# Regents of the University of California v. Bakke The case that set the terms of the affirmative-action debate for the next forty-five years. Decided June 28, 1978 in a fractured 4–1–4 split, *Bakke* did two things at once: it struck down rigid racial **quotas** in university admissions as a violation of the Equal Protection Clause and Title VI, while simultaneously holding that race **may** be considered as one factor among many in a holistic, individualized review. The straddle was the work of a single Justice — [[Lewis Powell]] — whose solo controlling opinion became the governing law of the land. ## The 4–1–4 Split The Court divided into two blocs of four with Powell alone in the middle. Four Justices would have upheld the University of California, Davis medical school's program (which set aside 16 of 100 seats for minority applicants) outright; four would have struck it down and barred any consideration of race. Powell agreed with the first four that race could be a permissible consideration, and with the second four that the Davis quota was unconstitutional. Allan Bakke, a white applicant twice rejected, was ordered admitted. Crucially, Powell rejected "remedying societal discrimination" as a sufficient justification but accepted a different rationale: the educational benefits of a **diverse** student body as a compelling interest, pointing to the Harvard College admissions plan as a model of permissible race-as-a-plus-factor. ## Significance Powell's diversity rationale is the doctrinal seed of everything that followed. It was reaffirmed by a majority in [[Grutter v. Bollinger]] (2003), tested in [[Fisher v. Texas I and II]] (2013–2016), and finally repudiated in [[Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard]] (2023). The entire arc of [[Affirmative Action]] in higher education is, in effect, a forty-five-year argument over whether Powell got it right — beginning with a compromise that satisfied no one fully and ending when a 6–3 conservative majority decided the compromise had to go. ## See Also - [[Affirmative Action]] — The policy regime *Bakke* framed - [[Grutter v. Bollinger]] — Reaffirmed Powell's diversity rationale - [[Fisher v. Texas I and II]] — Tightened the strict-scrutiny review - [[Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard]] — Ended the regime *Bakke* began