Page:Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College.pdf/193

54 Grutter, according to the majority, requires that universities identify a specific “end point” for the use of race. , for his part, suggests that Grutter itself automatically expires in 25 years, after either “the college class of 2028” or “the college class of 2032.” A faithful reading of this Court’s precedents reveals that Grutter held nothing of the sort.

True, Grutter referred to “25 years,” but that arbitrary number simply reflected the time that had elapsed since the Court “first approved the use of race” in college admissions in Bakke. Grutter, 539 U. S., at 343. It is also true that Grutter remarked that “race-conscious admissions policies must be limited in time,” but it did not do so in a vaccumvacuum [sic], as the Court suggests. Id., at 342. Rather than impose a fixed expiration date, the Court tasked universities with the responsibility of periodically assessing whether their race-conscious programs “are still necessary.” Ibid. Grutter offered as examples sunset provisions, periodic reviews, and experimenting with “race-neutral alternatives as they develop.” Ibid. That is precisely how this Court has previously interpreted Grutter’s command. See Fisher II, 579 U. S., at 388 (“It is the University’s ongoing obligation to engage in constant deliberation and continued reflection regarding its admissions policies”).

Grutter’s requirement that universities engage in periodic reviews so the use of race can end “as soon as practicable” is well grounded in the need to ensure that race is “employed no more broadly than the interest demands.” 539 U. S., at 343. That is, it is grounded in strict scrutiny. By contrast, the Court’s holding is based on the fiction that racial inequality has a predictable cutoff date. Equality is an ongoing project in a society where racial inequality persists. See. A temporal requirement that rests on the fantasy that racial inequality will end at a predictable hour is illogical and unworkable. There is a sound reason