UC Law Constitutional Quarterly
Abstract
In response to the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College Students for Fair Admissions, Inc., Petitioner v. University of North Carolina, et al. (“SFFA v. Harvard”),1 author Harvey Gee urges his fellow Asian Americans––the star plaintiffs in the case and depicted as the main beneficiaries of its holdings–– to fight back to preserve affirmative action. Part I explores how the Court’s approach to affirmative action changed from the emergence of the Civil Rights Movement through many of the pivotal affirmative action cases prior to the 2010s. Part II then seeks to contextualize the struggle over the role of affirmative action within the Asian American community. It delves into two core mythologies that haunt these discussions––the Perpetual Foreigner Myth and the Model Minority Myth. Readers need a basic understanding of these mythologies because Part III focuses on Fisher v. University of Texas: a case that illustrates how activists and one dubiously sympathetic Justice would later tokenize Asian Americans in their efforts to dismantle affirmative action. Part IV dives into SFFA v. Harvard itself to show how the Court discarded affirmative action precedent and the arguments the dissenting Justices deployed to point out the decision’s weaknesses. Finally, the article ends by advocating for interracial solidatry to resist further attacks on the hallmark achievements of the Civil Rights Movement.
Recommended Citation
Harvey Gee,
Unprecedented: Asian Americans, Harvard, the University of North Carolina, and the Supreme Court’s Striking Down of Affirmative Action,
51 Hastings Const. L.Q. 187
(2024).
Available at: https://repository.uclawsf.edu/hastings_constitutional_law_quaterly/vol51/iss2/4