Justice Thomas Unloads on Lawyer Defending Affirmative Action: ‘Diversity Seems to Mean Everything for Everyone’National Review, Oct 31, 2022
Justice Clarence Thomas pressed North Carolina’s solicitor general to explain how the University of North Carolina defines diversity during oral arguments on Monday in a Supreme Court case centered around the use of race as a factor in college admissions.
"I’ve heard the word diversity quite a few times and I don’t have a clue what it means,” said Thomas. “It seems to mean everything for everyone.”
Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA) has challenged the race-based admissions policies of both Harvard and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC), accusing both schools of discriminating against Asian-American applicants. The cases were initially merged, but are now being heard separately after Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson recused herself from the Harvard case because she had previously served on the university’s board of overseers.
Thomas asked Ryan Park, the North Carolina solicitor general, to offer a specific definition of diversity in the context of UNC and provide a clear idea of what the educational benefits of diversity at the school would be.
"First, we define diversity the way this court has, in its court’s precedents, which means a broadly diverse set of criteria that extends to all different backgrounds and perspectives and not solely limited to race,” said Park, before adding that there are “many different diversity factors that are considered as a greater factor in our admissions process than race.”
“I didn’t go to racially diverse schools but there were educational benefits,” replied Thomas, before again pushing for Park to list specific educational benefits.
Park said that there is a “truth seeking function of learning in a diverse environment,” and pointed out that certain studies have found that racially diverse groups of people making stock trading decisions perform at a higher level, and make more efficient trading decisions.
“The mechanism there is it reduces group think and people have longer and more sustained disagreement and that leads to a more efficient outcome,” Park explained.
Thomas said he doesn’t “put much stock in that because I’ve heard similar arguments in favor of segregation, too.”
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