Affirmative actions programs came about in the mid-1960's during the civil rights movement and the War on Poverty. The programs specifically went into effect in late 1965 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed an Executive Order that made all government sponsored groups "take affirmative action," to create more diversity in hiring and employment. Affirmative action programs have become extremely controversial and have been the subject of several Supreme Court cases. The first case was in 1978 California v. Bakke. This case involved a white student applying for admission into the medical school at the University of California, who was denied admission so that room could be made for those applying who were minorities and less qualified. The court ruled that there could be no “racial quotas” in admissions because it violates the Equal Protection Clause of the fourteenth Amendment. This ruling did not totally rid the admissions process of race and ethnicity biases because higher education learning facilites could still use race as a factor in admission. The most recent cases occurred in Michigan Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Regents. The first case Grutter v. Bollinger ruled that the University of Michigan Law School could use “race-based affirmative action to diversify the student body.” On the other side Gratz v. Regents ruled that the university’s undergraduate College of Literature, Science, and Arts could used any form of race based affirmative action programs to help grant admissions to minorities into the university.
The issue of affirmative action has been debate since its creation in the 1960’s. Many believe it to be a form of reverse racism that is granting jobs to those who are not as qualified to do them because of their race. Rather than hiring people and admitting those who have the best achievements and are the most qualified half of an admissions process has become which race you check off when you apply, take the SAT, or do most anything. We like to believe that our county has moved past race and has begun awarding jobs and admissions to those who are indeed the most qualified, but our country still cannot look past race. Whether or not affirmative action programs are a good thing is up to the individual. These programs do indeed increase diversity and grant opportunities to those who were once not allowed to have any sort of opportunity at all. These programs do have benefits, but are the benefits worth costing a very qualified person their job?
