compelling interest in "offering a marginally superior education while maintaining an elite institution."

One of the reasons the Court trusts the university's judgment about its need to discriminate is that the First Amendment supposedly protects the university's autonomy. Justice Thomas acidly notes that the Court showed no such concern seven years ago for the Virginia Military Institute's autonomy. There, equal protection was held to require the admission of women. VMI's judgment that it would have to sacrifice elements of its character received no "deference" ...