Case Title: Ritchey Produce Co., Inc. v. Ohio Dept. of Adm. Serv.

Citation: 1999-Ohio-262

Docket Number: 19972435

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 1999-04-07T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Cite as Perkins v. Norwood City Schools, 85 Ohio St.3d 191, 1999-Ohio-262.] 
 
 
 
 
 
RITCHEY PRODUCE COMPANY, INC., APPELLEE, v. STATE OF OHIO, DEPARTMENT OF 
ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES, APPELLANT. 
[Cite as Ritchey Produce Co., Inc. v. Ohio Dept. of Adm. Serv. (1999), 85 Ohio 
St.3d 194.] 
State government — Provisions of R.C. 125.081 requiring that approximately 
fifteen percent of state’s purchasing contracts be set aside for competitive 
bidding by minority business enterprises only are constitutional — 
Provisions of R.C. 122.71(E) defining “minority business enterprise” with 
explicit reference to race are constitutional as applied to deny minority-
business-enterprise status to business owned and controlled by person of 
Lebanese ancestry — Ohio’s Minority Business Enterprise Program as it 
relates to purchasing contracts is constitutional. 
1. 
The provisions of R.C. 125.081 requiring that approximately fifteen percent 
of the state’s purchasing contracts be set aside for competitive bidding by 
minority business enterprises only and the provisions of R.C. 122.71(E) 
defining “minority business enterprise” with explicit reference to race are 
constitutional as applied to deny minority-business-enterprise status to a 
business owned and controlled by a person of Lebanese ancestry. 
2. 
Ohio’s Minority Business Enterprise Program as it relates to the state’s 
purchasing contracts is sufficiently narrowly tailored to pass constitutional 
muster. 
(No. 97-2435 — Submitted November 10, 1998 — Decided April 7, 1999.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Franklin County, No. 97APE04-567. 
 
This appeal concerns an administrative order issued by the Ohio Department 
of Administrative Services (“ODAS”), appellant, denying recertification of 
appellee, Ritchey Produce Company, Inc., as a minority business enterprise 
 
 
2
(“MBE”) for purposes of Ohio’s MBE set-aside program.  See R.C. 122.71(E)(1), 
123.151, and 125.081.  The facts of this appeal are as follows. 
 
Ohio’s MBE set-aside program mandates that certain percentages of the 
state’s construction and procurement contracts are to be set aside for competitive 
bidding by MBEs only.  The MBE program for state construction contracts 
operates in a straightforward manner. 
 
From all of the contracts to be awarded by ODAS under R.C. 123.15 and 
R.C. Chapter 153, the Director of Administrative Services must “select a number 
of contracts with an aggregate value of approximately five per cent of the total 
estimated value of contracts to be awarded in the current fiscal year.”  R.C. 
123.151(C)(1).  The director must then “set aside the contracts so selected for 
bidding by minority business enterprises only.”  Id.  To the extent that any state 
agency other than ODAS is authorized to enter into construction contracts, those 
agencies are bound by a similar five-percent set-aside requirement.  R.C. 
123.151(D)(1).  The bidding procedures for set-aside contracts are the same as for 
all other contracts awarded by ODAS under R.C. 123.15 and R.C. Chapter 153 (or 
by any other state agency), except that only MBEs certified and listed by the Equal 
Employment Opportunity Coordinator are qualified to bid.  R.C. 123.151(C)(1) 
and 123.151(D)(1).  Each contractor awarded a contract is required to “make every 
effort to ensure that certified minority business subcontractors and materialmen 
participate in the contract.”  R.C. 123.151(C)(2)(a).  ODAS may not, however, 
enter into any contract authorized under R.C. 123.15 or R.C. Chapter 153, 
including any contract set aside under R.C. 123.151(C)(1), unless the contract 
contains a provision stipulating that the contractor, to the extent that it 
subcontracts work, “will award subcontracts totaling no less than five per cent of 
the total value of the contract to minority businesses certified under division (B) of 
 
 
3
this section and that the total value of both the materials purchased from minority 
businesses certified under division (B) of this section and of the subcontracts 
awarded * * * to such minority businesses will equal at least seven per cent of the 
total value of the contract; except that in the case of contracts specified in division 
(A) of section 153.50 of the Revised Code * * * [a different stipulation is 
required].”  R.C. 123.151(C)(2)(b).1  The same requirements apply in the case of 
construction contracts that are set aside by state agencies other than ODAS.  R.C. 
123.151(D)(2). 
 
With respect to state procurement contracts for supplies and services, etc., 
the MBE set-aside program also operates in a straightforward manner.  
Specifically, from the purchases ODAS is required to make through competitive 
selection, the director must “select a number of such purchases, the aggregate 
value of which equals approximately fifteen per cent of the estimated total value 
of all such purchases to be made in the current fiscal year.”  R.C. 125.081(A).  The 
director must then “set aside the purchases selected for competition only by 
minority business enterprises, as defined in division (E)(1) of section 122.71 of the 
Revised Code.”  Any agency of the state other than ODAS, the legislative and 
judicial branches, boards of elections, and the adjunct general that is authorized to 
make purchases is likewise bound by a fifteen-percent set-aside requirement.  R.C. 
125.081(B).  The competitive selection procedures for purchases set aside under 
R.C. 125.081(A) and (B) are the same as for any other purchases made by ODAS, 
or by a state agency other than ODAS, except that only MBEs certified and listed 
by the Equal Employment Opportunity Coordinator are qualified to compete.  R.C. 
125.081(A) and (B). 
 
R.C. 123.151(B)(1) provides that “[t]he director of administrative services 
shall make rules in accordance with Chapter 119. of the Revised Code establishing 
 
 
4
procedures by which minority businesses may apply to the equal employment 
opportunity coordinator for certification as minority business enterprises.”  R.C. 
123.151(B)(2) provides that the coordinator “shall approve the application of any 
minority business enterprise that complies with the rules adopted under this 
division.”  Additionally, the statute provides that any person adversely affected by 
an order of the coordinator denying certification may appeal from the order as 
provided in R.C. Chapter 119.  The statute also requires the coordinator to prepare 
and maintain a list of certified MBEs. 
 
R.C. 122.71(E)(1) defines “[m]inority business enterprise” for purposes of 
the MBE program.  R.C. 122.71 provides: 
 
“As used in sections 122.71 to 122.83 of the Revised Code: 
 
“* * * 
 
“(E)(1)  ‘Minority business enterprise’ means an individual, partnership, 
corporation, or joint venture of any kind that is owned and controlled by United 
States citizens, residents of Ohio, who are members of one of the following 
economically disadvantaged groups:  Blacks, American Indians, Hispanics, and 
Orientals. 
 
“(2)  ‘Owned and controlled’ means that at least fifty-one per cent of the 
business, including corporate stock if a corporation, is owned by persons who 
belong to one or more of the groups set forth in division (E)(1) of this section, and 
that such owners have control over the management and day-to-day operations of 
the business and an interest in the capital, assets, and profits and losses of the 
business proportionate to their percentage of ownership.  In order to qualify as a 
minority business enterprise, a business shall have been owned and controlled by 
such persons at least one year prior to being awarded a contract pursuant to this 
section.” 
 
 
5
 
Supplementing the statute, a rule promulgated by the Director of 
Administrative Services further defines these terms and, among other things, 
establishes the application and certification requirements for Ohio MBEs.  See 
Ohio Adm.Code 123:2-15-01.  The rule requires that “[a]ny minority business 
enterprise that desires to bid on a contract under division (C)(1) or (D)(1) of 
section 123.151 of the Revised Code or under division (A) or (B) of section 
125.081 of the Revised Code or to be a minority business subcontractor or 
materialman under division (C)(2) or (D)(2) of section 123.151 of the Revised 
Code shall first apply with the equal employment opportunity coordinator of the 
department of administrative services for certification as a minority business 
enterprise.”  Ohio Adm.Code 123:2-15-01(B).  Certification may be granted for a 
period not exceeding one year and, thus, successful applicants must reapply 
annually for MBE recertification.  Ohio Adm.Code 123:2-15-01(C).  The rule 
defines “minority business enterprise” as “an individual, partnership, corporation, 
or joint venture of any kind that is owned and controlled by United States citizens, 
residents of Ohio, who are and have held themselves out as members of the 
following economically disadvantaged groups:  Blacks, American Indians, 
Hispanics, and Orientals.”  Ohio Adm.Code 123:2-15-01(A).2  For purposes of the 
rule, “ ‘Orientals’ means all persons having origins in any of the original people of 
the Far East, including China, Japan and Southeast Asia.”  Ohio Adm.Code 123:2-
15-01(A)(9). 
 
Nadim F. Ritchey (“Ritchey”) is the sole shareholder of Ritchey Produce 
Company, Inc. (“Ritchey Produce”), appellee.  Ritchey Produce is a wholesale 
supplier of fruits and vegetables.  Ritchey, who was born in Lebanon, is a 
naturalized citizen of the United States and is a resident of Ohio.  In 1990, Ritchey 
filed an application seeking MBE certification for Ritchey Produce.  On the front 
 
 
6
page of the application, Ritchey indicated that he is a member of a racial or ethnic 
group identified as “Oriental.”  However, on the second page of the application 
form, Ritchey stated that his national origin is the country of Lebanon and that he 
is Lebanese.  In August 1991, Ritchey Produce received MBE certification for the 
twelve-month period beginning August 31, 1991, and was granted recertification 
as an MBE in each of the three succeeding years.  During the period of 
certification, appellee was awarded an R.C. 125.081(A) set-aside contract by 
ODAS covering the state’s requirements for fresh fruits and vegetables from July 
1995 through September 1997. 
 
In 1995, Ritchey filed an application for recertification of Ritchey Produce 
as an MBE.  The company’s then-current MBE certification was set to expire 
October 31, 1995.  However, during the recertification process, the State 
Purchasing Office advised the ODAS Equal Opportunity Center that Ritchey is 
Lebanese and that therefore Ritchey Produce might not have been properly 
certified as an MBE.  Apparently, that information had come to light as a result of 
concerns raised by an unsuccessful bidder on the contract that had previously been 
awarded to Ritchey Produce.  An investigation of the matter, which apparently 
included a review of the company’s original application for MBE certification, 
revealed that Ritchey, the sole owner of Ritchey Produce, is of Lebanese descent.  
Accordingly, by letter dated October 31, 1995, ODAS notified Ritchey of the 
Equal Employment Opportunity Coordinator’s intent to deny the application.  The 
asserted basis for denial was that Ritchey Produce was not owned by an Oriental 
person or by a member of any other racial/ethnic group listed in Ohio Adm.Code 
123:2-15-01(A).  Thereafter, Ritchey requested a hearing on the matter before the 
Director of ODAS, and the matter was submitted to an ODAS hearing examiner 
for consideration of the parties’ written position statements and proffered exhibits. 
 
 
7
 
In a report and recommendation, the ODAS hearing examiner found that 
Ritchey, the sole owner of Ritchey Produce, was not “Oriental” within the 
meaning of R.C. 122.71(E)(1).  Therefore, the hearing examiner concluded that 
because Ritchey was not a member of a specific minority group listed in R.C. 
122.71(E)(1), appellee Ritchey Produce did not meet the requirements for MBE 
certification.  In April 1996, the Director of Administrative Services adopted the 
report and recommendation of the hearing examiner and denied the application for 
recertification of Ritchey Produce as a qualified MBE.  Apparently, this action did 
not affect the contract that Ritchey Produce had previously been awarded by 
ODAS. 
 
Subsequently, appellee filed in the Court of Common Pleas of Franklin 
County an R.C. 119.12 appeal from the agency’s final adjudication order.  The 
matter was referred to a magistrate of the court.  See Civ.R. 53.  On October 21, 
1996, the magistrate issued her decision, finding that ODAS’s final adjudication 
order denying Ritchey Produce’s request for recertification violated the equal 
protection guarantees of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United 
States Constitution.  Specifically, the magistrate considered the provisions of R.C. 
125.081(A) (pertaining to purchasing contracts that must be set aside for bidding 
by MBEs) and the provisions of R.C. 122.71(E)(1) (defining “[m]inority business 
enterprise”) and stated: 
 
“[ODAS’s] Order was based solely on the interpretation of the statute [R.C. 
122.71(E)(1)] that only those four specifically named groups can be minorities for 
purposes of the MBE set aside statute [R.C. 125.081].  However, by case law, the 
statute has been enlarged to include Asian Indians as Orientals.  See [DLZ Corp. v. 
Ohio Dept. of Adm. Serv. (1995), 102 Ohio App.3d 777, 658 N.E.2d 28]. 
 
 
8
 
“[Ritchey] concedes that he is not Oriental and argues that, instead of 
focusing on the racial classifications contained within the statutes themselves, that 
the focus must be on the words ‘economically disadvantaged.’  Ritchey further 
argues that there should be a rebuttable presumption that the businesses within the 
named races are economically disadvantaged. * * * 
 
“The United States Supreme Court has recently held that the application of a 
statute which is race based must be reviewed with strict scrutiny and must be 
narrowly tailored to further a compelling governmental interest.  Adarand 
Constructors, Inc. v. Pena (1995) [515 U.S. 200], 115 S.Ct. 2097, 132 L.Ed.2d 
158.  The Court recognized that not all minority contractors are economically or 
socially disadvantaged and that there might not be actual discrimination occurring.  
To award the contract based on race and without regard to any other factors does 
not meet the requirement of strict scrutiny nor is it narrowly tailored to further a 
compelling governmental interest.  The government clearly has a compelling 
interest in avoiding racial discrimination.  But this statute, as applied herein, 
potentially discriminates against other socially or economically disadvantaged 
groups by narrowing its protected races to Blacks, Hispanics, American Indians 
and Orientals.  Rather, the focus, herein, as proposed by [Ritchey Produce], must 
be on whether or not there is actual disadvantage.  A group which can show 
disadvantage must be permitted to participate.  Adarand, supra.  DAS failed to 
address that issue, sidestepping it, by noting that Lebanese people are not 
Orientals.  In doing so, they violated [Ritchey Produce’s] Fifth and Fourteenth 
Amendment right to equal protection. 
 
“While it is the opinion of this Magistrate that the law needs to be rewritten 
to avoid cases such as this one * * *, it can be saved by requiring the EEOC, in the 
future, to look at economic disadvantage rather than race as the determining factor.  
 
 
9
Those named races, as suggested in Adarand, supra, could be rebuttably presumed 
to be disadvantaged.” 
 
Accordingly, the magistrate concluded that “the MBE statute as it is being 
applied is unconstitutional,” and that the matter should therefore be remanded to 
ODAS for a determination whether Ritchey Produce is an economically 
disadvantaged enterprise that “should be recertified under this new strict scrutiny 
review.” 
 
ODAS filed written objections to the decision of the magistrate.  However, 
despite ODAS’s protests, Judge Daniel T. Hogan of the common pleas court 
adopted the magistrate’s decision, stating: 
 
“[ODAS] argues that [Ritchey Produce] is not eligible to participate in [an] 
MBE program because its owner [is] of Lebanese descent.  The program is set up 
to remedy past discrimination by requiring the set aside of public contracts for 
certain economically disadvantaged groups:  namely Blacks, American Indians, 
Hispanics and Orientals. 
 
“The ODAS argues, at great length, that Mr. Ritchey being Lebanese is not 
Oriental, and therefore may not participate in the program regardless of ‘economic 
disadvantage.’ 
 
“[Ritchey Produce], on the other hand, argues that the Equal Protection 
guarantees of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States 
Constitution prohibit exemptions based on race per se.  Instead, for Ohio’s MBE 
Program to be constitutional, the use of the racial categories must merely represent 
that these ethnic groups are granted a rebuttable presumption that they are 
‘disadvantaged.’  Moreover, ODAS must make individualized case-by-case 
determinations with respect to whether businesses owned by other racial groups 
qualify as ‘disadvantaged business enterprises.’  This case-by-case determination 
 
 
10
without regard to race per se was the administrative procedure in place when 
[Ritchey Produce] was originally certified as a Minority Business Enterprise in 
1990.  * * * [Citing a 1992 deposition of former Equal Employment Opportunity 
Coordinator Booker T. Tall.] 
 
“[DLZ Corp., 102 Ohio App.3d 777, 658 N.E.2d 28] was decided upon 
issues of statutory construction rather than the constitutionality of the MBE 
program.  In that case, the Tenth District Court of Appeals determined that 
‘Oriental’ as used in the statute defining eligibility for participation in the MBE set 
aside program includes people with origins in India. 
 
“Working our way north and west from India we first come to Pakistan, then 
Iran, then Iraq, then Syria, and finally Lebanon.  If Asian Indians are ‘Oriental,’ 
shall we exclude Pakistanis separated from India only by the Great Indian Desert?  
And if Pakistanis are ‘Oriental,’ shall we exclude Iranians who share a common 
border with Pakistan?  And if Iran is ‘Oriental,’ shall we exclude Iraq separated 
from Iran only by the Zagros Mountains?  And if Iraq is ‘Oriental,’ shall we 
exclude Syria, for the Euphrates River flows through both countries?  And finally 
if Syria is ‘Oriental,’ how can its contiguous neighbor Lebanon be anything but 
‘Oriental’? 
 
“This Court can think of few things more repugnant to our constitutional 
system of government than the construction of a statute that would exclude a 
group of United States citizens and residents of Ohio from a State program, the 
sole criteri[on] for exclusion being the side of a river, a mountain range, or a 
desert their ancestor decided to settle. 
 
“For these reasons, as well as the reasons stated in the Magistrate’s opinion, 
the Court finds that the MBE statute as it is being applied is unconstitutional.  This 
case is REVERSED and it is REMANDED for a determination of whether or not 
 
 
11
[Ritchey Produce] remains an economically disadvantaged enterprise which 
should be recertified under new strict scrutiny review.” 
 
On appeal, the court of appeals majority found that the racial classification 
in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) “appears to be based on the presumption that caucasians and 
other minority groups are not disadvantaged, socially or economically, but that all 
members of the listed minority groups are socially and economically 
disadvantaged.”  In this regard, the court of appeals found that the classification 
was both underinclusive and overinclusive, since “[t]here may be socially and 
economically disadvantaged business owners who are excluded from the program 
simply because of their race” and “there may be business owners who are not 
socially and economically disadvantaged yet eligible to participate in the program 
simply because they are among the four enumerated minority groups.”  Therefore, 
the court of appeals determined that the MBE program was not “narrowly tailored” 
to further a compelling governmental interest, and stated that “[w]hile remedying 
past discrimination may be a compelling interest, we find it hard to envision a 
situation in which a race-based classification is narrowly tailored.” 
 
Additionally, the court of appeals, relying on Adarand, 515 U.S. 200, 115 
S.Ct. 2097, 132 L.Ed.2d 158, stated, “This court construes Adarand to mean that 
race may, in some circumstances, create a presumption of disadvantage, but that 
other races cannot be excluded based solely on statutory presumptions such as the 
one in R.C. 122.71(E)(1).”  The court of appeals concluded that the goal of the 
MBE Program “ideally” should be to maximize the opportunity for all 
economically or socially disadvantaged Ohioans.  The court also concluded that 
the state’s present policy reflects that goal as indicated by Executive Order 96-
53V, entitled “Socially and Economically Disadvantaged Business Policy.”  
Moreover, the court of appeals, relying on a 1992 deposition of former Equal 
 
 
12
Employment Opportunity Coordinator Booker T. Tall, stated, “[ODAS] had, at one 
point, shared the belief that the MBE racial distinctions exist because of a mere 
presumption that those racial groups are disadvantaged.  [Tall] testified that, prior 
to 1995, MBE certification was based not on whether the applicant fit neatly into 
one of the enumerated racial categories, but whether the applicant qualified as a 
disadvantaged business enterprise.  The certification determinations were made on 
a case-by-case basis.  Apparently, [Ritchey Produce’s] prior MBE certificates were 
granted under that prior practice.” 
 
The court of appeals did not decide the question whether Ritchey Produce 
qualified as an Oriental company, finding that because “the enumerated racial 
classifications could not constitutionally exclude [Ritchey], it makes no difference 
whether a Lebanese, such as [Ritchey], would qualify as an oriental.”  
Accordingly, the court of appeals affirmed the judgment of the trial court, holding 
that “the state’s MBE program is a race per se classification” and “was 
unconstitutionally applied to deny [Ritchey] MBE certification.”  The court of 
appeals remanded the cause to ODAS “for further review of [Ritchey’s] 
application irrespective of race.” 
 
Presiding Judge G. Gary Tyack, in a concurring opinion, stated that he 
agreed with the decision affirming the judgment of the trial court, but not for the 
reasons stated by the court of appeals majority.  Specifically, Judge Tyack stated 
that he would have decided the controversy on the sole basis that Ritchey’s 
Lebanese ancestry qualified him as Oriental and qualified Ritchey Produce for 
MBE certification.  Accordingly, Judge Tyack concluded that there was no need to 
address the arguments concerning the constitutionality of Ohio’s MBE program. 
 
The cause is now before this court pursuant to the allowance of a 
discretionary appeal. 
 
 
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__________________ 
 
Bricker & Eckler L.L.P., Luther L. Liggett, Jr., and Kimberly J. Brown; and 
William D. Joseph, for appellee. 
 
Betty D. Montgomery, Attorney General, Judith L. French and Darius N. 
Kandawalla, Assistant Attorneys General, for appellant. 
 
Squire, Sanders & Dempsey L.L.P., Frederick R. Nance and Michael W. 
Kelly, urging affirmance on other grounds for amici curiae, the Ohio Black 
Legislative Caucus, Senator Jeffrey Johnson and Representatives Otto Beatty, 
Samuel Britton, Troy Lee James, Peter Lawson Jones, Mark Mallory, Sylvester 
Patton, C.J. Prentiss, Tom Roberts, Vernon Sykes, Charleta Tavares, and Vermel 
Whalen. 
__________________ 
 
DOUGLAS, J.  As a preliminary matter, we note that appellee and amici raise 
a number of arguments that tend to confuse rather than to clarify the issues 
presented by this appeal.  Therefore, it is necessary to dispel some of this 
confusion before proceeding to the primary issue raised in this appeal, to wit, 
whether Ohio’s MBE Program, as administratively applied and as written, violates 
the equal protection guarantees of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States 
Constitution.3 
I 
 
In its brief, ODAS correctly notes that racial classifications of the type set 
forth in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) must be analyzed under strict scrutiny.  The reason, of 
course, is that “government may treat people differently because of their race only 
for the most compelling reasons.”  Adarand Constructors, Inc. v. Pena (1995), 515 
U.S. 200, 227, 115 S.Ct. 2097, 2113, 132 L.Ed.2d 158, 182.  Under strict scrutiny, 
governmental classifications based on race, even purportedly “benign” or 
 
 
14
“remedial” racial classifications of the type at issue here, are constitutional only if 
they are “narrowly tailored measures that further compelling governmental 
interests.”  Id.  Accordingly, in its first proposition of law, ODAS argues that 
Ohio’s MBE set-aside program satisfies both prongs of strict scrutiny, to wit, there 
was a compelling governmental interest for the adoption of the MBE program, and 
the program is narrowly tailored to meet that interest.  As a necessary part of this 
argument, ODAS has explored, at some length, the facts and history that gave rise 
to the enactment of Ohio’s MBE program.  In its second proposition of law, 
ODAS argues that the administrative determination denying appellee’s application 
for MBE recertification was correct, since the owner of the business, Ritchey, is 
clearly not “Oriental” within the meaning of R.C. 122.71(E)(1).  On the basis of 
these two propositions, ODAS seeks reversal of the judgment of the court of 
appeals and reinstatement of the administrative adjudication order denying the 
request for MBE recertification of Ritchey Produce. 
 
In response to ODAS’s first proposition of law, appellee argues that 
ODAS’s entire analysis concerning the constitutionality of Ohio’s MBE program 
raises issues that were neither argued nor decided in the courts below.  
Specifically, in its merit brief, appellee contends:  “The State argues in its first 
proposition of law the facial validity of its MBE program and the underlying State 
interests.  Accordingly, the State spends an inordinate amount of time arguing its 
compelling interest for legislating such a program.  However, Ritchey Produce 
never challenged the facial validity of the State’s MBE program and concedes the 
State’s compelling interest in creating a ‘disadvantaged business enterprise’ 
program.”  In addition, appellee argues that it never challenged the validity of 
Ohio’s MBE program but “instead challenged how ODAS reversed its policy and 
decertified Ritchey Produce on race per se.”  Appellee concludes, therefore, that 
 
 
15
“[a]s the lower courts never considered either a record or arguments on the validity 
of the State’s underlying interest in creating its MBE program, the State 
improperly raises these issues before this Court,” and ODAS’s first proposition of 
law should be stricken. 
 
We disagree with Ritchey Produce’s claim that ODAS’s first proposition of 
law should be stricken.  Rather, we find that strict scrutiny requires consideration 
of the type of issues that have been briefed and argued by ODAS in its first 
proposition of law.  That is, the question whether the MBE program is narrowly 
tailored to further a compelling governmental interest necessarily requires 
consideration of the compelling interest that gave rise to the program’s creation, 
i.e., the requirements of a compelling interest and narrowly tailored means go hand 
in hand.  Further, appellee’s concession that the state had a compelling interest to 
enact a disadvantaged business enterprise program underscores the fact that 
appellee does not fully comprehend the nature and character of Ohio’s MBE 
program.  This fact becomes all the more apparent when appellee’s arguments are 
considered in detail. 
 
Appellee claims that the MBE program, specifically, R.C. 122.71, 
“expressly creates a ‘disadvantaged business enterprise’ program.”  In connection 
with this argument, appellee has gone to great lengths in an attempt to convince us 
that ODAS changed its policy on MBE certifications between the time appellee 
was originally granted certification in 1991 and the time appellee’s request for 
recertification was denied in April 1996.  According to appellee, “in April 1996, 
ODAS reversed its course with no change in fact or law, and decertified Ritchey 
Produce based on the sole criteri[on] that Ritchey Produce racially does not meet 
the State’s latest definition of ‘Oriental.’ ”  Appellee suggests that “[w]hile prior to 
this time ODAS based MBE determinations upon whether the applicant qualified 
 
 
16
as ‘socially or economically disadvantaged’ as described in the statute, ODAS 
unconstitutionally altered its administration of its MBE program to focus on race 
per se.”  (Emphasis added.) 
 
We find that appellee’s arguments misconstrue the language, nature, and 
character of Ohio’s MBE program.  R.C. 122.71(E)(1) defines “minority business 
enterprise” as a business that is owned and controlled by persons “of the following 
economically disadvantaged groups:  Blacks, American Indians, Hispanics, and 
Orientals.”  (Emphasis added.)  Apparently, appellee believes that a plain reading 
of the statute requires ODAS to consider whether an applicant for MBE 
certification is socially or economically disadvantaged and to certify businesses 
that demonstrate disadvantage regardless of the business owner’s race.  That is, 
appellee reads R.C. 122.71(E)(1) as including in the definition of “minority 
business enterprise” businesses that are owned and controlled by members of the 
four groups specifically listed in the statute and any other businesses that can 
demonstrate economic disadvantage.  However, R.C. 122.71(E)(1) clearly does not 
say that.  Rather, under the plain terms of the statute, the four groups listed in R.C. 
122.71(E)(1) are considered to be “economically disadvantaged groups,” and only 
businesses owned and controlled by members of the specified groups are capable 
of satisfying the statutory definition of “minority business enterprise.” 
 
Moreover, appellee’s position that R.C. 122.71(E)(1) plainly creates a 
disadvantaged-business-enterprise program — i.e., one which benefits, inter alia, 
groups or individuals that fall outside the racial classification and that demonstrate 
economic disadvantage — is completely untenable in light of the legislative 
history of R.C. 122.71(E)(1).  Specifically, that statute was originally enacted in 
1980 as part of Am.Sub.H.B. No. 584, 138 Ohio Laws, Part II, 3062, 3065.  As 
originally enacted, former R.C. 122.71(E)(1) provided:  “ ‘Minority business 
 
 
17
enterprise’ means an individual, partnership, corporation, or joint venture of any 
kind that is owned and controlled by United States citizens, residents of Ohio, who 
are members of an economically disadvantaged group including, but not limited 
to, the following groups:  Blacks, American Indians, Hispanics, and Orientals.”  
(Emphasis added.)  Id.  In 1981, the above-emphasized portion of the statute was 
altered by amendment, and the following language was inserted in its place:  “one 
of the following economically disadvantaged groups:  Blacks, American Indians, 
Hispanics, and Orientals.”  139 Ohio Laws, Part II, 3166 and 3506.  Obviously, 
the 1981 amendment to R.C. 122.71(E)(1) evinces a clear legislative intention not 
to include in the definition of “minority business enterprise” any businesses owned 
and controlled by members of any group other than the four specific groups listed 
in the statute. 
 
Further, to accept appellee’s interpretation of the statute would essentially 
require us to rewrite it and to enact a new MBE program that benefits all 
disadvantaged businesses, thereby changing the MBE program into a 
disadvantaged-business-enterprise program.  However, Ohio’s MBE program was 
clearly designed to serve a far different purpose from the one appellee suggests it 
should now serve.  Given the plain language of R.C. 122.71(E)(1) and its history, 
we are in no position to modify the clear and unambiguous terms of the statute by 
rewriting it, under the guise of judicial interpretation, to make it say something far 
different from what the statute actually says and means.  This court is not now, nor 
has it ever been, a judicial legislature.  When a statute is assailed as 
unconstitutional, it is our duty to liberally construe it to save the statute from 
constitutional infirmities.  See, e.g., Wilson v. Kennedy (1949), 151 Ohio St. 485, 
492, 39 O.O. 301, 304, 86 N.E.2d 722, 725.  However, that duty does not entail 
our having to rewrite a statute so as to give it an entirely new meaning, particularly 
 
 
18
where the new meaning would utterly oppose the purposes for which the statute 
was enacted. 
 
Appellee also claims, and the court of appeals apparently agreed, that 
former Equal Employment Opportunity Coordinator Booker T. Tall had granted 
MBE certification to appellee in 1991 based solely on a determination that 
appellee was a “disadvantaged business” enterprise.  To support this argument, 
appellee relies on Tall’s 1992 deposition in an unrelated case.  Armed with this 
deposition, appellee argues that “[w]hen Ritchey Produce first applied [for MBE 
certification], ODAS correctly certified any business demonstrating actual ‘social 
or economic disadvantage,’ thus certifying MBE’s on a case-by-case basis.  
According to the sworn deposition testimony of State EEOC Coordinator Booker 
T. Tall (the same coordinator who first certified Ritchey Produce as an MBE), 
determinations of whether a business qualified for MBE status rested upon 
whether the business qualified as a ‘disadvantaged business enterprise,’ not 
whether the business fit neatly into the listed racial categories of Black, Hispanic, 
American Indian or Oriental.”  (Emphasis sic.) 
 
We have reviewed Tall’s deposition testimony in its entirety, and we find 
that it does not fully support appellee’s contentions.  Nor does the deposition fully 
support the conclusions of the court of appeals on this issue.  The testimony 
indicates that, during Tall’s tenure as Equal Employment Opportunity 
Coordinator, applications for MBE certification were reviewed to determine 
whether each applicant was an “economically disadvantaged” enterprise.  The 
testimony also indicates, however, that MBE certifications were issued by Tall 
only upon a determination that directly linked the ownership and control of the 
business to members of one of the four specific racial or ethnic groups listed in 
R.C. 122.71(E)(1).  Thus, it appears, when Tall originally granted MBE 
 
 
19
certification to appellee, the certification was premised upon a determination that 
Ritchey, the owner of the company, was Oriental.  Precisely how Tall could have 
reached that conclusion remains a mystery.  Perhaps he construed the term 
“Oriental” to include a person of Lebanese descent, or perhaps he never 
thoroughly reviewed appellee’s original application for MBE certification, 
wherein Ritchey indicated, among other things, that he was Lebanese.  In any 
event, as the magistrate noted at the trial court level, “under [DLZ Corp. v. Ohio 
Dept. of Adm. Serv. (1995), 102 Ohio App.3d 777, 658 N.E.2d 28] and the law as 
technically written, and previously applied, Ritchey Produce was mistakenly 
certified as an MBE from the beginning.”  (Emphasis added.)  Moreover, even if 
Tall did purposely certify MBEs regardless of race, that practice clearly does not 
comport with the language and purposes of R.C. 122.71(E)(1). 
 
There is also some evidence in the record (namely, Ritchey’s affidavit) that 
when Ritchey first applied for MBE certification, an employee of the state’s Equal 
Employment Opportunity Coordinator’s Office had interviewed Ritchey and had 
instructed him to fill out the application form by “check[ing] the box under 
‘racial/ethnic group’ that most closely related to [Ritchey’s] nation of origin.”  
Since there were only four racial groups from which Ritchey could chose, i.e., 
Black, Hispanic, American Indian, and Oriental, Ritchey chose “Oriental” and 
marked the application accordingly.  Appellee claims to have made that choice 
because the term “Oriental” was consistent with his “traditional understanding” 
that the term included people of Lebanese descent.  Ritchey also asserts that he did 
not arrive at that decision himself and implies that the interviewer, by directing 
him to choose one of the four possible options on the application form, had 
participated in that decision.  However, to the extent that the interviewer did 
participate in the conclusion that Ritchey was Oriental (and, incidentally, there is 
 
 
20
no proof that the interviewer did so), that conclusion was clearly incorrect.  See 
our discussion in Part VII, below.  Moreover, there is simply no proof that the 
actions of the employee or employees who interviewed Ritchey represent a 
department-wide policy of certifying MBEs regardless of the business owner’s 
race.  The decision to approve the original application for MBE certification was 
Tall’s decision to make, and we have already stated our views concerning his 
deposition testimony.  Although Ritchey apparently never intended to deceive 
anyone with respect to his race or ethnicity, the fact that Ritchey Produce was 
certified as an Oriental-owned MBE appears to have resulted from a series of 
errors. 
 
Appellee also relies heavily on Adarand, 515 U.S. 200, 115 S.Ct. 2097, 132 
L.Ed.2d 158, for the proposition that racial classifications of the type in R.C. 
122.71(E)(1) can never be applied to deny MBE certification on the basis of race 
per se.  Appellee contends that “according to Adarand and as found by the court of 
appeals, while race may be used as a rebuttable presumption of economic 
disadvantage, nothing justifies the State to exclude per se other races, when they 
can demonstrate actual disadvantage.”  Similarly, appellee suggests that “Adarand 
requires that to constitutionally enforce the MBE program the State must base its 
eligibility determinations on actual and social economic disadvantage,” so that 
appellee must be admitted to the program upon proof of disadvantage. 
 
However, neither Adarand nor any other decision of the United States 
Supreme Court specifically indicates that such a blanket constitutional principle 
exists with respect to remedial race-based state action that is necessary to serve 
compelling governmental interests, and that is narrowly tailored to the 
achievement of that objective.  What Adarand does hold is that all governmental 
classifications based on race must satisfy the strict scrutiny standard of review, so 
 
 
21
that racial classifications will be deemed constitutional only if they are narrowly 
tailored measures that further compelling governmental interests.  Id. at 227, 115 
S.Ct. at 2113, 132 L.Ed.2d at 182; see, also, our discussion in Part II, below.  The 
entire point of Adarand was to make explicit that federal racial classifications, like 
those of a state, are subject to the strict scrutiny standard of review.  Id. at 235, 
115 S.Ct. at 2117, 132 L.Ed.2d at 187; see, also, our discussion in Part II, below.  
Moreover, the court in Adarand remanded the matter at issue there to the lower 
federal courts for analysis under strict scrutiny.  Id. at 237-239, 115 S.Ct. at 2118, 
132 L.Ed.2d at 188-189; see, also, our discussion in Part II, below.  Thus, in 
Adarand, the United States Supreme Court did not conduct strict scrutiny itself 
and did not determine whether strict scrutiny was satisfied on the facts of that 
particular case. 
 
Appellee also cites certain executive orders that were issued by Governor 
George V. Voinovich in 1996 and 1997, specifically, Executive Order 96-53V 
(entitled “Socially and Economically Disadvantaged Business Policy”), and 
Executive Order 97-14V (entitled “Historically Underutilized Business Policy”).4  
These executive orders indicate a policy of the state with respect to the 
certification of disadvantaged business enterprises (now called “historically 
underutilized business enterprises”) on the basis of social and economic 
disadvantage.  Appellee claims that “[t]hese current policy changes in compliance 
with Adarand are admissions by the State that it recognizes the United States 
Supreme Court dictate that ‘disadvantaged business’ programs must be based on 
social and economic disadvantage, and not on race per se.”  However, these 
executive orders deal with policies that differ from the nature and purpose of the 
MBE program.  ODAS contends, and we agree, that the former Governor’s 
programs merely supplement, but do not supplant, the MBE program.  Moreover, 
 
 
22
we do not view these executive orders as supporting the conclusions that appellee 
attempts to draw from them.  As we indicated in our discussion immediately 
above, Adarand holds that all racial classifications, whether imposed by federal, 
state, or local government, are subject to strict scrutiny.  Id., 515 U.S. at 227, 115 
S.Ct. at 2113, 132 L.Ed.2d at 182.  By virtue of the decision in Richmond v. J.A. 
Croson Co. (1989), 488 U.S. 469, 109 S.Ct. 706, 102 L.Ed.2d 854, it has been 
known since 1989 that Ohio’s MBE program, if challenged, would be subject to 
strict scrutiny.  See our discussion in Part II, below.  Adarand merely placed the 
federal government in the same boat as state and local governments in terms of the 
applicability of strict scrutiny to benign or remedial race-based governmental 
actions.  Therefore, for this and other reasons, appellee’s claim that the former 
Governor’s executive orders were a measured response to the Adarand decision is 
unconvincing. 
 
As to ODAS’s second proposition of law, appellee contends that the 
question whether Ritchey is Oriental is irrelevant, since, according to appellee, 
Adarand requires that businesses must be admitted into the program on the basis 
of actual and social economic disadvantage.  Appellee also claims that “Ritchey 
qualifies under the definition of ‘Oriental’ as originally reviewed and certified by 
the State, or as should be properly administered now.”  Therefore, appellee 
maintains that Ritchey is Oriental, even though Ritchey admitted to the trial 
court’s magistrate that he is not Oriental. 
 
To complicate matters further, amici enter the fray by urging us to consider 
ODAS’s propositions of law in reverse order, i.e., to address the second 
proposition of law first, and the first proposition of law second.  With respect to 
ODAS’s second proposition of law, amici claim that Ritchey is Oriental — 
although he clearly is not.  Nevertheless, amici urge that construing the term 
 
 
23
“Orientals” in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) in accordance with rules of grammar and 
common usage, the term clearly includes within its meaning individuals of 
Lebanese descent.  With respect to ODAS’s first proposition of law, amici urge us 
to uphold R.C. 122.71(E)(1) as a constitutional exercise of legislative authority. 
 
In reply to the arguments of appellee and of appellee’s supporting amici, 
ODAS points out that appellee’s arguments in this case have been specifically 
calibrated “to save the program for [appellee’s] benefit, while disregarding the 
impact on all other MBEs — that is, if [appellee] cannot be certified under the 
existing program, then no company can.”  ODAS notes that the controversy in this 
case arose simply because ODAS had adhered to the plain language of R.C. 
122.71(E)(1) in denying appellee’s application for recertification.  ODAS observes 
that, despite this fact, appellee now “argues that the facial validity of the MBE 
program is not at issue” and “that the only constitutional question before the Court 
is whether the statute is constitutional as applied only to it.”  ODAS contends that 
appellee’s arguments indicate that appellee “does not seek to participate in the 
Ohio MBE program as that program is statutorily structured and as it is currently 
applied,” and that “[i]nstead, Ritchey asks the Court to grant him the benefit of a 
different program, one that would rely not on his race, but on his economic or 
social disadvantage, presumably arising in some way from his race.”  (Emphasis 
sic.)  We agree with ODAS’s summary: 
 
“In the final analysis, the semantics of whether the Court of Appeals 
decision presents a ‘facial’ or ‘as applied’ constitutional challenge to the MBE 
program are not critical.  Nor is it critical for the Court to consider the issues 
presented in a particular order.  What is critical is for the Court to consider, in full 
view, the State’s compelling interest in redressing state-sponsored racial 
 
 
24
discrimination and its narrow tailoring of a program [the MBE program] to meet 
that interest.” 
II 
 
Having set forth the arguments raised in this appeal, we now consider the 
precedents governing the determination whether Ohio’s MBE program, 
specifically, R.C. 122.71(E)(1), violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 
Fourteenth Amendment.  For the past twenty years, the United States Supreme 
Court has struggled with the tension between the Fourteenth Amendment 
guarantee of equal protection of citizens and the use of race-based measures 
imposed by governmental actors to ameliorate the effects of past discrimination on 
minority groups in society.  Beginning with Regents of the Univ. of California v. 
Bakke (1978), 438 U.S. 265, 98 S.Ct. 2733, 57 L.Ed.2d 750, and continuing 
through Adarand, 515 U.S. 200, 115 S.Ct. 2097, 132 L.Ed.2d 158, the United 
States Supreme Court has written volumes on the subject.  Over the course of the 
years, the court resolved the once-embattled question concerning the appropriate 
standard of review for benign or remedial race-based governmental action, finding 
that the standard for all governmental classifications based on race is the strict 
scrutiny standard of review.  See  Adarand, 515 U.S. at 227, 115 S.Ct. at 2113, 
132 L.Ed.2d at 182.  See, also, Croson, 488 U.S. 469, 109 S.Ct. 706, 102 L.Ed.2d 
854.  However, any discussion of benign or remedial race-based governmental 
action would be incomplete without a full review of the United States Supreme 
Court’s major pronouncements on the issue beginning with the court’s 1978 
landmark decision in Bakke. 
 
As we enter into our review of the opinions of the United States Supreme 
Court on the subject of remedial race-based governmental action, we first note that 
the cases are both difficult and complex.  In conducting our analysis, we set forth a 
 
 
25
summary of the high court’s pronouncements.  While our discussion tends to be 
lengthy, we find it necessary for our decisionmaking in this case. 
 
The issue in Bakke, 438 U.S. 265, 98 S.Ct. 2733, 57 L.Ed.2d 750, involved 
a special admissions program of the Medical School of the University of 
California at Davis.  The special admissions program was designed by the faculty 
to ensure the admission of a specified number of disadvantaged students from 
certain minority groups.  The special program operated in coordination with a 
regular admissions program.  When Bakke was decided, no disadvantaged 
Caucasian applicants had ever been admitted to medical school under the special 
admissions program, though many apparently had applied.  Allan Bakke, a white 
male, applied for admission to the medical school in 1973 and 1974.  In both 
years, Bakke’s application was reviewed under the regular admissions program 
and was rejected.  In both years, applicants from the special program were 
admitted with scores lower than Bakke’s.  After the second rejection, Bakke filed 
suit in state court, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief, claiming, among other 
things, that the special admissions program had operated to exclude him from 
medical school on the basis of his race in violation of the equal protection 
guarantees of the Fourteenth Amendment. 
 
Bakke won a hollow victory at the trial court level.  The trial court held that 
the challenged admissions program was unconstitutional and that the medical 
school could not consider race as part of its admissions decisions.  However, the 
trial court refused to order Bakke’s admission, finding that Bakke had failed to 
prove that he would have been admitted but for the special program.  The state 
Supreme Court, applying the strict scrutiny standard of review, affirmed the trial 
court’s finding that the special admissions program violated the Equal Protection 
Clause but also directed the trial court to order Bakke’s admission to the school.  
 
 
26
Thereafter, the United States Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider the 
constitutional issue. 
 
In Bakke, 438 U.S. 265, 98 S.Ct. 2733, 57 L.Ed.2d 750, the United States 
Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the state Supreme Court that Bakke was 
entitled to admission, but reversed insofar as the courts below had prohibited the 
school from establishing a race-conscious program in the future.  Bakke resulted in 
many different opinions of the Justices, with no single opinion speaking for the 
court.  However, in Justice Powell’s opinion announcing the judgment in Bakke, in 
a section joined by Justice White, he rejected an argument that strict scrutiny 
should be reserved for classifications that disadvantage “discrete and insular 
minorities.”  Id. at 287-291, 98 S.Ct. at 2746-2748, 57 L.Ed.2d at 769-771.  In the 
same section, Justice Powell stated, “The guarantee of equal protection cannot 
mean one thing when applied to one individual and something else when applied 
to a person of another color.  If both are not accorded the same protection, then it 
is not equal.”  Id. at 289-290, 98 S.Ct. at 2748, 57 L.Ed.2d at 770-771.  Justice 
Powell also determined that racial and ethnic distinctions of any sort are 
“inherently suspect and thus call for the most exacting judicial examination.”  Id. 
at 291, 98 S.Ct. at 2748, 57 L.Ed.2d at 771.  Additionally, Justice Powell, 
speaking for himself, observed that where a classification touches upon an 
individual’s race or ethnic background, that person “is entitled to a judicial 
determination that the burden he is asked to bear on that basis is precisely tailored 
to serve a compelling governmental interest.”  (Emphasis added.)  Id. at 299, 98 
S.Ct. at 2753, 57 L.Ed.2d at 777. 
 
Justice Powell’s opinion in Bakke is of great historic significance in that it 
built a foundation upon which the court’s future cases would be grounded.  
Therefore, a detailed discussion of that opinion is in order. 
 
 
27
 
Justice Powell’s opinion in Bakke considered four possible objectives of the 
special admissions program, none of which was found to justify the program under 
strict scrutiny.  Id., 438 U.S. at 305-319, 98 S.Ct. at 2756-2763, 57 L.Ed.2d at 781-
789.  With respect to the first asserted purpose (reducing the historic deficit of 
minorities in medical schools and the medical profession), Justice Powell noted, 
“Preferring members of any one group for no reason other than race or ethnic 
origin is discrimination for its own sake.”  Id. at 307, 98 S.Ct. at 2757, 57 L.Ed.2d 
at 782. 
 
As to the second purpose asserted in Bakke to justify the special admissions 
program (counteracting “societal discrimination”), Justice Powell observed that a 
state clearly has an interest in ameliorating the effects of identified discrimination 
but that the goal of remedying the effects of historic societal discrimination, “an 
amorphous concept of injury that may be ageless in its reach into the past,” did not 
justify imposing a burden on Bakke.  Id., 438 U.S. at 307, 307-310, 98 S.Ct. at 
2757, 2757-2758, 57 L.Ed.2d at 782, 782-784.  Justice Powell stated, “We have 
never approved a classification that aids persons perceived as members of 
relatively victimized groups at the expense of other innocent individuals in the 
absence of judicial, legislative, or administrative findings of constitutional or 
statutory violations.”  Id. at 307, 98 S.Ct. at 2757, 57 L.Ed.2d at 782.  He also 
stated that only after such findings are made can a governmental classification 
preferring members of the injured groups at the expense of others be justified as 
remedial, and that, in such cases, the extent of the injury and the scope of the 
remedy will have been appropriately defined.  Id. at 307-308, 98 S.Ct. at 2757, 57 
L.Ed.2d at 782.  He stated that absent such findings of statutory or constitutional 
violations, “it cannot be said that the government has any greater interest in 
helping one individual than in refraining from harming another,” and the 
 
 
28
government would therefore have no compelling justification for inflicting such 
harm.  Id. at 308-309, 98 S.Ct. at 2757-2758, 57 L.Ed.2d at 782-783.  Justice 
Powell went on to say, “[A] governmental body must have the authority and 
capability to establish, in the record, that the classification is responsive to 
identified discrimination.”  Id. at 309, 98 S.Ct. at 2758, 57 L.Ed.2d at 783.  He 
concluded that because the medical school had made no explicit findings of 
identifiable discrimination, and since the school’s mission was education and not 
the formulation of any legislative policy or the adjudication of particular claims of 
illegality, the petitioner had failed to carry its burden of justification on that issue.  
Id. at 309-310, 98 S.Ct. at 2758, 57 L.Ed.2d at 783. 
 
With respect to the third purpose asserted by the petitioner in Bakke to 
justify the special admissions program (to increase the number of doctors serving 
disadvantaged communities), Justice Powell concluded that the petitioner had 
made no showing that the special admissions program was either needed or geared 
to promote that goal.  Id., 438 U.S. at 310-311, 98 S.Ct. at 2758-2759, 57 L.Ed.2d 
at 784.  As to the fourth asserted objective for the program (attainment of an 
ethnically diverse student population), Justice Powell noted that although the 
medical school had a compelling interest in achieving a diverse student body, the 
means it had chosen to effectuate that goal — i.e., a fixed admissions quota system 
— was not appropriate.  Id. at 311-320, 98 S.Ct. at 2759-2763, 57 L.Ed.2d at 785-
790. 
 
In his opinion in Bakke, Justice Powell concluded, “The fatal flaw in 
petitioner’s preferential program is its disregard of individual rights as guaranteed 
by the Fourteenth Amendment. * * *  Such rights are not absolute.  But when a 
State’s distribution of benefits or imposition of burdens hinges on ancestry or the 
color of a person’s skin, that individual is entitled to a demonstration that the 
 
 
29
challenged classification is necessary to promote a substantial state interest.  
Petitioner has failed to carry this burden.”  Id. at 320, 98 S.Ct. at 2763, 57 L.Ed.2d 
at 790.  Therefore, on that basis, Justice Powell found that it was necessary to 
affirm the portion of the California court’s judgment that had invalidated the 
special admissions program under the Fourteenth Amendment.  Id.  That 
conclusion, when coupled with the views expressed in the opinion of Justice 
Stevens (see discussion below), provided a clear majority in Bakke for invalidating 
the special admissions program.  However, Justice Powell (joined by Justices 
Brennan, White, Marshall, and Blackmun) found that by prohibiting petitioner 
from considering the race of any applicant as a factor in admissions, the California 
courts had failed to recognize that “the State has a substantial interest that 
legitimately may be served by a properly devised admissions program involving 
the competitive consideration of race and ethnic origin.”  Id. at 320, 98 S.Ct. at 
2763, 57 L.Ed.2d at 790.  For that reason, it was determined that “so much of the 
California court’s judgment as enjoins petitioner from any consideration of the 
race of any applicant must be reversed.”  Id.  Finally, on the question of Bakke’s 
right to an injunction requiring his admission to the medical school, Justice Powell 
announced the judgment affirming that aspect of the state court’s decision.  Id. at 
320, 98 S.Ct. at 2763-2764, 57 L.Ed.2d at 790. 
 
As previously stated, Bakke produced many opinions by the Justices, but no 
single opinion on behalf of the court.  Thus, Justice Powell’s opinion on the 
constitutional question spoke only of Justice Powell’s own views of the case, 
except in certain limited instances.  In addition to Justice Powell’s opinion, four 
Justices in Bakke found that a less stringent standard of review should be applied 
to racial classifications that have been designed to further remedial purposes and, 
in applying that standard, found that the special admissions program was 
 
 
30
constitutional in all respects.  Id., 438 U.S. at 324-379, 98 S.Ct. at 2765-2794, 57 
L.Ed.2d at 792-827 (Brennan, White, Marshall, and Blackmun, JJ., concurring in 
judgment in part and dissenting in part).  The less stringent standard proposed by 
these four Justices was an intermediate level of scrutiny — i.e., racial 
classifications designed to further remedial purposes must serve important 
governmental objectives and must be substantially related to the achievement of 
those objectives.  Id. at 359, 98 S.Ct. at 2783, 57 L.Ed.2d at 814.  Conversely, four 
other Justices in Bakke would have decided the case by affirming the judgment of 
the Supreme Court of California solely on statutory grounds, finding that the 
program violated Title VI of the Civil Rights of 1964 by excluding Bakke from the 
medical school on the basis of race.  Id., 438 U.S. at 408-421, 98 S.Ct. at 2808-
2815, 57 L.Ed.2d at 845-853 (Stevens, J., joined by Burger, C.J., Stewart, and 
Rehnquist, JJ., concurring in judgment in part and dissenting in part).  Thus, in 
1978, Bakke provided limited guidance to the nation on the constitutionality of 
purportedly remedial race-based governmental action. 
 
Two years later, in 1980, the United States Supreme Court confronted a case 
involving a congressional spending program that established a remedial set-aside 
plan for the benefit of minority business enterprises.  Specifically, in Fullilove v. 
Klutznick (1980), 448 U.S. 448, 100 S.Ct. 2758, 65 L.Ed.2d 902, the court 
considered a facial challenge to the constitutionality of the MBE provision of the 
Public Works Employment Act of 1977.  The MBE provision required that absent 
an administrative waiver, at least ten percent of federal funds granted for local 
public works projects were to be used by the state or local grantee to procure 
services or supplies from business enterprises owned and controlled by minority 
group members.  For purposes of the provision, minority group members were 
defined as citizens of the United States who were “Negroes, Spanish-speaking, 
 
 
31
Orientals, Indians, Eskimos, and Aleuts.”  Section 6705(f)(2), Title 42, U.S.Code.  
The petitioners in Fullilove challenged the MBE provision in federal district court, 
claiming, among other things, that the MBE provision violated the Equal 
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and the equal protection 
component of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment.  The federal 
district court and the United States Second Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the 
MBE provision as constitutional in all respects. 
 
In Fullilove, the vote of the United States Supreme Court was once again 
extremely fractured, and Fullilove, like Bakke, produced no majority opinion for 
the court.  The lead opinion in Fullilove was authored by Chief Justice Burger and 
was joined by Justices White and Powell.  That opinion explored, in detail, the 
legislative history of the federal MBE provision.  The opinion noted that Congress 
had apparently believed that the provision requiring a ten-percent set-aside was 
necessary to ensure minority business participation in projects funded through the 
congressional spending program.  Id., 448 U.S. at 462, 100 S.Ct. at 2766, 65 
L.Ed.2d at 914.  The opinion observed that absent such a requirement, “it was 
thought that repetition of the prior experience [of an earlier congressional 
spending package] could be expected, with participation by minority business 
accounting for an inordinately small percentage of government contracting.”  Id. at 
462-463, 100 S.Ct. at 2766-2767, 65 L.Ed.2d at 914.  Additionally, “[t]he causes 
of this disparity were perceived as involving the longstanding existence and 
maintenance of barriers impairing access by minority enterprises to public 
contracting opportunities, or sometimes as involving more direct discrimination, 
but not as relating to lack [as one Senator put it] ‘of capable and qualified minority 
enterprises who are ready and willing to work.’  In the words of its sponsor, the 
MBE provision was ‘designed to begin to redress this grievance that has been 
 
 
32
extant for so long.’ ”  (Footnotes omitted.)  Id. at 463, 100 S.Ct. at 2767, 65 
L.Ed.2d at 914. 
 
The lead opinion in Fullilove also reviewed the guidelines and policies that 
had been developed for administering the federal MBE program.  Administrative 
regulations specified that where contractors were to be selected by state or local 
grantees through competitive bidding, bids for the prime contract were to be 
considered responsive only if at least ten percent of the contract funds were to be 
expended for MBEs.  Administrative guidelines had also been developed to ensure 
that waivers of the ten-percent set-aside requirement were to be granted on a case-
by-case basis and upon a determination that, despite affirmative efforts, the 
required level of MBE participation could not be achieved.  Id., 448 U.S. at 469-
470 and 481-482, 100 S.Ct. at 2770 and 2776, 65 L.Ed.2d at 918-919 and 926.  
Administrative waivers were available to avoid subcontracting with MBEs at an 
unreasonable price, i.e., prices exceeding competitive levels that could not be 
attributed to an MBE’s attempt to cover costs inflated by the present effects of 
disadvantage or discrimination.  Id. at 470-471, 100 S.Ct. at 2771, 65 L.Ed.2d at 
919.  In this regard, the lead opinion in Fullilove noted that the administrative 
policy was consistent with congressional intent, since the federal MBE program 
was meant to benefit MBEs whose competitive position had been impaired by the 
effects of disadvantage and discrimination.  Id. at 471, 100 S.Ct. at 2771, 65 
L.Ed.2d at 919. 
 
Additionally, in Fullilove, the administrative program ensured participation 
by only bona fide MBEs by specifying, among other things, that minority group 
ownership interests were to be “ ‘real and continuing and not created solely to 
meet 10% MBE requirements.’ ”  Id. at 492, 100 S.Ct. at 2782, 65 L.Ed.2d at 933, 
quoting Economic Development Administration guidelines.  The program also 
 
 
33
contained a procedure governing complaints of “unjust participation” and, thus, 
established a mechanism to prevent participation in the MBE program by 
enterprises whose access to public contracting opportunities had not been impaired 
by the effects of prior discrimination.  Id. at 482, 100 S.Ct. at 2776, 65 L.Ed.2d at 
926.  Further, the administrative program clarified the definition of minority group 
members by specifically defining, e.g., “Oriental” as “[a]n individual of a culture, 
origin or parentage traceable to the areas south of the Soviet Union, East of Iran, * 
* * and out to the Pacific including but not limited to Indonesia, Indochina, 
Malaysia, Hawaii and the Philippines.”  Id. at 495, 100 S.Ct. at 2783, 65 L.Ed.2d 
at 935. 
 
On the basis of the regulations and guidelines governing the administration 
of the federal MBE program, the lead opinion in Fullilove found that Congress 
had enacted the program as a “strictly remedial measure.”  Id. at 481, 100 S.Ct. at 
2776, 65 L.Ed.2d at 926.  The opinion states, “The clear objective of the MBE 
provision is disclosed by our necessarily extended review of its legislative and 
administrative background.  The program was designed to ensure that, to the 
extent federal funds were granted under the Public Works Employment Act of 
1977, grantees who elect to participate would not employ procurement practices 
that Congress had decided might result in perpetuation of the effects of prior 
discrimination which had impaired or foreclosed access by minority businesses to 
public contracting opportunities.  The MBE program does not mandate the 
allocation of federal funds according to inflexible percentages solely based on race 
or ethnicity.”  Id. at 473, 100 S.Ct. at 2772, 65 L.Ed.2d at 921. 
 
The lead opinion in Fullilove went on to address whether the objectives of 
the federal MBE program were within the scope of the congressional spending 
power and concluded that insofar as the MBE program pertained to the actions of 
 
 
34
state and local grantees, Congress’s objectives could have been achieved by use of 
its power under Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment “to enforce, by 
appropriate legislation,” the equal protection guarantees of that Amendment.  Id., 
448 U.S. at 476, 100 S.Ct. at 2773-2774, 65 L.Ed.2d at 923.  In this regard, the 
opinion states: 
 
“With respect to the MBE provision, Congress had abundant evidence from 
which it could conclude that minority businesses have been denied effective 
participation in public contracting opportunities by procurement practices that 
perpetuated the effects of prior discrimination.  Congress, of course, may legislate 
without compiling the kind of ‘record’ appropriate with respect to judicial or 
administrative proceedings.  Congress had before it, among other data, evidence of 
a long history of marked disparity in the percentage of public contracts awarded to 
minority business enterprises.  This disparity was considered to result not from any 
lack of capable and qualified minority businesses, but from the existence and 
maintenance of barriers to competitive access which had their roots in racial and 
ethnic discrimination, and which continue today, even absent any intentional 
discrimination or other unlawful conduct.  Although much of this history related to 
the experience of minority businesses in the area of federal procurement, there was 
direct evidence before the Congress that this pattern of disadvantage and 
discrimination existed with respect to state and local construction contracting as 
well.  In relation to the MBE provision, Congress acted within its competence to 
determine that the problem was national in scope. 
 
“Although the Act recites no preambulary ‘findings’ on the subject, we are 
satisfied that Congress had abundant historical basis from which it could conclude 
that traditional procurement practices, when applied to minority businesses, could 
perpetuate the effects of prior discrimination.  Accordingly, Congress reasonably 
 
 
35
determined that the prospective elimination of these barriers to minority firm 
access to public contracting opportunities generated by the 1977 Act was 
appropriate to ensure that those businesses were not denied equal opportunity to 
participate in federal grants to state and local governments, which is one aspect of 
the equal protection of the laws.  Insofar as the MBE program pertains to the 
actions of state and local grantees, Congress could have achieved its objectives by 
use of its power under §5 of the Fourteenth Amendment.  We conclude that in this 
respect the objectives of the MBE provision are within the scope of the Spending 
Power.”  Id., 448 U.S. at 477-478, 100 S.Ct. at 2774-2775, 65 L.Ed.2d at 924. 
 
The lead opinion in Fullilove then turned to the question whether the means 
that had been chosen by Congress to accomplish its objectives were 
constitutionally permissible.  Id. at 480, 100 S.Ct. at 2775, 65 L.Ed.2d at 925.  On 
this question, the opinion noted that “Congress may employ racial or ethnic 
classifications in exercising its Spending or other legislative powers only if those 
classifications do not violate the equal protection component of the Due Process 
Clause of the Fifth Amendment.”  Id. at 480, 100 S.Ct. at 2775, 65 L.Ed.2d at 925.  
It also pointed out “the need for careful judicial evaluation to assure that any 
congressional program that employs racial or ethnic criteria to accomplish the 
objective of remedying the present effects of past discrimination is narrowly 
tailored to the achievement of that goal.”  Id. at 480, 100 S.Ct. at 2775-2776, 65 
L.Ed.2d at 925. 
 
En route to upholding the MBE provision as constitutional, the lead opinion 
in Fullilove addressed and rejected the concept that, in the remedial context, 
Congress must act in a colorblind fashion.  Id., 448 U.S. at 482, 100 S.Ct. at 2776, 
65 L.Ed.2d at 926-927.  It also rejected arguments that the MBE program 
impermissibly deprived nonminority businesses of access to a portion of 
 
 
36
governmental 
contracting 
opportunities, 
that 
the 
MBE 
provision 
was 
underinclusive, and that the provision was overinclusive.  Id. at 484-489, 100 S.Ct. 
at 2777-2780, 65 L.Ed.2d at 928-931. 
 
With respect to the argument that the program would impermissibly deprive 
nonminority businesses of access to some percentage of the public contracting 
opportunities, the lead opinion in Fullilove determined that it was “not a 
constitutional defect in this program that it may disappoint the expectations of 
nonminority firms,” since “[w]hen effectuating a limited and properly tailored 
remedy to cure the effects of prior discrimination, such a ‘sharing of the burden’ 
by innocent parties is not impermissible.”  Id., 448 U.S. at 484, 100 S.Ct. at 2778, 
65 L.Ed.2d at 928.  Additionally, the lead opinion observed that “[t]he actual 
‘burden’ shouldered by nonminority firms is relatively light in this connection 
when we consider the scope of this public works program as compared with 
overall construction contracting opportunities.”  Id.  Further, the opinion noted 
that the burden placed on nonminority firms was merely an “incidental 
consequence” of the MBE program — not part of the program’s objective.  Id.  
Moreover, the lead opinion states, “although we may assume that the complaining 
parties are innocent of any discriminatory conduct, it was within congressional 
power to act on the assumption that in the past some nonminority businesses may 
have reaped competitive benefit over the years from the virtual exclusion of 
minority firms from these contracting opportunities.”  Id. at 484-485, 100 S.Ct. at 
2778, 65 L.Ed.2d at 928. 
 
With regard to the argument that the MBE provision was underinclusive 
(i.e., that it benefited only specified minority groups and not other businesses that 
may have suffered from disadvantage or discrimination), the lead opinion in 
Fullilove concluded that any expansion of the program was “not a function for the 
 
 
37
courts.”  Id., 448 U.S. at 485, 100 S.Ct. at 2778, 65 L.Ed.2d at 929.  The opinion 
noted, “The Congress has not sought to give select minority groups a preferred 
standing in the construction industry, but has embarked on a remedial program to 
place them on a more equitable footing with respect to public contracting 
opportunities.  There has been no showing in this case that Congress has 
inadvertently effected an invidious discrimination by excluding from coverage an 
identifiable minority group that has been the victim of a degree of disadvantage 
and discrimination equal to or greater than that suffered by the groups 
encompassed by the MBE program.  It is not inconceivable that on very special 
facts a case might be made to challenge the congressional decision to limit MBE 
eligibility to the particular minority groups identified in the Act. * * *  But on this 
record we find no basis to hold that Congress is without authority to undertake the 
kind of limited remedial effort represented by the MBE program.  Congress, not 
the courts, has the heavy burden of dealing with a host of intractable economic and 
social problems.”  Id. at 485-486, 100 S.Ct. at 2778-2779, 65 L.Ed.2d at 929. 
 
As to the claim that the MBE provision was overinclusive, the lead opinion 
in Fullilove states: 
 
“It is also contended that the MBE program is overinclusive — that it 
bestows a benefit on businesses identified by racial or ethnic criteria which cannot 
be justified on the basis of competitive criteria or as a remedy for the present 
effects of identified prior discrimination.  It is conceivable that a particular 
application of the program may have this effect; however, the peculiarities of 
specific applications are not before us in this case.  We are not presented here with 
a challenge involving a specific award of a construction contract or the denial of a 
waiver request; such questions of specific application must await future cases. 
 
 
38
 
“This does not mean that the claim of overinclusiveness is entitled to no 
consideration in the present case.  The history of governmental tolerance of 
practices using racial or ethnic criteria for the purpose or with the effect of 
imposing an invidious discrimination must alert us to the deleterious effects of 
even benign racial or ethnic classifications when they stray from narrow remedial 
justifications.  Even in the context of a facial challenge such as is presented in this 
case, the MBE provision cannot pass muster unless, with due account for its 
administrative program, it provides a reasonable assurance that application of 
racial or ethnic criteria will be limited to accomplishing the remedial objectives of 
Congress and that misapplications of the program will be promptly and adequately 
remedied administratively. 
 
“It is significant that the administrative scheme provides for waiver and 
exemption.  Two fundamental congressional assumptions underlie the MBE 
program:  (1) that the present effects of past discrimination have impaired the 
competitive position of businesses owned and controlled by members of minority 
groups; and (2) that affirmative efforts to eliminate barriers to minority-firm 
access, and to evaluate bids with adjustment for the present effects of past 
discrimination, would assure that at least 10% of the federal funds granted under 
the Public Works Employment Act of 1977 would be accounted for by contracts 
with available, qualified, bona fide minority business enterprises.  Each of these 
assumptions may be rebutted in the administrative process. 
 
“The administrative program contains measures to effectuate the 
congressional objective of assuring legitimate participation by disadvantaged 
MBE’s.  Administrative definition has tightened some less definite aspects of the 
statutory identification of the minority groups encompassed by the program.  
There is administrative scrutiny to identify and eliminate from participation in the 
 
 
39
program MBE’s who are not ‘bona fide’ within the regulations and guidelines; for 
example, spurious minority-front entities can be exposed.  A significant aspect of 
this surveillance is the complaint procedure available for reporting ‘unjust 
participation by an enterprise or individuals in the MBE program.’ * * * And even 
as to specific contract awards, waiver is available to avoid dealing with an MBE 
who is attempting to exploit the remedial aspects of the program by charging an 
unreasonable price, i.e., a price not attributable to the present effects of past 
discrimination. * * * We must assume that Congress intended close scrutiny of 
false claims and prompt action on them. 
 
“Grantees are given the opportunity to demonstrate that their best efforts 
will not succeed or have not succeeded in achieving the statutory 10% target for 
minority firm participation within the limitations of the program’s remedial 
objectives.  In these circumstances a waiver or partial waiver is available once 
compliance has been demonstrated.  A waiver may be sought and granted at any 
time during the contracting process, or even prior to letting contracts if the facts 
warrant. 
 
“* * * 
 
“That the use of racial and ethnic criteria is premised on assumptions 
rebuttable in the administrative process gives reasonable assurance that 
application of the MBE program will be limited to accomplishing the remedial 
objectives contemplated by Congress and that misapplications of the racial and 
ethnic criteria can be remedied.  In dealing with this facial challenge to the statute, 
doubts must be resolved in support of the congressional judgment that this limited 
program is a necessary step to effectuate the constitutional mandate for equality of 
economic opportunity.  The MBE provision may be viewed as a pilot project, 
appropriately limited in extent and duration, and subject to reassessment and 
 
 
40
reevaluation by the Congress prior to any extension or reenactment.  Miscarriages 
of administration could have only a transitory economic impact on businesses not 
encompassed by the program, and would not be irremediable.”  (Footnotes 
omitted.)  Id., 448 U.S. at 486-489, 100 S.Ct. at 2779-2780, 65 L.Ed.2d at 929-
931. 
 
The lead opinion in Fullilove determined that “[f]or its part, the Congress 
must proceed only with programs narrowly tailored to achieve its objectives, 
subject to continuing evaluation and reassessment; administration of the programs 
must be vigilant and flexible; and, when such a program comes under judicial 
review, courts must be satisfied that the legislative objectives and projected 
administration give reasonable assurance that the program will function within 
constitutional limitations.”  Id. at 490, 100 S.Ct. at 2781, 65 L.Ed.2d at 932.  
Additionally, the opinion notes, “Any preference based on racial or ethnic criteria 
must necessarily receive a most searching examination to make sure that it does 
not conflict with constitutional guarantees.”  Id. at 491, 100 S.Ct. at 2781, 65 
L.Ed.2d at 933.  The lead opinion did not, however, “adopt, either expressly or 
implicitly, the formulas of analysis articulated in such cases as [Bakke, 438 U.S. 
265, 98 S.Ct. 2733, 57 L.Ed.2d 750].”  Fullilove at 492, 100 S.Ct. at 2781, 65 
L.Ed.2d at 933.  Nevertheless, the lead opinion specifically states that “our 
analysis demonstrates that the MBE provision would survive judicial review under 
either ‘test’ articulated in the several Bakke opinions.”  (Emphasis added.)  
Fullilove at 492, 100 S.Ct. at 2781, 65 L.Ed.2d at 933. 
 
As previously noted, Fullilove did not produce a majority opinion for the 
court.  In addition to Chief Justice Burger’s lead opinion (joined by Justices White 
and Powell), Justice Powell wrote a separate concurring opinion, in which he 
expressed the view that the lead opinion was substantially in accordance with his 
 
 
41
own views that strict scrutiny applied to the racial classification of the federal 
MBE provision and that, for all practical purposes, the lead opinion had applied 
that standard correctly.  Id., 448 U.S. at 495-496, 100 S.Ct. at 2783-2784, 65 
L.Ed.2d at 935.  Justice Powell stated that the applicable standard is whether a 
racial classification “is a necessary means of advancing a compelling 
governmental interest.”  Id. at 496, 100 S.Ct. at 2783-2784, 65 L.Ed.2d at 935.  He 
concluded, therefore, that the racial classification at issue was justified as a 
narrowly tailored remedy serving the compelling governmental interest in 
eradicating and repairing the continuing effects of past unlawful discrimination 
identified by Congress — even though, incidentally, there was never any explicit 
or formal congressional findings of illegal discrimination in the form of statutory 
or constitutional violations.  See, generally, id. at 496-507, 100 S.Ct. at 2784-
2789, 65 L.Ed.2d at 936-943. 
 
Additionally, in Fullilove, Justice Marshall, joined by Justices Brennan and 
Blackmun, concurred in judgment and wrote separately to express the view that 
the analysis of their joint separate opinion in Bakke, joined also by Justice White, 
438 U.S. at 324-379, 98 S.Ct. at 2765-2794, 57 L.Ed.2d at 792-827, controlled the 
resolution of the question whether the federal MBE provision was constitutional.  
448 U.S. at 517-522, 100 S.Ct. at 2794-2797, 65 L.Ed.2d at 949-953.  Specifically, 
Justice Marshall argued that “the proper inquiry is whether racial classifications 
designed to further remedial purposes serve important governmental objectives 
and are substantially related to achievement of those objectives,” and in applying 
that standard, he concluded that the federal MBE provision was “plainly 
constitutional.”  Id. at 519, 100 S.Ct. at 2796, 65 L.Ed.2d at 951. 
 
Justice Stewart, joined by Justice Rehnquist, dissented.  Id. at 522-532, 100 
S.Ct. at 2797-2803, 65 L.Ed.2d at 953-959.  He argued that the equal protection 
 
 
42
standard is the same for state and federal governments, that the single standard 
prohibits invidious discrimination, that all discrimination is invidious by 
definition, and that the federal MBE provision was unconstitutional because it 
granted preferences to certain groups on the basis of race.  Id., 448 U.S. at 523 and 
526-532, 100 S.Ct. at 2798 and 2799-2803, 65 L.Ed.2d at 953 and 955-959. 
 
Justice Stevens also dissented in Fullilove, urging that “[r]acial 
classifications are simply too pernicious to permit any but the most exact 
connection between justification and classification,” and that the MBE provision 
was a “slapdash” statute providing classwide relief that could not be characterized 
as a narrowly tailored remedy.  Id. at 537, 539 and 541, 100 S.Ct. at 2805, 2806 
and 2807, 65 L.Ed.2d at 962, 963 and 965. 
 
Several years after Fullilove, the court, in 1986, decided Wygant v. Jackson 
Bd. of Edn. (1986), 476 U.S. 267, 106 S.Ct. 1842, 90 L.Ed.2d 260.  At issue in 
Wygant was a layoff provision in a collective bargaining agreement between a 
local school board and a teachers’ union.  The provision required that if layoffs 
became necessary, teachers with the most seniority would be retained, except that 
at no time would there be a greater percentage of minority personnel laid off than 
the current percentage of minority personnel at the time of the layoff.  Minorities 
were defined in the agreement as employees who were Black, American Indian, 
Oriental, or of Spanish descent.  In 1974, during a round of layoffs, the board did 
not comply with the provision.  However, after the layoff provision was upheld in 
litigation arising from the board’s noncompliance with its terms, the board began 
adhering to the provision.  As a result, during the 1976-1977 and 1981-1982 
school years, nonminority teachers were laid off, while minority teachers with less 
seniority were retained. 
 
 
43
 
In Wygant, the displaced nonminority teachers sued in federal district court, 
alleging violations of, among other things, the Equal Protection Clause of the 
Fourteenth Amendment.  The district court upheld the constitutionality of the 
school board’s race-based layoffs.  The district court found that the racial 
preferences granted by the school board need not have been grounded on a finding 
of prior discrimination, and that the racial preferences were permissible under the 
Equal Protection Clause as an attempt to remedy societal discrimination by 
providing role models for minority schoolchildren.  On appeal, the United States 
Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment of the district court.  
Thereafter, the United States Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider the 
constitutionality of race-based layoffs by public employers and reversed the 
judgment of the court of appeals. 
 
In Wygant, the United States Supreme Court was once again unable to 
produce a majority opinion.  Rather, Justice Powell wrote a plurality opinion, 
which was joined in full by Chief Justice Burger and by Justice Rehnquist, and in 
all but one part by Justice O’Connor.5  The plurality phrased the issue in Wygant 
as “whether a school board, consistent with the Equal Protection Clause, may 
extend preferential protection against layoffs to some of its employees because of 
their race or national origin.”  Id., 476 U.S. at 269-270, 106 S.Ct. at 1844-1845, 90 
L.Ed.2d at 266. 
 
In Wygant, Justice Powell’s plurality opinion observed that “the level of 
scrutiny does not change merely because the challenged classification operates 
against a group that historically has not been subject to governmental 
discrimination.”  Id. at 273, 106 S.Ct. at 1846, 90 L.Ed.2d at 268.  Therefore, 
recognizing that the layoff provision established a classification based on race and 
that it had operated against whites and in favor of certain minorities, the plurality 
 
 
44
conducted a searching examination of the classification to determine whether it 
conflicted with equal protection guarantees.  The plurality noted that there are two 
prongs to this examination:  (1) whether the racial classification could be justified 
by a compelling governmental interest and (2) whether the means chosen by the 
state to effectuate its objective were narrowly tailored to the achievement of that 
goal.  Id. at 274, 106 S.Ct. at 1847, 90 L.Ed.2d at 268.  The plurality stated, “We 
must decide whether the layoff provision is supported by a compelling state 
purpose and whether the means chosen to accomplish that purpose are narrowly 
tailored.”  Id. 
 
The plurality in Wygant, employing strict scrutiny, rejected the conclusion 
of the Sixth Circuit (and that of the district court) that the respondent’s “interest in 
providing minority role models for its minority students, as an attempt to alleviate 
the effects of societal discrimination, was sufficiently important to justify the 
racial classification embodied in the layoff provision.”  Id., 476 U.S. at 274, 106 
S.Ct. at 1847, 90 L.Ed.2d at 269.  The plurality observed that the Sixth Circuit had 
“discerned a need for more minority faculty role models by finding that the 
percentage of minority teachers was less than the percentage of minority students.”  
Id. at 274, 106 S.Ct. at 1847, 90 L.Ed.2d at 269.  However, the plurality noted, 
“This Court has never held that societal discrimination alone is sufficient to justify 
a racial classification.  Rather, the Court has insisted upon some showing of prior 
discrimination by the governmental unit involved before allowing limited use of 
racial classifications in order to remedy such discrimination.”  Id.  The plurality 
stated, “[T]he relevant analysis in cases involving proof of discrimination by 
statistical disparity focuses on those disparities that demonstrate such prior 
governmental discrimination.”  Id.  The plurality pointed out that the appropriate 
statistical comparison for purposes of determining actual discrimination would 
 
 
45
have been a comparison between the racial composition of the teaching staff and 
the racial composition of the qualified public school teacher population in the 
relevant labor market.  Id. at 274-275, 106 S.Ct. at 1847, 90 L.Ed.2d at 269.  Thus, 
the plurality found that the statistical disparity relied on by the district and 
appellate courts had no probative value in demonstrating that past discriminatory 
hiring practices by the school board had occurred.  Id. at 276, 106 S.Ct. at 1848, 
90 L.Ed.2d at 270.  Therefore, the role model theory relied on by the district and 
appellate courts gave no basis for believing that prior discriminatory practices by 
the school board had occurred and, further, had no relation to the harm caused by 
any prior discriminatory hiring practices.  Id. at 275-276, 106 S.Ct. at 1847-1848, 
90 L.Ed.2d at 269-270; see, also, Croson, 488 U.S. at 497-498, 109 S.Ct. at 723-
724, 102 L.Ed.2d at 884 (explaining the decision of the Wygant plurality).  The 
plurality in Wygant observed, “[T]he role model theory employed by the District 
Court has no logical stopping point,” and “allows the Board to engage in 
discriminatory hiring and layoff practices long past the point required by any 
legitimate remedial purpose.”  Id. at 275, 106 S.Ct. at 1847-1848, 90 L.Ed.2d at 
269. 
 
Finding that “[s]ocietal discrimination, without more, is too amorphous a 
basis for imposing a racially classified remedy,” and that the role-model theory 
espoused by the district and appellate courts merely “typify this indefiniteness,” 
the Wygant plurality determined that the role model justification for the race-based 
layoff provision was not sufficiently compelling.  Id. at 276, 106 S.Ct. at 1848, 90 
L.Ed.2d at 270.  The plurality observed that there was no doubt that there had been 
serious racial discrimination in this country, but concluded that “as the basis for 
imposing discriminatory legal remedies that work against innocent people, societal 
discrimination is insufficient and overexpansive.”  (Emphasis sic.)  Id.  The 
 
 
46
plurality stated, “In the absence of particularized findings, a court could uphold 
remedies that are ageless in their reach into the past, and timeless in their ability to 
affect the future.”  Id. 
 
In Wygant, the school board also urged that the purpose in adopting the 
layoff provision was to remedy the board’s own prior discriminatory hiring 
practices.  The plurality in Wygant did not specifically determine whether that 
asserted remedial objective constituted a compelling state interest.  Id., 476 U.S. at 
278, 106 S.Ct. at 1849, 90 L.Ed.2d at 271.  The plurality did indicate, however, 
that it was not fatal to the school board’s asserted remedial justification that the 
board had never made any official predicate findings that the board had actually 
engaged in prior discriminatory practices.  Id. at 277-278, 106 S.Ct. at 1848-1849, 
90 L.Ed.2d at 270-271.  See, also, id. at 289-293, 106 S.Ct. at 1855-1857, 90 
L.Ed.2d at 278-281 (O’Connor, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment).  
Rather, the plurality indicated that it was enough if the public employer had a 
sufficient basis in evidence to justify its conclusion that remedial action was 
necessary.  Id. at 277, 106 S.Ct. at 1849, 90 L.Ed.2d at 271.  Specifically, the 
plurality explained: 
 
“[A] public employer like the Board must ensure that, before it embarks on 
an affirmative-action program, it has convincing evidence that remedial action is 
warranted.  That is, it must have sufficient evidence to justify the conclusion that 
there has been prior discrimination. 
 
“Evidentiary support for the conclusion that remedial action is warranted 
becomes crucial when the remedial program is challenged in court by nonminority 
employees.  In this case, for example, petitioners contended at trial that the 
remedial program — Article XII — had the purpose and effect of instituting a 
racial classification that was not justified by a remedial purpose. * * *  In such a 
 
 
47
case, the trial court must make a factual determination that the employer had a 
strong basis in evidence for its conclusion that remedial action was necessary.  
The ultimate burden remains with the employees to demonstrate the 
unconstitutionality of an affirmative-action program.  But unless such a 
determination is made, an appellate court reviewing a challenge by nonminority 
employees to remedial action cannot determine whether the race-based action is 
justified as a remedy for prior discrimination.”  (Emphasis added.)  Id. at 277-278, 
106 S.Ct. at 1848-1849, 90 L.Ed.2d at 271. 
 
The plurality in Wygant also observed that no such factual determination 
had ever been made in the case.  Id., 476 U.S. at 278, 106 S.Ct. at 1849, 90 
L.Ed.2d at 271.  The school board protested, however, that it could, if given 
another opportunity, establish the existence of prior discrimination.  In response to 
that argument, the plurality stated, “Although this argument seems belated at this 
point in the proceedings, we need not consider the question since we conclude 
below that the layoff provision was not a legally appropriate means of achieving 
even a compelling purpose.”  Id. 
 
Thereafter, the plurality, having never specifically answered the question 
whether the asserted objective of remedying the effects of the school board’s own 
discriminatory hiring practices was sufficiently compelling, turned to the issue 
whether the means chosen by the school board for the achievement of that 
objective were narrowly tailored.  Id. at 279-284, 106 S.Ct. at 1849-1852, 90 
L.Ed.2d at 272-275.  First, however, the plurality consisting of Burger, C.J., 
Powell and Rehnquist, JJ., noted that the court of appeals had reviewed the “means 
chosen to accomplish the Board’s race-conscious purposes under a test of 
‘reasonableness.’ ”  Id. at 279, 106 S.Ct. at 1849-1850, 90 L.Ed.2d at 272.  The 
plurality observed that that standard had “no support in the decisions of this 
 
 
48
Court.”  Id. at 280, 106 S.Ct. at 1850, 90 L.Ed.2d at 272.  Rather, the plurality 
noted, “[O]ur decisions always have employed a more stringent standard — 
however articulated — to test the validity of the means chosen by a State to 
accomplish its race-conscious purposes.”  Id.  On the question of narrow tailoring, 
the plurality (consisting here of Burger, C.J., Powell and Rehnquist, JJ.) stated, 
“We have recognized * * * that in order to remedy the effects of prior 
discrimination, it may be necessary to take race into account.  As part of this 
Nation’s dedication to eradicating racial discrimination, innocent persons may be 
called upon to bear some of the burden of the remedy.”  Id. at 280-281, 106 S.Ct. 
at 1850, 90 L.Ed.2d at 273.  However, this plurality found that there was a marked 
distinction between the burden shouldered by innocent parties in cases involving 
valid race-preference hiring goals and the far more intrusive burden imposed on 
innocent parties where loss of an existing job is concerned.  Id. at 282-283, 106 
S.Ct. at 1851, 90 L.Ed.2d at 274.  This plurality explained: 
 
“While hiring goals impose a diffuse burden, often foreclosing only one of 
several opportunities, layoffs impose the entire burden of achieving racial equality 
on particular individuals, often resulting in serious disruption of their lives.  That 
burden is too intrusive.  We therefore hold that, as a means of accomplishing 
purposes that otherwise may be legitimate, the Board’s layoff plan is not 
sufficiently narrowly tailored.  Other, less intrusive means of accomplishing 
similar purposes — such as the adoption of hiring goals — are available.  For 
these reasons, the Board’s selection of layoffs as the means to accomplish even a 
valid purpose cannot satisfy the demands of the Equal Protection Clause.”  
(Footnotes omitted.)  Id. at 283-284, 106 S.Ct. at 1852, 90 L.Ed.2d at 274-275. 
 
Justice O’Connor wrote a separate opinion concurring in part and 
concurring in judgment.  Id., 476 U.S. at 284-294, 106 S.Ct. at 1852-1858, 90 
 
 
49
L.Ed.2d at 275-282.  Additionally, Justice White concurred in judgment only and 
wrote separately to express his views that none of the interests asserted by the 
school board, taken singly or together, justified the board’s layoff policy.  Id. at 
294-295, 106 S.Ct. at 1858, 90 L.Ed.2d at 282. 
 
The remaining four Justices dissented.  Justice Marshall, joined by Justices 
Brennan and Blackmun, argued for the application of a less exacting, intermediate 
level of review for remedial race-based governmental classifications.  Id., 476 U.S. 
at 301-302, 106 S.Ct. at 1861, 90 L.Ed.2d at 286.  Justice Stevens, in a separate 
dissenting opinion, stated that the purpose of the layoff provision — the 
recognition of the desirability of multiethnic representation on the teaching faculty 
— advanced the public interest in educating children for the future and was, thus, 
a valid public purpose.  Id. at 313-316, 106 S.Ct. at 1867-1869, 90 L.Ed.2d at 293-
296.  Justice Stevens observed that the goal of the school board’s race-conscious 
layoff-protection policy was to include minorities (not to exclude them) in the 
educational process — a goal that “plainly distinguishes the Board’s valid purpose 
in this case from a race-conscious decision that would reinforce assumptions of 
inequality.”  (Footnote omitted.)  Id. at 316-317, 106 S.Ct. at 1869, 90 L.Ed.2d at 
296. 
 
Justice O’Connor’s concurrence in Wygant is significant in several respects.  
Justice O’Connor observed that the proper analysis for racial classifications that 
work to the disadvantage of nonminorities had been articulated in a number of 
different ways by the individual Justices, in Wygant and elsewhere, with no 
particular test or formulation being adopted by a majority of the court.  Id., 476 
U.S. at 284-286, 106 S.Ct. at 1852-1853, 90 L.Ed.2d at 275-276.  For her part, 
Justice O’Connor stated that she agreed that the strict scrutiny standard articulated 
by the Wygant plurality was the appropriate standard to apply.  Id.  However, she 
 
 
50
also observed that the court had reached a fair measure of consensus in Wygant on 
the following issue: 
 
“The Court is in agreement that, whatever the formulation employed, 
remedying past or present racial discrimination by a state actor is a sufficiently 
weighty state interest to warrant the remedial use of a carefully constructed 
affirmative action program.  This remedial purpose need not be accompanied by 
contemporaneous findings of actual discrimination to be accepted as legitimate as 
long as the public actor has a firm basis for believing that remedial action is 
required.”  (Emphasis added.)  Id. at 286, 106 S.Ct. at 1853, 90 L.Ed.2d at 276. 
 
In her concurrence in Wygant, Justice O’Connor also provided much-needed 
insight into a variety of matters that, quite frankly, are less than abundantly clear 
from a reading of the lead opinion in that case.  Justice O’Connor stated: 
 
“Respondent School Board argues that the governmental purpose or goal 
advanced here was the School Board’s desire to correct apparent prior 
employment discrimination against minorities while avoiding further litigation. * * 
* The Michigan Civil Rights Commission determined that the evidence before it 
supported the allegations of discrimination on the part of the Jackson School 
Board, though that determination was never reduced to formal findings because 
the School Board, with the agreement of the Jackson Education Association 
(Union), voluntarily chose to remedy the perceived violation.  Among the 
measures the School Board and the Union eventually agreed were necessary to 
remedy the apparent prior discrimination was the layoff provision challenged here; 
they reasoned that without the layoff provision, the remedial gains made under the 
ongoing hiring goals contained in the collective bargaining agreement could be 
eviscerated by layoffs. 
 
 
51
 
“The District Court and the Court of Appeals did not focus on the School 
Board’s unquestionably compelling interest in remedying its apparent prior 
discrimination when evaluating the constitutionality of the challenged layoff 
provision.  Instead, both courts reasoned that the goals of remedying ‘societal 
discrimination’ and providing ‘role models’ were sufficiently important to 
withstand equal protection scrutiny.  I agree with the plurality that a governmental 
agency’s interest in remedying ‘societal’ discrimination, that is, discrimination not 
traceable to its own actions, cannot be deemed sufficiently compelling to pass 
constitutional muster under strict scrutiny. * * * I also concur in the plurality’s 
assessment that use by the courts below of a ‘role model’ theory to justify the 
conclusion that this plan had a legitimate remedial purpose was in error. * * * 
Thus, in my view, the District Court and the Court of Appeals clearly erred in 
relying on these purposes and in failing to give greater attention to the School 
Board’s asserted purpose of rectifying its own apparent discrimination. 
 
“The error of the District Court and the Court of Appeals can be explained 
by reference to the fact that the primary issue argued by the parties on the cross 
motions for summary judgment was whether the School Board, a court, or another 
competent body had to have made a finding of past discrimination before or at the 
time of the institution of the plan in order for the plan to be upheld as remedial in 
purpose. * * * The courts below ruled that a particularized, contemporaneous 
finding of discrimination was not necessary and upheld the plan as a remedy for 
‘societal’ discrimination, apparently on the assumption that in the absence of a 
specific, contemporaneous finding, any discrimination addressed by an affirmative 
action plan could only be termed ‘societal.’ * * *  I believe that this assumption is 
false and therefore agree with the plurality that a contemporaneous or antecedent 
finding of past discrimination by a court or other competent body is not a 
 
 
52
constitutional prerequisite to a public employer’s voluntary agreement to an 
affirmative action plan. * * * 
 
“A violation of federal statutory or constitutional requirements does not 
arise with the making of a finding; it arises when the wrong is committed. * * * 
 
“The imposition of a requirement that public employers make findings that 
they have engaged in illegal discrimination before they engage in affirmative 
action programs would severely undermine public employers’ incentive to meet 
voluntarily their civil rights obligations. * * * 
 
“Such results cannot, in my view, be justified by reference to the 
incremental value a contemporaneous findings requirement would have as an 
evidentiary safeguard.  As is illustrated by this case, public employers are trapped 
between the competing hazards of liability to minorities if affirmative action is not 
taken to remedy apparent employment discrimination and liability to 
nonminorities if affirmative action is taken.  Where these employers, who are 
presumably fully aware both of their duty under federal law to respect the rights of 
all their employees and of their potential liability for failing to do so, act on the 
basis of information which gives them a sufficient basis for concluding that 
remedial action is necessary, a contemporaneous findings requirement should not 
be necessary. 
 
“This conclusion is consistent with our previous decisions recognizing the 
States’ ability to take voluntary race-conscious action to achieve compliance with 
the law even in the absence of a specific finding of past discrimination.  * * * 
Indeed, our recognition of the responsible state actor’s competency to take these 
steps is assumed in our recognition of the States’ constitutional duty to take 
affirmative steps to eliminate the continuing effects of past unconstitutional 
discrimination. * * * 
 
 
53
 
“Of course, as Justice Powell notes, the public employer must discharge this 
sensitive duty with great care; in order to provide some measure of protection to 
the interests of its nonminority employees and the employer itself in the event that 
its affirmative action plan is challenged, the public employer must have a firm 
basis for determining that affirmative action is warranted.  Public employers are 
not without reliable benchmarks in making this determination.  For example, 
demonstrable evidence of a disparity between the percentage of qualified blacks 
on a school’s teaching staff and the percentage of qualified minorities in the 
relevant labor pool sufficient to support a prima facie Title VII pattern or practice 
claim by minority teachers would lend a compelling basis for a competent 
authority such as the School Board to conclude that implementation of a voluntary 
affirmative action plan is appropriate to remedy apparent prior employment 
discrimination. 
 
“* * * If a voluntary affirmative action plan is subsequently challenged in 
court by nonminority employees, those employees must be given the opportunity 
to prove that the plan does not meet the constitutional standard this Court has 
articulated.  However, as the plurality suggests, the institution of such a challenge 
does not automatically impose upon the public employer the burden of convincing 
the court of its liability for prior unlawful discrimination; nor does it mean that the 
court must make an actual finding of prior discrimination based on the employer’s 
proof before the employer’s affirmative action plan will be upheld. * * * In 
‘reverse discrimination’ suits, as in any other suit, it is the plaintiffs who must bear 
the burden of demonstrating that their rights have been violated.  The findings a 
court must make before upholding an affirmative action plan reflect this allocation 
of proof and the nature of the challenge asserted.  For instance, in the example 
posed above, the nonminority teachers could easily demonstrate that the purpose 
 
 
54
and effect of the plan is to impose a race-based classification.  But when the Board 
introduces its statistical proof as evidence of its remedial purpose, thereby 
supplying the court with the means for determining that the Board had a firm 
basis for concluding that remedial action was appropriate, it is incumbent upon 
the nonminority teachers to prove their case; they continue to bear the ultimate 
burden of persuading the court that the Board’s evidence did not support an 
inference of prior discrimination and thus a remedial purpose, or that the plan 
instituted on the basis of this evidence was not sufficiently ‘narrowly tailored.’  
Only by meeting this burden could the plaintiffs establish a violation of their 
constitutional rights, and thereby defeat the presumption that the Board’s 
assertedly remedial action based on the statistical evidence was justified. 
 
“* * * 
 
“There is, however, no need to inquire whether the provision actually had a 
legitimate remedial purpose based on the record, such as it is, because the 
judgment is vulnerable on yet another ground: the courts below applied a 
‘reasonableness’ test in evaluating the relationship between the ends pursued and 
the means employed to achieve them that is plainly incorrect under any of the 
standards articulated by this Court.  Nor is it necessary, in my view, to resolve the 
troubling questions whether any layoff provision could survive strict scrutiny or 
whether this particular layoff provision could, when considered without reference 
to the hiring goal it was intended to further, pass the onerous ‘narrowly tailored’ 
requirement.  Petitioners have met their burden of establishing that this layoff 
provision is not ‘narrowly tailored’ to achieve its asserted remedial purpose by 
demonstrating that the provision is keyed to a hiring goal that itself has no relation 
to the remedying of employment discrimination. 
 
 
55
 
“* * *  The disparity between the percentage of minorities on the teaching 
staff and the percentage of minorities in the student body is not probative of 
employment discrimination; it is only when it is established that the availability of 
minorities in the relevant labor pool substantially exceeded those hired that one 
may draw an inference of deliberate discrimination in employment. * * * Because 
the layoff provision here acts to maintain levels of minority hiring that have no 
relation to remedying employment discrimination, it cannot be adjudged ‘narrowly 
tailored’ to effectuate its asserted remedial purpose.”  (Emphasis added in part and 
deleted in part; footnote omitted.)  Wygant, 476 U.S. at 287-294, 106 S.Ct. at 
1854-1857, 90 L.Ed.2d at 277-282. 
 
In any event, the lack of a majority opinion in Bakke, Fullilove, and Wygant 
left unresolved the question as to the appropriate standard of review in cases 
involving remedial race-based governmental action.  However, the court’s 1989 
decision in Croson, 488 U.S. 469, 109 S.Ct. 706, 102 L.Ed.2d 854, finally 
resolved the question concerning the appropriate standard of review for race-
conscious affirmative-action programs adopted by state and local governmental 
actors or entities. 
 
In Croson, the City Council of Richmond, Virginia, had adopted a Minority 
Business Utilization Plan in 1983.  The plan required prime contractors who had 
been awarded city construction contracts to subcontract at least thirty percent of 
the dollar amount of the contract to MBEs.  The plan defined an MBE as any 
business owned and controlled by minority group members.  Minority group 
members were defined by the plan as citizens of the United States who are 
“Blacks, Spanish-speaking, Orientals, Indians, Eskimos, or Aleuts.”  Id. at 478, 
109 S.Ct. at 713, 102 L.Ed.2d at 871.  There was no geographical limitation to the 
plan.  Any business from anywhere in the United States that met the definition of 
 
 
56
an MBE could take advantage of the set-aside program.  Prime contractors could 
obtain a waiver of the thirty-percent set-aside requirement, but to do so the 
contractor was required to prove that there were no qualified MBEs available and 
willing to participate. 
 
The plan in Croson declared that it was remedial in nature and was meant to 
promote wider participation by MBEs in the construction of public projects.  The 
plan was adopted by city council following a public hearing.  At the hearing, no 
direct evidence was presented that the city had ever engaged in racial 
discrimination in its construction contracting or that the city’s prime contractors 
had ever discriminated against minority subcontractors.  The evidence at the 
hearing included a study indicating that, although the population of Richmond was 
fifty-percent black, a mere .67 percent of the city’s prime construction contracts 
had been awarded to MBEs between 1978 and 1983.  It was also established that a 
variety of contractors’ associations had virtually no MBE members.  Additionally, 
legal counsel for the city had indicated that the plan was constitutional under 
Fullilove, 448 U.S. 448, 100 S.Ct. 2758, 65 L.Ed.2d 902.  City council members 
(the majority of whom were African-American) were also aware of Congress’s 
findings in connection with the set-aside program upheld in Fullilove that there 
had been national discrimination in the construction industry.  One council 
member stated at the hearing that racial discrimination was widespread in the 
construction industry in the Richmond area, in the state, and in the nation.  At the 
hearing, opponents of the plan questioned whether there were enough MBEs in the 
Richmond area to satisfy the thirty-percent set-aside requirement.  Additionally, 
representatives of local contractors’ organizations indicated that they had not 
discriminated against minorities and, in fact, that they had been actively recruiting 
minority membership.  At the hearing, concerns were also raised that the plan 
 
 
57
could result in job losses in the Richmond area due to the absence of any 
geographic limit to the plan.  On the basis of the evidence adduced at the hearing, 
city council enacted the ordinance by a vote of six to two. 
 
In 1983, following passage of the Richmond set-aside ordinance, the city 
solicited bids on a construction project for the installation of plumbing fixtures at 
the city jail.  J.A. Croson Company (“Croson”) was the sole bidder.  Croson 
applied for and was denied a waiver of the set-aside requirement, and, 
consequently, Croson eventually lost its contract with the city.  Thereafter, Croson 
sued in federal district court, alleging that the city ordinance was unconstitutional, 
on its face and as applied, under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth 
Amendment.  The district court upheld Richmond’s set-aside plan in all respects. 
 
On appeal, the United States Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, applying a 
test derived from Fullilove, affirmed the judgment of the district court.  The court 
of appeals found that the great deference the Fullilove court had accorded to 
Congress’s findings of past national discrimination in the construction industry 
also applied to the determination whether the Richmond City Council had acted 
reasonably in adopting the Richmond set-aside plan.  Specifically, the appellate 
court found that the national findings of discrimination, coupled with the 
statistical study showing the lack of significant minority participation in public 
contracting in Richmond, provided a reasonable basis for the city’s conclusion that 
the low minority participation in city contracts was due to past discrimination.  
The court of appeals also determined that the plan was narrowly tailored.  
However, on petition for certiorari, the United States Supreme Court vacated the 
judgment of the court of appeals and remanded the cause for further consideration 
in light of its intervening decision in Wygant, 476 U.S. 267, 106 S.Ct. 1842, 90 
L.Ed.2d 260.  On remand, the court of appeals in Croson struck down Richmond’s 
 
 
58
minority set-aside program, finding that the program failed both prongs of the 
strict scrutiny test.  In particular, the court of appeals determined that the set-aside 
plan was not justified by a compelling interest, since there was no evidence of past 
discrimination by the city itself in letting public contracts and that the city could 
not rely simply on “ ‘broad-brush assumptions of historical discrimination.’ ”  
Croson, 488 U.S. at 485, 109 S.Ct. at 717, 102 L.Ed.2d at 876, quoting 822 F.2d 
1355, 1357.  The court of appeals also determined that the thirty-percent set-aside 
requirement in the Richmond program was not narrowly tailored to achieve a 
remedial objective.  On appeal from the court of appeals’ decision on remand, the 
United States Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of the court of appeals. 
 
In Croson, Justice O’Connor authored the lead opinion, speaking for a 
plurality of the court on some issues and for a majority on others.  The majority in 
Croson held that “the standard of review under the Equal Protection Clause is not 
dependent on the race of those burdened or benefited by a particular 
classification,” id., 488 U.S. at 494, 109 S.Ct. at 722, 102 L.Ed.2d at 882, and that 
the standard of review for all racial classifications is strict scrutiny, id. at 493-494, 
109 S.Ct. at 721-722, 102 L.Ed.2d at 881-882 (plurality opinion of O’Connor, J., 
joined by Rehnquist, C.J., and White and Kennedy, JJ.).  See, also, id. at 520, 109 
S.Ct. at 735-736, 102 L.Ed.2d at 899 (Scalia, J., concurring in judgment) (“I agree 
with much of the Court’s opinion, and, in particular, with Justice O’Connor’s 
conclusion that strict scrutiny must be applied to all governmental classification by 
race, whether or not its asserted purpose is ‘remedial’ or ‘benign’ ”).  Croson, 
therefore, definitively established the bedrock principle that the Fourteenth 
Amendment requires strict scrutiny of all racial classifications imposed by state or 
local government entities or actors.  See, also, Adarand, 515 U.S. at 222, 115 S.Ct. 
at 2110, 132 L.Ed.2d at 178-179 (“With Croson, the Court finally agreed that the 
 
 
59
Fourteenth Amendment requires strict scrutiny of all race-based action by state 
and local governments”). 
 
The breakdown of the votes in Croson makes that case tremendously 
difficult to discuss and even more difficult to understand.  The lead opinion in 
Croson is actually a mixture of plurality and majority views.  Thus, in order to 
derive full meaning from the Croson decision, a section-by-section analysis of the 
case becomes necessary. 
 
A plurality in Croson (Part II of opinion of O’Connor, J., joined by 
Rehnquist, C.J., and White, J.) began the discussion by addressing an “initial 
battle” of the parties “over the scope of the city’s power to adopt legislation 
designed to address the effects of past discrimination.”  Id., 488 U.S. at 486, 109 
S.Ct. at 718, 102 L.Ed.2d at 877.  Specifically, appellee Croson, relying on 
Wygant, 476 U.S. 267, 106 S.Ct. 1842, 90 L.Ed.2d 260, had argued that the city of 
Richmond was required to limit any race-based remedial efforts to eradicating the 
effects of the city’s own prior discrimination.  Croson at 486, 109 S.Ct. at 718, 102 
L.Ed.2d at 877.  Conversely, the city had argued that Fullilove, 448 U.S. 448, 100 
S.Ct. 2758, 65 L.Ed.2d 902, was controlling, and that the city therefore enjoyed 
the same type of sweeping legislative power to define and attack the effects of 
prior discrimination in its local construction industry that Congress had enjoyed 
on a national level in Fullilove.  Croson at 486, 109 S.Ct. at 718, 102 L.Ed.2d at 
877.  The plurality in Croson concluded, “[N]either of these two rather stark 
alternatives can withstand analysis,” id., and went on to address the arguments in 
detail, stating: 
 
“Appellant [the city] and its supporting amici rely heavily on Fullilove for 
the proposition that a city council, like Congress, need not make specific findings 
of discrimination to engage in race-conscious relief. * * * 
 
 
60
 
“What appellant ignores is that Congress, unlike any State or political 
subdivision, has a specific constitutional mandate [in Section 5 of the Fourteenth 
Amendment] to enforce the dictates of the Fourteenth Amendment. * * * 
 
“That Congress may identify and redress the effects of society-wide 
discrimination does not mean that, a fortiori, the States and their political 
subdivisions are free to decide that such remedies are appropriate.  Section 1 of the 
Fourteenth Amendment [containing the Equal Protection Clause] is an explicit 
constraint on state power, and the States must undertake any remedial efforts in 
accordance with that provision.  To hold otherwise would be to cede control over 
the content of the Equal Protection Clause to the 50 state legislatures and their 
myriad political subdivisions.  The mere recitation of a benign or compensatory 
purpose for the use of a racial classification would essentially entitle the States to 
exercise the full power of Congress under §5 of the Fourteenth Amendment and 
insulate any racial classification from judicial scrutiny under §1.  We believe that 
such a result would be contrary to the intentions of the Framers of the Fourteenth 
Amendment, who desired to place clear limits on the States’ use of race as a 
criterion for legislative action, and to have the federal courts enforce those 
limitations. * * * 
 
“* * * Thus, our treatment of an exercise of congressional power in 
Fullilove cannot be dispositive here. * * * 
 
“It would seem equally clear, however, that a state or local subdivision (if 
delegated the authority from the State) has the authority to eradicate the effects of 
private discrimination within its own legislative jurisdiction.  This authority must, 
of course, be exercised within the constraints of §1 of the Fourteenth Amendment.  
Our decision in Wygant is not to the contrary.  Wygant addressed the 
constitutionality of the use of racial quotas by local school authorities pursuant to 
 
 
61
an agreement reached with the local teachers’ union.  It was in the context of 
addressing the school board’s power to adopt a race-based layoff program 
affecting its own work force that the Wygant plurality indicated that the Equal 
Protection Clause required ‘some showing of prior discrimination by the 
governmental unit involved.’  Wygant, 476 U.S., at 274 [106 S.Ct. at 1847, 90 
L.Ed.2d at 269].  As a matter of state law, the city of Richmond has legislative 
authority over its procurement policies, and can use its spending powers to remedy 
private discrimination, if it identifies that discrimination with the particularity 
required by the Fourteenth Amendment.  To this extent, on the question of the 
city’s competence, the Court of Appeals erred in following Wygant by rote in a 
case involving a state entity which has state-law authority to address 
discriminatory practices within local commerce under its jurisdiction. 
 
“Thus, if the city could show that it had essentially become a ‘passive 
participant’ in a system of racial exclusion practiced by elements of the local 
construction industry, we think it clear that the city could take affirmative steps to 
dismantle such a system.  It is beyond dispute that any public entity, state or 
federal, has a compelling interest in assuring that public dollars, drawn from the 
tax contributions of all citizens, do not serve to finance the evil of private 
prejudice.”  (Emphasis sic and footnote omitted.)  Croson, 488 U.S. at 489-492, 
109 S.Ct. at 719-721, 102 L.Ed.2d at 879-881 (Part II of opinion of O’Connor, J., 
joined by Rehnquist, C.J., and White, J.). 
 
Next, a plurality in Croson (Part III-A of opinion of O’Connor, J., joined by 
Rehnquist, C.J., White and Kennedy, JJ.) stated that the rights secured by the 
Equal Protection Clause are personal rights, and that the Richmond program 
“denies certain citizens the opportunity to compete for a fixed percentage of public 
contracts based solely upon their race.”  Id., 488 U.S. at 493, 109 S.Ct. at 721, 102 
 
 
62
L.Ed.2d at 881.  Therefore, the plurality observed, “[t]o whatever racial group 
these citizens belong, their ‘personal rights’ to be treated with equal dignity and 
respect are implicated by a rigid rule erecting race as the sole criterion in an aspect 
of public decisionmaking.”  Id.  The plurality stated, “Absent searching judicial 
inquiry into the justification for such race-based measures, there is simply no way 
of determining what classifications are ‘benign’ or ‘remedial’ and what 
classifications are in fact motivated by illegitimate notions of racial inferiority or 
simple racial politics.”  Id.  The plurality also observed, “Indeed, the purpose of 
strict scrutiny is to ‘smoke out’ illegitimate uses of race by assuring that the 
legislative body is pursuing a goal important enough to warrant use of a highly 
suspect tool.  The test also ensures that the means chosen ‘fit’ this compelling goal 
so closely that there is little or no possibility that the motive for the classification 
was illegitimate racial prejudice or stereotype.”  Id. at 493, 109 S.Ct. at 721, 102 
L.Ed.2d at 881-882.  Additionally, the plurality in Croson, expressing a concern 
that racial classifications “carry a danger of stigmatic harm,” determined that 
unless racial classifications “are strictly reserved for remedial settings, they may in 
fact promote notions of racial inferiority and lead to a politics of racial hostility.”  
Id. at 493, 109 S.Ct. at 722, 102 L.Ed.2d at 882.  Accordingly, the plurality in 
Croson “reaffirm[ed] the view expressed by the plurality in Wygant that the 
standard of review under the Equal Protection Clause is not dependent on the race 
of those burdened or benefited by a particular classification.”  Croson, 488 U.S. at 
494, 109 S.Ct. at 722, 102 L.Ed.2d at 882.  Further, pledging “continued 
adherence to the standard of review employed in Wygant,” the plurality in Croson 
retained the strict scrutiny standard of review.  Id.  That determination, coupled 
with Justice Scalia’s concurring view that strict scrutiny applies “to all 
governmental classification by race, whether or not its asserted purpose is 
 
 
63
‘remedial’ or ‘benign,’ ” id. at 520, 109 S.Ct. at 735-736, 102 L.Ed.2d at 899, 
constituted a majority in support of the strict scrutiny standard. 
 
The plurality in Croson (Part III-A of opinion of O’Connor, J., joined by 
Rehnquist, C.J., White and Kennedy, JJ.) also went on to discuss the rationale of 
the plurality opinion in Wygant.  Specifically, the plurality in Croson, 488 U.S. at 
497-498, 109 S.Ct. at 723-724, 102 L.Ed.2d at 884, stated: 
 
“In Wygant [476 U.S. 267, 106 S.Ct. 1842, 90 L.Ed.2d 260], four Members 
of the Court applied heightened scrutiny to a race-based system of employee 
layoffs.  Justice Powell, writing for the plurality, again drew the distinction 
between ‘societal discrimination’ which is an inadequate basis for race-conscious 
classifications, and the type of identified discrimination that can support and 
define the scope of race-based relief.  The challenged classification in that case 
tied the layoff of minority teachers to the percentage of minority students enrolled 
in the school district.  The lower courts had upheld the scheme, based on the 
theory that minority students were in need of ‘role models’ to alleviate the effects 
of prior discrimination in society.  This Court reversed, with a plurality of four 
Justices reiterating the view expressed by Justice Powell in Bakke [438 U.S. at 
307, 98 S.Ct. at 2757, 57 L.Ed.2d at 782, that remedying the effects of historic 
societal discrimination is too amorphous a basis to justify imposing a racially 
classified remedy]. 
 
“The role model theory employed by the lower courts [in Wygant] failed for 
two reasons.  First, the statistical disparity between students and teachers had no 
probative value in demonstrating the kind of prior discrimination in hiring or 
promotion that would justify race-based relief.  476 U.S., at 276 [106 S.Ct. at 
1848, 90 L.Ed.2d at 270]; see also id., at 294 [106 S.Ct. at 1857, 90 L.Ed.2d at 
281] (O’Connor, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment) (‘The disparity 
 
 
64
between the percentage of minorities on the teaching staff and the percentage of 
minorities in the student body is not probative of employment discrimination’).  
Second, because the role model theory had no relation to some basis for believing 
a constitutional or statutory violation had occurred, it could be used to ‘justify’ 
race-based decisionmaking essentially limitless in scope and duration.  Id. 
[Wygant], at 276 [106 S.Ct. at 1848, 90 L.Ed.2d at 270] (plurality opinion) (‘In the 
absence of particularized findings, a court could uphold remedies that are ageless 
in their reach into the past, and timeless in their ability to affect the future’).” 
 
Immediately following the Croson plurality’s discussion of Wygant, the 
opinion in Croson abruptly changes to a majority opinion.  Specifically, in Part 
III-B of Croson, Justice O’Connor, now speaking for a majority of the court, 
stated: 
 
“We think it clear that the factual predicate offered in support of the 
Richmond Plan suffers from the same two defects identified as fatal in Wygant.  
The District Court found the city council’s ‘findings sufficient to ensure that, in 
adopting the Plan, it was remedying the present effects of past discrimination in 
the construction industry. * * *  Like the ‘role model’ theory employed in Wygant, 
a generalized assertion that there has been past discrimination in an entire industry 
provides no guidance for a legislative body to determine the precise scope of the 
injury it seeks to remedy.  It ‘has no logical stopping point.’  Wygant, supra, at 
275 [106 S.Ct. at 1847, 90 L.Ed.2d at 269] (plurality opinion).  ‘Relief’ for such an 
ill-defined wrong could extend until the percentage of public contracts awarded to 
MBE’s in Richmond mirrored the percentage of minorities in the population as a 
whole. 
 
“Appellant argues that it is attempting to remedy various forms of past 
discrimination that are alleged to be responsible for the small number of minority 
 
 
65
businesses in the local contracting industry.  Among these the city cites [the 
historic exclusion of blacks from skilled construction trade unions and training 
programs and a host of nonracial factors that would seemingly affect a member of 
any racial group seeking to establish a new business enterprise]. 
 
“While there is no doubt that the sorry history of both private and public 
discrimination in this country has contributed to a lack of opportunities for black 
entrepreneurs, this observation, standing alone, cannot justify a rigid racial quota 
in the awarding of public contracts in Richmond, Virginia.  Like the claim [in 
Bakke, 438 U.S. 265, 98 S.Ct. 2733, 57 L.Ed.2d 750] that discrimination in 
primary and secondary schooling justifies a rigid racial preference in medical 
school admissions, an amorphous claim that there has been past discrimination in 
a particular industry cannot justify the use of an unyielding racial quota. 
 
“It is sheer speculation how many minority firms there would be in 
Richmond absent past societal discrimination, just as it was sheer speculation how 
many minority medical students would have been admitted to the medical school 
at Davis [in Bakke] absent past discrimination in educational opportunities.  
Defining these sorts of injuries as ‘identified discrimination’ would give local 
governments license to create a patchwork of racial preferences based on 
statistical generalizations about any particular field of endeavor. 
 
“These defects are readily apparent in this case.  The 30% quota cannot in 
any realistic sense be tied to any injury suffered by anyone.  The District Court 
relied upon five predicate ‘facts’ in reaching its conclusion that there was an 
adequate basis for the 30% quota:  (1) the ordinance declares itself to be remedial; 
(2) several proponents of the measure stated their views that there had been past 
discrimination in the construction industry; (3) minority businesses received 
0.67% of prime contracts from the city while minorities constituted 50% of the 
 
 
66
city’s population; (4) there were very few minority contractors in local and state 
contractors’ associations; and (5) in 1977, Congress made a determination that the 
effects of past discrimination had stifled minority participation in the construction 
industry nationally. * * * 
 
“None of these ‘findings,’ singly or together, provide the city of Richmond 
with a ‘strong basis in evidence for its conclusion that remedial action was 
necessary.’  Wygant, 476 U.S., at 277 [106 S.Ct. at 1849, 90 L.Ed.2d at 271] 
(plurality opinion).  There is nothing approaching a prima facie case of a 
constitutional or statutory violation by anyone in the Richmond construction 
industry.  Id., at 274-275 [106 S.Ct. at 1847, 90 L.Ed.2d at 268-269]; see also id., 
at 293 [106 S.Ct. at 1857, 90 L.Ed.2d at 280-281] (O’Connor, J., concurring).”  
(Emphasis sic.)  Croson, 488 U.S. at 498-500, 109 S.Ct. at 724-725, 102 L.Ed.2d 
at 884-886 (Part III-B of opinion of O’Connor, J., joined by Rehnquist, C.J., 
White, Stevens and Kennedy, JJ.). 
 
Additionally, in Part III-B of the opinion in Croson, Justice O’Connor, 
speaking for the majority of the court, addressed and rejected each of the five 
separate predicate facts the district court had relied upon in upholding the city of 
Richmond’s set-aside program.  Id. at 499-504, 109 S.Ct. at 725-727, 102 L.Ed.2d 
at 885-889.  The court’s assessment of each of the five predicate facts is set forth 
immediately below. 
 
First, the Croson majority determined that the district court had erred in 
according great weight to the fact that city council had declared the Richmond set-
aside program to be remedial in nature.  Id., 488 U.S. at 500, 109 S.Ct. at 725, 102 
L.Ed.2d at 886.  Specifically, the Croson majority found that “the mere recitation 
of a ‘benign’ or legitimate purpose for a racial classification is entitled to little or 
no weight.”  Id.  The court reasoned that because racial classifications are 
 
 
67
inherently suspect, “simple legislative assurances of good intention cannot 
suffice.”  Id. 
 
Second, the court in Croson found that the district court had relied on a 
“highly conclusionary” statement by a member of the Richmond City Council that 
there was discrimination in the construction industry in Richmond, in Virginia, 
and in the nation.  Id., 488 U.S. at 500, 109 S.Ct. at 725, 102 L.Ed.2d at 886.  The 
court in Croson also found that the district court had relied on a statement by the 
Richmond city manager that discrimination was prevalent in the city manager’s 
hometown in Pennsylvania.  Id.  The Croson majority determined that these 
statements were of “little probative value in establishing identified discrimination 
in the Richmond construction industry.”  Id.  The Croson majority held that 
although the factfinding process of a legislative body is generally entitled to a 
presumption of regularity and deferential review by the judiciary, “when a 
legislative body chooses to employ a suspect classification, it cannot rest on a 
generalized assertion as to the classification’s relevance to its goals. * * *  A 
governmental actor cannot render race a legitimate proxy for a particular condition 
merely by declaring that the condition exists. * * *  The history of racial 
classifications in this country suggests that blind judicial deference to legislative 
or executive pronouncements of necessity has no place in equal protection 
analysis.”  Id. at 500-501, 109 S.Ct. at 725, 102 L.Ed.2d at 886. 
 
Third, the Croson majority determined that the district court’s reliance on 
the statistical disparity between the number of prime contracts awarded to minority 
enterprises and the minority population of the city of Richmond was similarly 
misplaced.  Id., 488 U.S. at 501, 109 S.Ct. at 725, 102 L.Ed.2d at 886.  The court 
in Croson noted that gross disparities alone may constitute prima facie proof of a 
pattern of discrimination, but that when special qualifications are necessary to 
 
 
68
perform particular tasks, the relevant statistical pool must consist of the group of 
individuals that are qualified to perform the task.  Id. at 501-502, 109 S.Ct. at 725-
726, 102 L.Ed.2d at 887.  In this regard, the Croson majority observed: 
 
“In this case, the city does not even know how many MBE’s in the relevant 
market are qualified to undertake prime or subcontracting work in public 
construction projects.  Cf. Ohio Contractors Assn. v. Keip [C.A.6, 1983], 713 F.2d 
[167], at 171 (relying on percentage of minority businesses in the State compared 
to percentage of state purchasing contracts awarded to minority firms in upholding 
set-aside).  Nor does the city know what percentage of total city construction 
dollars minority firms now receive as subcontractors on prime contracts let by the 
city. 
 
“To a large extent, the set-aside of subcontracting dollars seems to rest on 
the unsupported assumption that white prime contractors simply will not hire 
minority firms. * * *  Indeed, there is evidence in this record that overall minority 
participation in city contracts in Richmond is 7 to 8%, and that minority contractor 
participation in the Community Block Development Grant construction projects is 
17 to 22%. * * *  Without any information on minority participation in 
subcontracting, it is quite simply impossible to evaluate overall minority 
representation in the city’s construction expenditures.”  (Emphasis sic and 
footnote omitted.)  Croson, 488 U.S. at 502-503, 109 S.Ct. at 726, 102 L.Ed.2d at 
887-888. 
 
Fourth, the court in Croson rejected the city’s and the district court’s 
reliance on evidence that MBE membership in local subcontractor associations 
was low, finding that “standing alone this evidence is not probative of any 
discrimination in the local construction industry.”  Id. at 503, 109 S.Ct. at 726, 102 
L.Ed.2d at 888.  The court observed that there could be many reasons for the 
 
 
69
phenomenon, including things such as “past societal discrimination in education 
and economic opportunities as well as both black and white career and 
entrepreneurial choices.”  Id. at 503, 109 S.Ct. at 726-727, 102 L.Ed.2d at 888.  
The court also found that “[t]he mere fact that black membership in these trade 
organizations is low, standing alone, cannot establish a prima facie case of 
discrimination.”  Id. at 503, 109 S.Ct. at 727, 102 L.Ed.2d at 888.  Additionally, 
the Croson majority stated: 
 
“For low minority membership in these associations to be relevant, the city 
would have to link it to the number of local MBE’s eligible for membership.  If the 
statistical disparity between eligible MBE’s and MBE membership were great 
enough, an inference of discriminatory exclusion could arise.  In such a case, the 
city would have a compelling interest in preventing its tax dollars from assisting 
these organizations in maintaining a racially segregated construction market.  See 
* * * [Keip], supra, [713 F.2d] at 171 (upholding minority set-aside based in part 
on earlier District Court finding that ‘the state [of Ohio] had become “a joint 
participant” with private industry and certain craft unions in a pattern of racially 
discriminatory conduct which excluded black laborers from work on public 
construction contracts’).”  Croson, 488 U.S. at 503-504, 109 S.Ct. at 727, 102 
L.Ed.2d at 888. 
 
Fifth, the court in Croson found that the city’s and the district court’s 
reliance on Congress’s findings that there had been nationwide discrimination in 
the construction industry in the context of the set-aside program approved in 
Fullilove was of extremely limited value in demonstrating the existence of 
discrimination in Richmond.  Croson at 504, 109 S.Ct. at 727, 102 L.Ed.2d at 888.  
The Croson majority stated, “While the States and their subdivisions may take 
remedial action when they possess evidence that their own spending practices are 
 
 
70
exacerbating a pattern of prior discrimination, they must identify that 
discrimination, public or private, with some specificity before they may use race-
conscious relief.  Congress has made national findings that there has been societal 
discrimination in a host of fields.  If all a state or local government need do is find 
a congressional report on the subject to enact a set-aside program, the constraints 
of the Equal Protection Clause will, in effect, have been rendered a nullity.”  Id. at 
504, 109 S.Ct. at 727, 102 L.Ed.2d at 889. 
 
Accordingly, the majority in Croson concluded that the city had simply 
failed to make a showing of any identified discrimination in the Richmond 
construction industry and, thus, had failed to demonstrate any compelling interest 
for the race-based set-aside program.  Id., 488 U.S. at 505, 109 S.Ct. at 728, 102 
L.Ed.2d at 889.  The majority also noted that its analysis had applied only to the 
inclusion of blacks within the Richmond set-aside plan, that there was no evidence 
whatsoever of any past discrimination involving other racial groups that had been 
included in the program such as Aleuts and Eskimos, and that “[i]t may well be 
that Richmond has never had an Aleut or Eskimo citizen.”  Id. at 506, 109 S.Ct. at 
728, 102 L.Ed.2d at 890.  The court observed that this seemingly “random 
inclusion of racial groups that, as a practical matter, may never have suffered from 
discrimination in the construction industry in Richmond suggests that perhaps the 
city’s purpose was not in fact to remedy past discrimination.”  Id.  Moreover, 
adding to the undifferentiated nature of the Richmond set-aside program was the 
lack of any geographic limit to the plan, so that an Eskimo-owned MBE from 
Alaska, for instance, could participate in the program even though that enterprise 
never suffered any discrimination in the Richmond construction industry.  Thus, as 
the court in Croson noted, “[t]he gross overinclusiveness of Richmond’s racial 
preference strongly impugns the city’s claim of remedial motivation.”  Id. 
 
 
71
 
A majority of the court in Croson also determined that the Richmond plan 
was not or simply could not be narrowly tailored.  Specifically, in Part IV of the 
opinion, Justice O’Connor, once again speaking for the majority, stated that “it is 
almost impossible to assess whether the Richmond Plan is narrowly tailored to 
remedy prior discrimination since it is not linked to identified discrimination in 
any way.”  Id., 488 U.S. at 507, 109 S.Ct. at 729, 102 L.Ed.2d at 890.  
Nevertheless, on the issue of narrow tailoring, the court made two observations.  
First, the court observed that the city of Richmond had apparently never 
considered any race-neutral alternatives to the race-based quota.  Id.  In this 
regard, the court noted that, in Fullilove, 448 U.S. 448, 100 S.Ct. 2758, 65 L.Ed.2d 
902, the court had found that Congress had carefully considered and rejected the 
use of alternatives to a race-based remedy and had known from past experience 
that such alternatives would have failed to ameliorate the effects of discrimination 
in the construction industry.  Croson, 488 U.S. at 507, 109 S.Ct. at 729, 102 
L.Ed.2d at 891.  Second, the court observed that Richmond’s thirty-percent set-
aside quota could not be narrowly tailored to any goal except “outright racial 
balancing,” since the quota had been predicated on the “ ‘completely unrealistic’ 
assumption that minorities will choose a particular trade in lockstep proportion to 
their representation in the local population.”  Id.  In addition, the court in Croson 
stated: 
 
“Since the city must already consider bids and waivers on a case-by-case 
basis, it is difficult to see the need for a rigid numerical quota.  As noted above, 
the congressional scheme upheld in Fullilove allowed for a waiver of the set-aside 
provision where an MBE’s higher price was not attributable to the effects of past 
discrimination.  Based upon proper findings, such programs are less problematic 
from an equal protection standpoint because they treat all candidates individually, 
 
 
72
rather than making the color of an applicant’s skin the sole relevant consideration.  
Unlike the program upheld in Fullilove, the Richmond Plan’s waiver system 
focuses solely on the availability of MBE’s; there is no inquiry into whether or not 
the particular MBE seeking a racial preference has suffered from the effects of 
past discrimination by the city or prime contractors. 
 
“Given the existence of an individualized procedure, the city’s only interest 
in maintaining a quota system rather than investigating the need for remedial 
action in particular cases would seem to be simple administrative convenience.  
But the interest in avoiding the bureaucratic effort necessary to tailor remedial 
relief to those who truly have suffered the effects of prior discrimination cannot 
justify a rigid line drawn on the basis of a suspect classification. * * * Under 
Richmond’s scheme, a successful black, Hispanic, or Oriental entrepreneur from 
anywhere in the country enjoys an absolute preference over other citizens based 
solely on their race.  We think it obvious that such a program is not narrowly 
tailored to remedy the effects of prior discrimination.”  Croson, 488 U.S. at 508, 
109 S.Ct. at 729-730, 102 L.Ed.2d at 891. 
 
Finally, in Part V of Croson, the opinion reverts to a plurality opinion.  
Therein, the plurality (O’Connor, J., joined by Rehnquist, C.J., White and 
Kennedy, JJ.) specifically stated, in no uncertain terms: 
 
“Nothing we say today precludes a state or local entity from taking action to 
rectify the effects of identified discrimination within its jurisdiction.  If the city of 
Richmond had evidence before it that nonminority contractors were systematically 
excluding minority businesses from subcontracting opportunities, it could take 
action to end the discriminatory exclusion.  Where there is a significant statistical 
disparity between the number of qualified minority contractors willing and able to 
perform a particular service and the number of such contractors actually engaged 
 
 
73
by the locality or the locality’s prime contractors, an inference of discriminatory 
exclusion could arise. * * * Under such circumstances, the city could act to 
dismantle the closed business system by taking appropriate measures against those 
who discriminate on the basis of race or other illegitimate criteria. * * * In the 
extreme case, some form of narrowly tailored racial preference might be necessary 
to break down patterns of deliberate exclusion.”  Id. at 509, 109 S.Ct. at 730, 102 
L.Ed.2d at 892. 
 
The plurality in Croson noted, however, that Richmond had ascertained 
neither “how many minority enterprises are present in the local construction 
market nor the level of their participation in city construction projects,” and that 
“[t]he city points to no evidence that qualified minority contractors have been 
passed over for city contracts or subcontracts, either as a group or in any 
individual case.”  Id., 488 U.S. at 510, 109 S.Ct. at 730, 102 L.Ed.2d at 892-893.  
Therefore, the plurality stated, “Under such circumstances, it is simply impossible 
to say that the city has demonstrated ‘a strong basis in evidence for its conclusion 
that remedial action was necessary.’ ”  Id. at 510, 109 S.Ct. at 730, 102 L.Ed.2d at 
893, quoting Wygant, 476 U.S. at 277, 106 S.Ct. at 1849, 90 L.Ed.2d at 271.  The 
plurality in Croson added that “[p]roper findings in this regard are necessary to 
define both the scope of the injury and the extent of the remedy necessary to cure 
its effects,” and that “[s]uch findings also serve to assure all citizens that the 
deviation from the norm of equal treatment * * * is a temporary matter * * * 
[undertaken to promote the goal] of equality itself.”  Id., 488 U.S. at 510, 109 S.Ct. 
at 730-731, 102 L.Ed.2d at 893. 
 
Justice Stevens wrote a separate opinion, in which he took issue with what 
he saw as the underlying premise of both Wygant and Croson — that 
governmental decisions based on racial classifications are never permissible 
 
 
74
except to remedy past wrongs.  Croson, 488 U.S. at 511, 109 S.Ct. at 731, 102 
L.Ed.2d at 893 (Stevens, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment).  
However, Justice Stevens did agree with the court’s explanation as to why the 
Richmond program could not be justified as a remedy for past discrimination and, 
thus, joined Parts III-B and IV of the Croson opinion.  Id. at 511-512, 109 S.Ct. at 
731, 102 L.Ed.2d at 893-894. 
 
Justice Kennedy also wrote separately in Croson, 488 U.S. at 518-520, 109 
S.Ct. at 734-735, 102 L.Ed.2d at 897-899, concurring in part and concurring in 
judgment.  He joined all but Part II of the Croson opinion and stated his general 
agreement with the strict scrutiny standard adopted by the court.  Id. at 518-519, 
109 S.Ct. at 734-735, 102 L.Ed.2d at 897-898.  In his concurrence, Justice 
Kennedy stated, “[I]t suffices to say that the State has the power to eradicate racial 
discrimination and its effects in both the public and private sectors, and the 
absolute duty to do so where those wrongs were caused intentionally by the State 
itself.” Id. at 518, 109 S.Ct. at 735, 102 L.Ed.2d at 898.  He also stated, “The 
ordinance before us falls short of the [strict scrutiny] standard we adopt.  The 
nature and scope of the injury that existed; its historic or antecedent causes; the 
extent to which the city contributed to it, either by intentional acts or by passive 
complicity in acts of discrimination by the private sector; the necessity for the 
response adopted, its duration in relation to the wrong, and the precision with 
which it otherwise bore on whatever injury in fact was addressed, were all matters 
unmeasured, unexplored, and unexplained by the city council.  We are left with an 
ordinance and a legislative record open to the fair charge that it is not a remedy but 
is itself a preference which will cause the same corrosive animosities that the 
Constitution forbids in the whole sphere of government and that our national 
 
 
75
policy condemns in the rest of society as well.”  Id. at 519-520, 109 S.Ct. at 735, 
102 L.Ed.2d at 898-899. 
 
Justice Scalia concurred in the judgment in Croson, 488 U.S. at 520-528, 
109 S.Ct. at 735-740, 102 L.Ed.2d at 899-904.  He agreed with much of the court’s 
analysis and, particularly, the conclusion that strict scrutiny applies to all 
governmental classifications by race regardless of the asserted purpose of the 
classification.  Id. at 520, 109 S.Ct. at 735-736, 102 L.Ed.2d at 899.  Additionally, 
Justice Scalia stated his view that “there is only one circumstance in which the 
States may act by race to ‘undo the effects of past discrimination’: where that is 
necessary to eliminate their own maintenance of a system of unlawful racial 
classification.”  (Emphasis sic.)  Id. at 524, 109 S.Ct. at 738, 102 L.Ed.2d at 901. 
 
Three Justices dissented in Croson.  The principal dissent was written by 
Justice Marshall and was joined by Justices Brennan and Blackmun.  Id., 488 U.S. 
at 528-561, 109 S.Ct. at 740-757, 102 L.Ed.2d at 904-926.  Therein, the dissenters 
lamented the adoption of the strict scrutiny test in the context of remedial race-
based action, and lambasted the majority for what they evidently perceived to be 
the court’s narrow view of the Equal Protection Clause, its myopic view of the 
evidence, and its departure from precedent. 
 
Croson finally decided the appropriate standard of review under the Equal 
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment for race-conscious set-aside 
programs by state and local governments.  However, Croson did not directly 
decide the question as to the appropriate test under the Fifth Amendment for 
benign or remedial race-based classifications imposed by the federal government.  
This latter issue was addressed by the court in 1990, but was not finally resolved 
until the court’s 1995 decision in Adarand, 515 U.S. 200, 115 S.Ct. 2097, 132 
L.Ed.2d 158. 
 
 
76
 
In 1990, the United States Supreme Court, by a vote of five to four, upheld 
two minority preference policies that had been adopted by the Federal 
Communications Commission to comply with certain congressional mandates.  
Metro Broadcasting, Inc. v. Fed. Communications Comm. (1990), 497 U.S. 547, 
110 S.Ct. 2997, 111 L.Ed.2d 445, overruled in Adarand, 515 U.S. 200, 115 S.Ct. 
2097, 132 L.Ed.2d 158.  In Metro Broadcasting, the majority stated: 
 
“A majority of the Court in Fullilove [448 U.S. 448, 100 S.Ct. 2758, 65 
L.Ed.2d 902] did not apply strict scrutiny to the race-based classification at issue.  
Three Members inquired ‘whether the objectives of th[e] legislation are within the 
power of Congress’ and ‘whether the limited use of racial and ethnic criteria * * * 
is a constitutionally permissible means for achieving the congressional objectives.’  
Id., at 473 [100 S.Ct. at 2772, 65 L.Ed.2d at 921] (opinion of Burger, C.J.) 
(emphasis in original).  Three other Members would have upheld benign racial 
classifications that ‘serve important governmental objectives and are substantially 
related to achievement of those objectives.’  Id., at 519 [100 S.Ct. at 2796, 65 
L.Ed.2d at 951]  (Marshall, J., concurring in judgment).  We apply that standard 
today.  We hold that benign race-conscious measures mandated by Congress — 
even if those measures are not ‘remedial’ in the sense of being designed to 
compensate victims of past governmental or societal discrimination — are 
constitutionally permissible to the extent that they serve important governmental 
objectives within the power of Congress and are substantially related to 
achievement of those objectives.”  (Emphasis added and footnote omitted.)  Metro 
Broadcasting, 497 U.S. at 564-565, 110 S.Ct. at 3008-3009, 111 L.Ed.2d at 462-
463. 
 
Thus, the court adopted the intermediate level of scrutiny for 
congressionally mandated benign racial classifications.  The court distinguished its 
 
 
77
holding from the decision in Croson (which had imposed the strict scrutiny 
standard for all racial classifications prescribed by state and local governments) by 
noting Congress’s unique powers in the area of equal protection and its 
institutional competence to deal with societywide problems.  Metro Broadcasting 
at 565-566, 110 S.Ct. at 3009, 111 L.Ed.2d at 463-464. 
 
In 1995, however, the court overruled Metro Broadcasting in Adarand, 515 
U.S. 200, 115 S.Ct. 2097, 132 L.Ed.2d 158.  In Adarand, a federal agency awarded 
the prime contract for a federal highway construction project in Colorado to a 
prime contractor, Mountain Gravel & Construction Company, which, in turn, 
solicited bids from subcontractors for the guardrail portion of the contract.  The 
terms of the prime contract provided that Mountain Gravel would receive 
additional compensation if it hired subcontractors certified as small businesses 
controlled by socially and economically disadvantaged individuals.  Federal law 
required subcontracting compensation clauses similar to the one in Mountain 
Gravel’s prime contract to be used in most federal agency contracts, and required 
the contractor to presume that “socially and economically disadvantaged 
individuals” included certain named minorities and any other individuals found to 
be disadvantaged by the Small Business Administration (“SBA”).  Adarand 
Constructors, Inc., a Colorado-based company specializing in guardrail work, 
submitted the low bid for the guardrail portion of the highway construction 
contract.  Gonzales Construction Company also submitted a bid.  Gonzales had 
been certified as a small disadvantaged business enterprise (“DBE”); however, 
Adarand had not.  Thus, solely on the basis of the financial incentive clause, 
Mountain Gravel accepted Gonzales’s bid despite the fact that Adarand was the 
lowest bidder.  Although the record did not reveal precisely how Gonzales had 
obtained its certification as a DBE, Gonzales could have obtained certification 
 
 
78
under either the SBA’s “8(a)” or “8(d)” program, or a program of certification by a 
state agency under relevant United States Department of Transportation 
regulations.  Id. at 209-210, 115 S.Ct. at 2104, 132 L.Ed.2d at 170.  Each of these 
three routes to certification used, to some extent or another, race-based 
presumptions.  Id. at 206-208, 115 S.Ct. at 2102-2103, 132 L.Ed.2d at 168-169. 
 
Adarand filed suit against federal officials in district court after it lost the 
guardrail subcontract to Gonzales, claiming that the race-based presumptions 
involved in the government’s use of subcontracting compensation clauses denied 
Adarand the right to equal protection of the laws.  The district court granted 
summary judgment in favor of the government.  The United States Tenth Circuit 
Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment of the district court.  The court of appeals 
read Fullilove, 448 U.S. 448, 100 S.Ct. 2758, 65 L.Ed.2d 902, as having adopted a 
“lenient standard,” akin to “intermediate scrutiny,” for assessing the 
constitutionality of federal race-based action.  Adarand, 515 U.S. at 210, 115 S.Ct. 
at 2104, 132 L.Ed.2d at 170.  The court of appeals, applying this lenient standard 
as it was further developed in Metro Broadcasting, 497 U.S. 547, 110 S.Ct. 2997, 
111 L.Ed.2d 445, upheld the government’s use of subcontracting compensation 
clauses in federal agency contracts.  Adarand, 515 U.S. at 210, 115 S.Ct. at 2104, 
132 L.Ed.2d at 170. 
 
In Adarand, the United States Supreme Court vacated the judgment of the 
Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals and remanded the cause to the lower federal courts 
for review under strict scrutiny.  Id. at 237-239, 115 S.Ct. at 2118, 132 L.Ed.2d at 
189 (opinion of O’Connor, J., joined by Rehnquist, C.J., Scalia, Kennedy and 
Thomas, JJ.).  Justice O’Connor’s opinion in Adarand spoke for a majority of the 
court, except in one particular section, and except to the extent that the opinion 
“might be inconsistent” with the views expressed by Justice Scalia in his 
 
 
79
concurrence.  Id. at 204, 115 S.Ct. at 2101, 132 L.Ed.2d at 167; see, also, id. at 
239, 115 S.Ct. at 2118-2119, 132 L.Ed.2d at 189-190 (Scalia, J., concurring in part 
and concurring in judgment). 
 
In Adarand, the United States Supreme Court thoroughly reviewed the 
relevant equal protection decisions predating Metro Broadcasting, 497 U.S. 547, 
110 S.Ct. 2997, 111 L.Ed.2d 445, and determined that the decisions through 
Croson had established “three general propositions with respect to governmental 
racial classifications.”  Adarand, 515 U.S. at 223, 115 S.Ct. at 2111, 132 L.Ed.2d 
at 179.  The court identified these general propositions as follows: 
 
“First, skepticism:  ‘ “Any preference based on racial or ethnic criteria must 
necessarily receive a most searching examination,” ‘ Wygant, 476 U.S., at 273 
[106 S.Ct. at 1847, 90 L.Ed.2d at 268] (plurality opinion of Powell, J.); Fullilove, 
448 U.S., at 491 [100 S.Ct. at 2781, 65 L.Ed.2d at 933] (opinion of Burger, C.J.) * 
* *. * * *  Second, consistency:  ‘[T]he standard of review under the Equal 
Protection Clause is not dependent on the race of those burdened or benefited by a 
particular classification,’ Croson, 488 U.S., at 494 [109 S.Ct. at 722, 102 L.Ed.2d 
at 882] (plurality opinion); id., at 520 [109 S.Ct. at 735-736, 102 L.Ed.2d at 899] 
(Scalia, J., concurring in judgment); see also Bakke, 438 U.S., at 289-290 [98 S.Ct. 
at 2747-2748, 57 L.Ed.2d at 770-771] (opinion of Powell, J.), i.e., all racial 
classifications reviewable under the Equal Protection Clause must be strictly 
scrutinized.  And third, congruence:  ‘Equal protection analysis in the Fifth 
Amendment area is the same as that under the Fourteenth Amendment’ * * *.  
Taken together, these three propositions lead to the conclusion that any person, of 
whatever race, has the right to demand that any governmental actor subject to the 
Constitution justify any racial classification subjecting that person to unequal 
 
 
80
treatment under the strictest judicial scrutiny.”  Adarand, 515 U.S. at 223-224, 115 
S.Ct. at 2111, 132 L.Ed.2d at 179-180. 
 
The court in Adarand then took aim at Metro Broadcasting, finding that the 
adoption of intermediate scrutiny in Metro Broadcasting had departed from 
precedent in two important respects.  First, Metro Broadcasting had turned its 
back on the explanation in Croson as to why strict scrutiny of all governmental 
racial classifications is essential, to wit, to determine what classifications are truly 
benign or remedial as opposed to those that are motivated by illegitimate notions 
of racial inferiority or racial politics, to smoke out illegitimate uses of race, and to 
ensure that the means chosen by the governmental actor fit a compelling goal so 
tightly that there is little or no chance that the motive for the classification was 
illegitimate racial prejudice or stereotype.  Adarand at 226, 115 S.Ct. at 2112, 132 
L.Ed.2d at 181; see, also, Croson at 493, 109 S.Ct. at 721, 102 L.Ed.2d at 881-882 
(plurality opinion of O’Connor, J.).  Second, the Adarand majority concluded that 
Metro Broadcasting had “squarely rejected one of the three propositions 
established by the Court’s earlier equal protection cases, namely, congruence 
between the standards applicable to federal and state racial classifications, and in 
so doing also undermined the other two — skepticism of all racial classifications 
and consistency of treatment irrespective of the race of the burdened or benefited 
group.”  Adarand at 226-227, 115 S.Ct. at 2112, 132 L.Ed.2d at 181. 
 
In Adarand, the majority determined that the principles of skepticism, 
consistency, and congruence “all derive from the basic principle that the Fifth and 
Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution protect persons, not groups.”  
(Emphasis sic.)  Id., 515 U.S. at 227, 115 S.Ct. at 2112, 132 L.Ed.2d at 182.  Thus, 
the court concluded, “It follows from that principle that all governmental action 
based on race — a group classification long recognized as ‘in most circumstances 
 
 
81
irrelevant and therefore prohibited,’ * * * — should be subjected to detailed 
judicial inquiry to ensure that the personal right to equal protection of the laws has 
not been infringed.”  (Emphasis sic.)  Id. at 227, 115 S.Ct. at 2112-2113, 132 
L.Ed.2d at 182.  Additionally, the court in Adarand, finding that government 
should be permitted to treat people differently on the basis of race “only for the 
most compelling reasons,” held that “all racial classifications, imposed by 
whatever federal, state, or local governmental actor, must be analyzed by a 
reviewing court under strict scrutiny.  In other words, such classifications are 
constitutional only if they are narrowly tailored measures that further compelling 
governmental interests.”  Id. at 227, 115 S.Ct. at 2113, 132 L.Ed.2d at 182.  
Adarand, therefore, specifically overruled Metro Broadcasting. 
 
In holding that all governmental classifications based on race are subject to 
strict scrutiny, the court in Adarand observed, “Our action today makes explicit 
what Justice Powell thought implicit in the Fullilove lead opinion:  Federal racial 
classifications, like those of a State, must serve a compelling governmental 
interest, and must be narrowly tailored to further that interest.  See Fullilove, 448 
U.S., at 496 [100 S.Ct. at 2783-2784, 65 L.Ed.2d at 935-936] (concurring 
opinion).  (Recall that the lead opinion in Fullilove ‘d[id] not adopt * * * the 
formulas of analysis articulated in such cases as [Bakke].’  Id., at 492 [100 S.Ct. at 
2781, 65 L.Ed.2d at 933] (opinion of Burger, C.J.).”  Adarand, 515 U.S. at 235, 
115 S.Ct. at 2117, 132 L.Ed.2d at 187.  The court went on to say, “Of course, it 
follows that to the extent (if any) that Fullilove held federal racial classifications 
to be subject to a less rigorous standard, it is no longer controlling.  But we need 
not decide today whether the program upheld in Fullilove would survive strict 
scrutiny as our more recent cases have defined it.”  Id. 
 
 
82
 
In Adarand, the court also went out of its way to dispel a commonly held 
notion concerning strict scrutiny, stating, “[W]e wish to dispel the notion that 
strict scrutiny is ‘strict in theory, but fatal in fact.’ * * *  The unhappy persistence 
of both the practice and the lingering effects of racial discrimination against 
minority groups in this country is an unfortunate reality, and government is not 
disqualified from acting in response to it. * * *  When race-based action is 
necessary to further a compelling interest, such action is within constitutional 
constraints if it satisfies the ‘narrow tailoring’ test this Court has set out in 
previous cases.”  Id. at 237, 115 S.Ct. at 2117, 132 L.Ed.2d at 188. 
 
Finally, in Adarand, the court observed that “[b]ecause our decision today 
alters the playing field in some important respects, we think it best to remand the 
case to the lower courts for further consideration in light of the principles we have 
announced.”  Id. at 237, 115 S.Ct. at 2118, 132 L.Ed.2d at 188.  The Adarand 
majority noted, “The Court of Appeals did not decide the question whether the 
interests served by the use of subcontractor compensation clauses are properly 
described as ‘compelling.’  It also did not address the question of narrow tailoring 
in terms of our strict scrutiny cases, by asking, for example, whether there was 
‘any consideration of the use of race-neutral means to increase minority business 
participation’ in government contracting, Croson, supra, at 507 [109 S.Ct. at 729, 
102 L.Ed.2d at 890], or whether the program was appropriately limited such that it 
‘will not last longer than the discriminatory effects it is designed to eliminate,’ 
Fullilove, supra, at 513 [100 S.Ct. at 2792-2793, 65 L.Ed.2d at 947] (Powell, J., 
concurring).”  Adarand at 237-238, 115 S.Ct. at 2118, 132 L.Ed.2d at 189.  
Additionally, the court in Adarand noted that numerous unresolved questions 
remained “concerning the details of the complex regulatory regimes implicated by 
the use of subcontractor compensation clauses.”  Id. at 238, 115 S.Ct. at 2118, 132 
 
 
83
L.Ed.2d at 189.  For example, one of the three routes to DBE certification 
apparently required an individualized inquiry into the disadvantage of each 
participant, another evidently did not, and the third was entirely unclear as 
whether individualized assessment of disadvantage was necessary or instead 
whether the race-based presumptions alone were enough for participation.  Id.  
The court in Adarand concluded, “The question whether any of the ways in which 
the Government uses subcontractor compensation clauses can survive strict 
scrutiny, and any relevance distinctions such as these may have to that question, 
should be addressed in the first instance by the lower courts.”  Id. at 238-239, 115 
S.Ct. at 2118, 132 L.Ed.2d at 189.  Thus, the court in Adarand did not review the 
constitutionality of any particular program but, rather, remanded the matter to the 
lower courts for strict scrutiny. 
 
Justice Scalia concurred in part and concurred in the judgment in Adarand, 
515 U.S. at 239, 115 S.Ct. at 2118-2119, 132 L.Ed.2d at 189-190.  Justice Scalia 
stated that he joined the court’s opinion, except Part III-C and “except insofar as it 
may be inconsistent” with what he thereafter went on to say.  Id., 515 U.S. at 239, 
115 S.Ct. at 2118, 132 L.Ed.2d at 189-190.  Justice Scalia stated that, in his view, 
there could never be a compelling interest “in discriminating on the basis of race 
in order to ‘make up’ for past racial discrimination in the opposite direction.”  Id. 
at 239, 115 S.Ct. at 2118, 132 L.Ed.2d at 190.  He recognized that individuals 
wronged by unlawful discrimination should be made whole, but that there is no 
such thing as “either a creditor or a debtor race.”  Id.  He also indicated that to 
pursue the concept of racial entitlement — no matter how good or benign the 
intention — is constitutionally unacceptable, and that in the eyes of government 
“we are just one race here” — “American.”  Id. at 239, 115 S.Ct. at 2119, 132 
L.Ed.2d at 190.  Finally, Justice Scalia observed that it was unlikely, if not 
 
 
84
impossible, that the challenged program could survive under his view of strict 
scrutiny but that he was nevertheless content to leave that issue to be decided on 
remand. 
 
Justice Thomas also concurred in part and concurred in judgment in 
Adarand.  He agreed with the adoption of strict scrutiny for all racial 
classifications, but wrote separately to address what he perceived to be an 
underlying premise of the dissenting opinions of Justices Stevens and Ginsburg — 
“that there is a racial paternalism exception to the principle of equal protection.”  
Id., 515 U.S. at 240, 115 S.Ct. at 2119, 132 L.Ed.2d at 190.  Justice Thomas 
stated:  “That these programs may have been motivated, in part, by good intentions 
cannot provide refuge from the principle that under our Constitution, the 
government may not make distinctions on the basis of race.  As far as the 
Constitution is concerned, it is irrelevant whether a government’s racial 
classifications are drawn by those who wish to oppress a race or by those who 
have a sincere desire to help those thought to be disadvantaged.”  Id.  He also 
thought that “benign” discrimination fostered illegitimate notions that minorities 
cannot compete without a certain “patronizing indulgence,” and that “benign” 
classifications “engender attitudes of superiority,” and “stamp minorities with a 
badge of inferiority and may cause them to develop dependencies or to adopt an 
attitude [of entitlement].”  Id. at 241, 115 S.Ct. at 2119, 132 L.Ed.2d at 191.  
Justice Thomas concluded, “In my mind, government-sponsored racial 
discrimination based on benign prejudice is just as noxious as discrimination 
inspired by malicious prejudice.  In each instance, it is racial discrimination, plain 
and simple.”  (Footnote omitted.)  Id. 
 
Justice Stevens wrote a dissenting opinion in Adarand, which was joined by 
Justice Ginsburg.  Id., 515 U.S. at 242-264, 115 S.Ct. at 2120-2131, 132 L.Ed.2d 
 
 
85
at 191-205.  In that dissent, Justice Stevens took the majority to task on a number 
of issues.  He rejected the court’s concept of consistency because it made the 
untenable assumption that there is “no significant difference between a decision by 
the majority [race] to impose a special burden on the members of a minority race 
and a decision by the majority to provide a benefit to certain members of that 
minority notwithstanding its incidental burden on some members of the majority.”  
Id., 515 U.S. at 243, 115 S.Ct. at 2120, 132 L.Ed.2d at 192.  Justice Stevens found 
that there was no such “moral or constitutional equivalence between a policy that 
is designed to perpetuate a caste system and one that seeks to eradicate racial 
subordination.”  Id.  He noted that the concept of consistency espoused by the 
Adarand majority would simply “disregard the difference between a ‘No 
Trespassing’ sign and a welcome mat.”  Id. at 245, 115 S.Ct. at 2121, 132 L.Ed.2d 
at 193.  Justice Stevens concluded that a “single standard that purports to equate 
remedial preferences with invidious discrimination cannot be defended in the 
name of ‘equal protection.’ ”  Id. at 246, 115 S.Ct. at 2122, 132 L.Ed.2d at 194. 
 
In his dissent in Adarand, Justice Stevens also found the court’s concept of 
congruence to be seriously misguided, stating that, in his judgment, 
“Congressional deliberations about a matter as important as affirmative action 
should be accorded far greater deference than those of a State or municipality.”  
Id., 515 U.S. at 255, 115 S.Ct. at 2126, 132 L.Ed.2d at 200.  He viewed the court’s 
concept of congruence as a “sudden and enormous departure from the reasoning in 
past cases.”  Id. at 252-253, 115 S.Ct. at 2125, 132 L.Ed.2d at 198.  Moreover, he 
determined, “If the 1977 program of race-based set-asides [upheld in Fullilove, 
448 U.S. 448, 100 S.Ct. 2758, 65 L.Ed.2d 902] satisfied the strict scrutiny dictated 
by Justice Powell’s vision of the Constitution — a vision the Court expressly 
endorses today — it must follow as night follows day that the Court of Appeals’ 
 
 
86
judgment upholding this more carefully crafted program should be affirmed.”  
Adarand at 264, 115 S.Ct. at 2130, 132 L.Ed.2d at 205. 
 
Additionally, two other dissenting opinions were filed in Adarand.  One was 
authored by Justice Souter and was joined by Justices Ginsburg and Breyer.  Id. at 
264-271, 115 S.Ct. at 2131-2134, 132 L.Ed.2d at 205-210.  The other dissent was 
authored by Justice Ginsburg and was joined by Justice Breyer.  Id. at 271-276, 
115 S.Ct. at 2134-2136, 132 L.Ed.2d at 210-213. 
III 
 
In light of the foregoing authorities, the strict scrutiny standard clearly 
applies to our review of Ohio’s MBE set-aside program, and, specifically, R.C. 
122.71(E), which defines “minority business enterprise” with explicit reference to 
race, and the relevant provisions of R.C. 125.081 and 123.151, requiring that 
approximate percentages of the state’s contracts must be set aside for competitive 
bidding by MBEs only.  To survive strict scrutiny, the state’s race-based program 
must be justified by a compelling governmental interest, and the means chosen by 
the state to effectuate its purposes must be sufficiently narrowly tailored.  With the 
foregoing cases to guide us, however, the question we must decide, i.e., whether 
the program at issue meets strict scrutiny, is far easier asked than answered. 
 
There is no question that a state has a compelling interest in remedying the 
past and present effects of identified racial discrimination within its jurisdiction 
where the state itself was involved in the discriminatory practices.  See, generally, 
Wygant, 476 U.S. at 277-278, 106 S.Ct. at 1848-1849, 90 L.Ed.2d at 270-271 
(plurality opinion); id. at 286, 106 S.Ct. at 1853, 90 L.Ed.2d at 276 (O’Connor, J., 
concurring in part and concurring in judgment) (“The Court is in agreement that * 
* * remedying past or present racial discrimination by a state actor is a sufficiently 
weighty state interest to warrant the remedial use of a carefully constructed 
 
 
87
affirmative action program”); and United States v. Paradise (1987), 480 U.S. 149, 
167, 107 S.Ct. 1053, 1064, 94 L.Ed.2d 203, 220 (“The Government 
unquestionably has a compelling interest in remedying past and present 
discrimination by a state actor”).  See, also, Croson, 488 U.S. at 490-493, 109 
S.Ct. at 720-721, 102 L.Ed.2d at 880-881 (discussing the limitations on the use of 
race-based affirmative-action measures by state or local governments).  A state 
also has a compelling interest in redressing discrimination by private parties 
within its jurisdiction where the state was a participant in a system of 
discriminatory exclusion.  See, generally, id. at 492, 109 S.Ct. at 721, 102 L.Ed.2d 
at 881 (recognizing that “[i]f the city could show that it had essentially become a 
‘passive participant’ in a system of racial exclusion practiced by elements of the 
local construction industry, we think it clear that the city could take affirmative 
steps to dismantle such a system”).  Moreover, “[i]t is beyond dispute that any 
public entity, state or federal, has a compelling interest in assuring that public 
dollars, drawn from the tax contributions of all citizens, do not serve to finance the 
evil of private prejudice.”  Id. at 492, 109 S.Ct. at 721, 102 L.Ed.2d at 881.  In 
addition to the foregoing legal authorities, it is also, from our perspective, the truly 
right thing to do. 
 
To determine whether a state can establish a compelling interest in set-aside 
programs like the one at issue here, it is necessary to consider the factual predicate 
offered in support of the program.  See id., 488 U.S. at 498-500, 109 S.Ct. at 724-
725, 102 L.Ed.2d at 884-886.  Evidence demonstrating a systematic pattern of 
exclusion of minorities from public contracting opportunities can, in certain 
circumstances, provide a competent legislative body with the authority to adopt a 
narrowly tailored racial preference to break down patterns of discriminatory 
exclusion.  Id. at 509, 109 S.Ct. at 730, 102 L.Ed.2d at 892.  The factual predicate 
 
 
88
supporting the adoption of a race-preference program must have provided the 
legislative body with a “ ‘strong basis in evidence for its conclusion that remedial 
action was necessary.’ ”  Id. at 500, 109 S.Ct. at 725, 102 L.Ed.2d at 886, quoting 
Wygant, 476 U.S. at 277, 106 S.Ct. at 1849, 90 L.Ed.2d at 271. 
 
In the case at bar, the state of Ohio, through ODAS, seeks to establish its 
compelling interest in the MBE program.  ODAS contends that the state of Ohio 
enacted the MBE program for the purpose of redressing the past and lingering 
effects of identified racial discrimination in the area of state construction and 
procurement contracting.  ODAS asserts that the state’s interest was compelling in 
that the state was a participant in the discrimination and the General Assembly had 
a “ ‘strong basis in evidence’ to support its conclusion that remedial action was 
necessary.”  The trial court and the court of appeals did not consider this issue in 
any detail but, rather, concluded that although the state’s interest in adopting the 
MBE program may have been compelling, the MBE program was not narrowly 
tailored.  However, we believe that it is simply impossible to reach such a 
conclusion without a detailed consideration of the nature and extent of the state’s 
interest in having adopted the MBE set-aside program.  Indeed, upon a careful 
review of the state’s arguments in this case, it clear to us that the General 
Assembly had a “strong basis” in evidence to support its conclusion that Ohio’s 
program was necessary to redress a pattern of discriminatory exclusion of 
minorities from state contracting opportunities and, thus, had a compelling 
governmental interest for adopting the MBE program. 
IV 
 
R.C. 122.71(E)(1), 123.151, and 125.081 were originally enacted in 1980 as 
part of Am.Sub.H.B. No. 584, 138 Ohio Laws, Part II, 3062, 3065, 3081-3085, 
3088-3090 (the “1980 MBE Act”), a comprehensive legislative scheme that 
 
 
89
established, among other things, minority business loan and bonding programs and 
requirements for the setting aside of approximate percentages of the state’s 
construction and procurement contracts for MBEs.  The 1980 MBE Act was 
passed by the General Assembly several months after the United States Supreme 
Court’s decision in Fullilove, 448 U.S. 448, 100 S.Ct. 2758, 65 L.Ed.2d 902, and, 
in a number of respects, Ohio’s program was substantially similar to the type of 
program upheld in Fullilove. 
 
In the early 1980s, the constitutionality of certain portions of the 1980 MBE 
Act, as amended, and, specifically, the provisions requiring set-asides for minority 
businesses enterprises (i.e., R.C. 122.71, 123.151, and 125.081), were challenged 
in federal district court in Ohio Contractors Assn. v. Keip (Dec. 15, 1982), 
S.D.Ohio No. C-2-82-446, unreported, reversed (C.A.6, 1983), 713 F.2d 167.  The 
district court struck down the challenged statutes under the Equal Protection 
Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.  However, on appeal, the United States 
Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the judgment of the district court and 
upheld the challenged provisions.  The Sixth Circuit’s decision in Keip was based 
on the available precedents at that time, namely, the several opinions in Bakke, 
438 U.S. 265, 98 S.Ct. 2733, 57 L.Ed.2d 750, and in Fullilove.  Thus, it was 
decided without the benefit of the United States Supreme Court’s decisions since 
Fullilove.  See Michigan R. Builders Assn., Inc. v. Milliken (C.A.6, 1987), 834 
F.2d 583, 589, affirmed 489 U.S. 1061, 109 S.Ct. 1333, 103 L.Ed.2d 601.  
However, both the district court and circuit court decisions in Keip are nonetheless 
relevant here because, among other things, they detail some of the information the 
General Assembly considered in enacting the 1980 MBE Act and, thus, help to 
develop the historical background and the pertinent factual predicate upon which 
 
 
90
the General Assembly relied when it passed the legislation requiring set-asides of 
approximate percentages of the state’s contracts for bidding by MBEs only. 
 
Ohio’s participation in a pattern of discriminatory practices against 
minorities in the area of state contracting was documented and established by 
judicial decision as early as 1967.  In Ethridge v. Rhodes (S.D.Ohio 1967), 268 
F.Supp. 83, 14 Ohio Misc. 43, 41 O.O.2d 396, the United States District Court for 
the Southern District of Ohio found that the state had become a joint participant 
with private industry and certain craft unions in a continual pattern of racially 
discriminatory conduct that excluded qualified black laborers from access to job 
opportunities on public construction projects.  Id. at 87-88, 14 Ohio Misc. at 49-
50, 41 O.O.2d at 399-400.  The court in Ethridge condemned state officials for 
their “shocking lack of concern” for the “inevitable discrimination” that would 
result from entering into and performing under proposed contracts with 
contractors who had regularly denied equal employment opportunity on the basis 
of race.  Id. at 88, 14 Ohio Misc. at 50, 41 O.O.2d at 400.  The court determined 
that the state’s use of nondiscrimination clauses in state construction contracts was 
totally inadequate to eliminate the pattern of racially discriminatory practices that 
the state had allowed to exist.  Id.  Testimony in Ethridge established that the Ohio 
Civil Rights Commission had been totally ineffectual in redressing the persistent 
pattern of racial discrimination.  Id. at 89, 14 Ohio Misc. at 52, 41 O.O.2d at 401.  
Finding that the state’s participation and acquiescence in the discriminatory 
practices of contractors and craft unions had violated the Equal Protection Clause, 
the court in Ethridge enjoined the state from entering into the proposed contracts 
with the proposed contractors without first obtaining reasonable assurances that 
equal employment opportunities were to be made available.  Id. at 89-90, 14 Ohio 
Misc. at 52-53, 41 O.O.2d at 401-402.  Significantly, the General Assembly was 
 
 
91
well aware of the Ethridge decision at the time Am.Sub.H.B. No. 584, 138 Ohio 
Laws, Part II, 3062 et seq. (the 1980 MBE Act) was under consideration.  See, 
generally, Keip, 713 F.2d at 170-171.  See, also, Keip, S.D.Ohio No. C-2-82-446, 
unreported, at 9-10. 
 
During the early 1970s, Ohio Governor John J. Gilligan cited Ethridge in an 
executive order.  Specifically, the Governor issued an order dated January 27, 
1972, directing all state agencies to eliminate discriminatory barriers to 
employment, including “efforts required to remedy all effects of present and past 
discriminatory patterns and practices and those actions necessary to guarantee 
equal employment opportunity for all people.”  (Emphasis added.)  The purpose of 
this order was, among other things, to increase minority participation in state 
contracting opportunities.  The Governor’s 1972 order was part of the evidentiary 
mosaic considered by members of the Ohio General Assembly at the time the 1980 
MBE Act was under consideration.  Keip, 713 F.2d at 171 (“A series of executive 
orders issued by the Governor of Ohio subsequent to 1967 was designed to 
increase participation by members of minority groups in state contracts.  These 
orders were circulated to members of the legislature while the MBE act was under 
consideration”).  In Keip, Governor Gilligan testified that, during his 
administration, he was aware of the difficulties experienced by minority 
businesses and small businesses in obtaining state contracts.  S.D.Ohio No. C-2-
82-446, unreported, at 10.  He testified that the cause of the difficulty was the 
existence of “ ‘an old boys’ club sort of relationship’ ” between state officials and 
a number of established and reputable firms with a great deal of experience that “ 
‘tended to get the lion’s share of the business.’ ”  Id.  He had also informally urged 
cabinet members and department heads to seek out qualified minorities and small 
 
 
92
businesses for public projects, but the results of that informal affirmative-action 
initiative were apparently unknown.  Id. 
 
In 1977, the General Assembly created a form of affirmative action for 
minority contractors as part of Am.Sub.H.B. No. 618, 137 Ohio Laws, Part II, 
3100, a biennial capital-improvement appropriations Act.  Am.Sub.H.B. No. 618 
approved funding for, among other things, capital-improvement projects 
throughout the state.  Section 13 of the bill provided:  “No funds shall be 
appropriated as utilized for any purpose pursuant to this Act unless the project for 
which such funds are appropriated or utilized provides for an affirmative action 
program for the employment and effective utilization of disadvantaged persons 
whose disadvantage may arise from cultural, racial or ethnic background, or other 
similar cause including, without limitation, race, religion, sex, national origin, or 
ancestry.”  137 Ohio Laws, Part II, 3129.  Additionally, Section 13 provided, “The 
Ohio Board of Regents for all higher education projects, and the Department of 
Administrative Services for all other capital projects, shall identify and designate 
specific capital improvements projects, or specific contracts or sub-contracts to be 
awarded as part of such projects, for which minority business enterprises or small 
businesses, after certification of eligibility [by the Regents or by ODAS], shall be 
invited to participate in the competitive bidding procedures for such projects, 
contracts, or sub-contracts as set forth in Chapters 127. and 153. of the Revised 
Code.”  137 Ohio Laws, Part II, 3130-3131.  Section 13 defined “minority 
business enterprise” as a business “at least fifty-one percent of which is owned by 
United States citizens who are black, Hispanic, Orientals, women, or American 
Indians, or a business in which at least fifty-one per cent [of the stock is owned by 
such persons].”  (Emphasis added.)  137 Ohio Laws, Part II, 3129. 
 
 
93
 
Following passage of the 1977 Act, Section 13 was apparently interpreted 
by certain state agencies or actors to restrict bidding on a portion of the capital 
improvement contracts to minority businesses only.  Thus, certain parties sued in 
the Court of Common Pleas of Franklin County, seeking to enjoin such restrictions 
and challenging the constitutionality of Section 13.  See Ohio Bldg. Chapter, AGC 
v. Jackson (Sept. 28, 1979), Franklin C.P. Nos. 78CV-05-2343 and 79CV-01-247, 
unreported.  Judge George E. Tyack of the common pleas court, on the eve of the 
expiration of the two-year operation of the appropriations measure, issued a 
decision upholding the constitutionality of Section 13, id. at 5, stating:  “From the 
evidence submitted in the instant case, the Court fully realizes there are many 
factors that affect the ability of the minority groups outlined in Section 13 of 
[Am.Sub.H.B. No. 618].  These include problems of financing, ability to obtain 
performance bonds, the variable costs of performance bonds, labor problems and, 
probably, experience in the contracting field.  These factors may well have been a 
cause, if not the cause, of the provisions of [Am.Sub.H.B. No. 618].”  Id. at 4.  
However, he went on to conclude:  “This Court finds from the evidence submitted 
that there exists in the awarding of state contracts a discrimination against the 
minority groups specified in [Section 13, Am.Sub.H.B. No. 618].  The Court finds 
that there is a compelling need to correct this discrimination.”  (Emphasis added.)  
Id. at 5.6 
 
Members of the General Assembly were aware of this decision at the time 
the 1980 MBE Act was pending for consideration.  Indeed, it appears that Senator 
Bowen, the chief sponsor of the set-aside provisions of Am.Sub.H.B. No. 584 (and 
the chairman of the committee that reported it to the Ohio Senate), circulated 
copies of that decision to the members of both houses of the General Assembly 
 
 
94
while the bill was pending.  See Keip, S.D.Ohio No. C-2-82-446, unreported, at 
13.  See, also, Keip, 713 F.2d at 171. 
 
In connection with the litigation in Ohio Bldg. Chapter, AGC, Franklin C.P. 
Nos. 78CV-05-2343 and 79CV-01-247, unreported, ODAS had gathered statistical 
data from records of past capital-improvement contracts awarded by the state 
between 1957 and 1979.  The statistical data revealed that “identifiable minority 
businesses obtained a very small portion of the prime capital improvement 
projects” awarded by the state.  Keip, S.D.Ohio No. C-2-82-446, unreported, at 15.  
“The actual amount in terms of dollar value * * * was $4,265,797.44 out of a total 
of $2,004,301,803.33, or roughly 0.21 percent.”  Id. at 15-16.  See, also, Keip, 713 
F.2d at 171 (finding that a study performed by ODAS “showed that in the period 
from 1959 to 1975 the state paid out $1.14 billion in general construction 
contracts,” and that “[o]nly 0.24% of these payments went to minority 
businesses”).  Additionally, in 1977, the Ohio Legislative Budget Office (“LBO”) 
obtained minority participation figures for fiscal years 1975, 1976, and 1977 
pertaining to the Ohio Department of Transportation’s construction contracts.  “In 
terms of dollar value, these figures showed minority participation to be 0.13 
percent, 0.3 percent, and 0.18 percent for the three years respectively.”  Id. at 16.  
All this information was before the General Assembly at the time the 1980 MBE 
Act was pending, as were statistics indicating that minority businesses represented 
approximately 6.7 percent of the total number of Ohio businesses.  Id. at 15-16. 
 
Further, in 1978, Ohio Attorney General William J. Brown established a 
Task Force on Minorities in Business to examine the relationship between state 
government and minority business, and to develop ways to make that relationship 
more effective, efficient, and equitable.  The task force was directed to review 
state laws, practices, and services relating to minority-owned businesses and to 
 
 
95
recommend legislative, administrative, and fiscal measures to enhance assistance 
to small businesses in general and to minority-owned businesses in particular.  
During 1978, the task force convened regional public hearings to gather 
information from practitioners, experts, and interested citizens.  The task force 
also conducted several working sessions over a period of nine months to discuss 
and to analyze information gathered from the hearings and from the task force’s 
independent research.  In October 1978, the task force issued a final report 
documenting the results of its ten months of study and deliberation. 
 
The task force found a grave numerical imbalance in the number of public 
contracts awarded to minority-owned businesses in Ohio.  Statistics revealed that 
from 1975 to 1977, minority-owned businesses accounted for approximately seven 
percent of all Ohio businesses, but had received less than one-half of one percent 
of all state purchase contracts.  The task force concluded that minority businesses 
were receiving less than one-fourteenth of their proportionate share of state 
contracts.  In its report, the task force noted that certain state officials and state 
agencies had undertaken efforts to increase minority participation in state 
contracting opportunities, but that those efforts had been largely ineffectual.  The 
task force identified certain needs of minority business enterprises, including the 
need for a better method of receiving information on impending public contracts, 
the need to overcome bonding barriers, and the need for the state to correct delays 
in paying for completed work.  The report also discussed the option of a 
mandatory set-aside program and noted that witnesses at the public hearings had 
agreed that set-asides were necessary to increase minority business participation in 
state contracts.  In addition to the need for set-asides, the report noted that several 
witnesses had also suggested that the state needed to more aggressively encourage 
joint business arrangements between minority firms and nonminority firms. 
 
 
96
 
The task force made several recommendations for legislative and 
administrative assistance to minority business enterprises, and specifically 
recommended, among other things, the adoption of a ten-percent affirmative-
action goal for state purchase contracts for goods, services, and construction.  The 
1978 task force report was widely circulated and distributed to members of the 
General Assembly while the 1980 MBE Act was pending for consideration.  See 
Keip, S.D.Ohio No. C-2-82-446, unreported, at 15.  See, also, Keip, 713 F.2d at 
171. 
 
The progress of the 1980 MBE Act through the General Assembly was 
unremarkable by legislative standards.  In March 1980, the Ohio House of 
Representatives passed a version of Am.Sub.H.B. No. 584 by a vote of eighty-five 
to six and sent the bill to the Ohio Senate for its consideration and concurrence.  
138 Ohio House Journal, Part II, 2136; 138 Ohio Senate Journal 1665.  However, 
the version of the bill passed by the House did not contain the set-aside provisions, 
which were later incorporated into the bill and then codified in former R.C. 
123.151 and 125.081.  Upon receipt of the bill from the House of Representatives, 
the Senate referred it to the Senate Committee on Commerce and Labor.  138 Ohio 
Senate Journal 1724.  That committee considered the bill, incorporated the 
minority set-aside requirements for state contracts (i.e., the predecessor versions of 
R.C. 123.151 and 125.081), conducted public hearings, considered statistical data 
concerning the level of minority participation in state contracts, and approved the 
adoption of the set-aside provisions.  Keip, S.D.Ohio No. C-2-82-446, unreported, 
at 7.  On September 11, 1980, the committee reported a substitute bill back to the 
full Senate and recommended its passage.  138 Ohio Senate Journal 2125.  On 
November 24, 1980, the Senate passed Am.Sub.H.B. No. 584, by a vote of twenty-
five to seven, after making amendments.  138 Ohio Senate Journal 2339-2343.  
 
 
97
During debates on the floor of the Senate, Senator Bowen explained how the set-
aside provisions would operate and indicated that there was no need for him to 
elaborate on the merits of the bill, since the component parts of the legislation 
were understood.  Keip, S.D.Ohio No. C-2-82-446, unreported, at 8, citing 
Transcript of Proceedings before the Ohio Senate.  Several other senators spoke in 
favor of the bill.  Id.  One senator expressed his belief that the bill would provide 
equal opportunity and his hope that someday set-asides would not be necessary.  
Id.  Another senator stated that the bill would go a long way in helping minorities 
develop their companies.  Id.  On November 25, 1980, the day after the Senate 
passed the bill, the House of Representatives, by a vote of sixty-four to twenty-
four, concurred in the Senate amendments without floor debate.  138 Ohio House 
Journal, Part II, 2950. 
 
The purpose of the 1980 MBE Act, as stated in its title, was to amend 
certain sections of the Revised Code and “to enact sections 122.71 to 122.85, 
122.87 to 122.89, 122.92 to 122.94, 123.151, 125.081, 125.111, and 4115.032 of 
the Revised Code to establish a minority business development loan program, to 
provide construction contract bonds for minority businesses unable to obtain them 
from private sources, to set aside 5% of state construction contracts and 15% of 
procurement contracts for minority businesses, to require a portion of every state 
construction contract to be reserved for minority subcontractors and materialmen, 
to require all state and local procurement contracts to contain anti-discrimination 
clauses, and to make an appropriation.”  138 Ohio Laws, Part II, 3062.  The bill 
contained no explicit findings of discrimination, and there was no express 
statement in the bill indicating that its purpose was to correct past discriminatory 
practices against minority businesses in which the state was involved.  However, it 
is evident from the text of the Act and the facts and circumstances surrounding its 
 
 
98
enactment that the purpose of the legislation and, particularly, the MBE set-aside 
provisions was to halt and to redress past practices in which the state was involved 
in discrimination against minority contractors. 
 
In Keip, 713 F.2d 167, the United States Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, in 
reviewing the legislative history of the Act, reached this same conclusion, stating, 
“While the act did not contain a preamble which stated in so many words that its 
purpose was to correct past practices by which the state was involved in 
discrimination against minority contractors its purpose and objective were 
absolutely clear from the text and the hearings and floor debate which preceded 
final enactment.  In addition, this legislation was considered and adopted against a 
‘backdrop’ which must have made the members aware of the problem and the 
necessity for action.”  Id. at 170.  Additionally, the court in Keip went on to state, 
“When viewed against this ‘backdrop’ there can be no doubt that the members of 
the Ohio legislature understood the situation which produced the MBE act and the 
purposes for which it was offered. * * *  [I]t is clear from the overwhelming 
approval of the MBE act that the members [of the General Assembly] accepted the 
findings of Ohio courts, executive department investigations and earlier studies by 
committees of the legislature itself.”  Id. at 171.  Furthermore, our research 
indicates that an early version of the bill contained specific language explaining 
that the legislation was to remedy the past discrimination minority businesses had 
experienced in state contracting opportunities.  However, that language was 
deleted at some point during the legislative process, presumably because the 
remedial objectives of the legislation, as finally enacted, were obvious to 
everyone. 
 
Given the evidence that was before the General Assembly when it 
considered and passed the 1980 MBE Act, we think it clear that the General 
 
 
99
Assembly had a “strong basis in evidence” for finding that remedial action was 
necessary to ameliorate the effects of identified racial discrimination in which the 
state itself had either actively or passively participated.  Prior to the enactment of 
the legislation, the General Assembly and other state governmental entities and 
officials had examined and had attempted to redress the nearly nonexistent 
minority participation in public contracting opportunities.  The General Assembly 
knew that these prior efforts had not been sufficient to remedy the problem.  The 
General Assembly was aware of judicial and executive findings of discrimination 
in state contracting, the state’s involvement and acquiescence in a pattern of 
discriminatory practices, and the debilitating effects that such discriminatory 
practices had on the ability of MBEs to compete in the state contracting system.  
The General Assembly considered the task force report and a vast array of 
statistical evidence showing a severe numerical imbalance in the amount of 
business engaged in between the state and minority contractors.  The evidence 
before the General Assembly showing the gross statistical imbalance is precisely 
the type of evidence that may give rise to an inference of discriminatory exclusion 
and that may justify a finding that remedial action was necessary.  Obviously, the 
General Assembly’s factfinding process is entitled to a presumption of regularity 
and deferential review by this court, not blind judicial deference, but deference 
nonetheless. 
 
In Croson, the United States Supreme Court found that the factual predicate 
relied on by the city of Richmond in adopting an MBE set-aside program did not 
amount to a strong basis in evidence to support the city’s conclusion that remedial 
action was necessary.  Id., 488 U.S. at 498-506, 109 S.Ct. at 724-728, 102 L.Ed.2d 
at 884-890.  The court found that the city’s recitation of a remedial purpose for the 
program was entitled to little or no weight.  Id. at 500, 109 S.Ct. at 725, 102 
 
 
100
L.Ed.2d at 886.  The court found that the city’s reliance on certain statements that 
discrimination existed around the Richmond area and elsewhere in the country 
were of little probative value in establishing identified discrimination in the 
Richmond construction industry.  Id.  The court also found that the city’s reliance 
on the statistical disparity between the number of prime contracts awarded to 
minority-owned businesses and the percentage of minorities in the city of 
Richmond was misplaced.  Id. at 501-503, 109 S.Ct. at 725-726, 102 L.Ed.2d at 
886-888.  Additionally, the court determined that the city’s reliance on evidence 
that there was a low percentage of MBE membership in local constructors’ 
associations was also misplaced because, among other things, the city had no 
evidence upon which to make any probative statistical comparisons.  Id. at 503, 
109 S.Ct. at 726-727, 102 L.Ed.2d at 888.  Further, the court determined that the 
city’s reliance on congressional findings of nationwide discrimination in the 
construction industry were of extremely limited value in demonstrating the 
existence of discrimination in Richmond, and the court also noted the necessity for 
state or local governments to base determinations of discrimination on their own 
factfinding processes.  Id. at 504, 109 S.Ct. at 727, 102 L.Ed.2d at 888-889.  The 
court concluded that because none of the evidence presented by the city had 
pointed to any identifiable discrimination in the Richmond construction industry, 
the city had failed to demonstrate a compelling interest in apportioning contracting 
opportunities on the basis of race.  Id. at 505, 109 S.Ct. at 728, 102 L.Ed.2d at 
889. 
 
The case at bar is distinguishable from the Richmond experience for a 
number of reasons.  When Ohio’s General Assembly enacted the 1980 MBE 
program, the General Assembly had a wealth of evidence before it.  The evidence 
considered by the General Assembly included past judicial decisions confirming 
 
 
101
the existence of discrimination in state contracting and establishing the state’s 
acquiescence 
in 
such 
discriminatory 
practices, 
executive 
findings 
of 
discrimination in state contracting opportunities, administrative findings of the 
need for affirmative action, testimony of opponents and proponents of minority 
set-asides, and a host of relevant statistical evidence showing the severe numerical 
imbalance in the amount of business the state did with minority-owned enterprises.  
The evidence that was before the General Assembly showed, inter alia, a gross 
statistical disparity between the number of qualified MBEs in Ohio and the number 
of contracts awarded to Ohio’s minority businesses.  The 1978 task force report 
indicated, among other things, that minority businesses constituted approximately 
seven percent of all Ohio businesses, but that minority businesses were receiving 
less than one-half of one percent of state purchasing contracts.  A study by ODAS 
also indicated a disparity in the general construction contracts awarded to minority 
businesses, as did a report issued by Legislative Budget Office.  In our judgment, 
this type of relevant statistical data, coupled with all other pieces of the 
evidentiary mosaic considered by the General Assembly, is precisely the type of 
probative evidence of identified racial discrimination found lacking in Croson. 
 
Croson itself in this regard buttresses our conclusion.  Specifically, we note 
that in Keip, 713 F.2d 167, the United States Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, in 
upholding Ohio’s set-aside program, relied on the 1967 decision in Ethridge, 14 
Ohio Misc. 43, 41 O.O.2d 396, 268 F.Supp. 83 (establishing the state’s joint 
participation in a pattern of racially discriminatory conduct), the data revealing a 
severe numerical imbalance between the percentage of minority businesses in 
Ohio, and the percentage of state purchasing contracts awarded to minority 
businesses.  Keip at 171.  In Croson, the United States Supreme Court cited Keip 
twice, apparently to provide an example in which consideration of relevant 
 
 
102
statistical data and other predicate facts could give rise to an inference of a pattern 
of discriminatory conduct supporting an MBE set-aside program.  Croson, 488 
U.S. at 502-503, 109 S.Ct. at 726-727, 102 L.Ed.2d at 887-888. 
 
Moreover, Ohio’s MBE program was clearly not enacted to redress “ 
‘societal discrimination,’ an amorphous concept of injury that may be ageless in its 
reach into the past,” Bakke, 438 U.S. at 307, 98 S.Ct. at 2757, 57 L.Ed.2d at 782.  
Nor was it aimed at merely “[s]ocietal discrimination, without more.”  Wygant, 
476 U.S. at 276, 106 S.Ct. at 1848, 90 L.Ed.2d at 270.  The program was not based 
on “a generalized assertion that there has been past discrimination in an entire 
industry [which] provides no guidance to a legislative body to determine the 
precise scope of the injury it seeks to remedy,” “the sorry history of both public 
and private discrimination in this country * * * standing alone,” or “an amorphous 
claim that there has been past discrimination in a particular industry.”  Croson at 
498-499, 109 S.Ct. at 724, 102 L.Ed.2d at 885.  Rather, we find that the 
information that was before the General Assembly provided it with a firm basis in 
evidence for believing that remedial action was necessary, and, thus, the General 
Assembly had a compelling interest to adopt the legislation apportioning public 
contracting opportunities on the basis of race.  Therefore, since the compelling 
nature of the state’s interests in redressing racial discrimination in which the state 
itself had participated is clear, we turn now to the question whether the means 
chosen by the state to effectuate its interests are sufficiently narrowly tailored. 
V 
 
The trial court and the court of appeals found that Ohio’s MBE program, as 
administratively applied to deny appellee’s application for MBE recertification on 
the basis of race per se, violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth 
Amendment.  The trial court and the court of appeals acknowledged that the MBE 
 
 
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program was designed to redress past racial discrimination, and recognized that 
the state’s interest in remedying past discrimination is or may be compelling.  
Nevertheless, the trial court and the court of appeals concluded that equal 
protection required participation by every disadvantaged business enterprise in the 
state regardless of the business owner’s race.  In so holding, the courts below 
essentially ignored the state’s compelling interest in having adopted the MBE 
program in the first instance, i.e., to redress the lingering effects of past, 
documented racial discrimination against the particular minority groups listed in 
R.C. 122.71(E)(1). 
 
The court of appeals’ analysis in this case was similar to the analysis of the 
trial court in holding that Ohio’s MBE program and, specifically, the definition of 
“minority business enterprise” in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) were not narrowly tailored to 
effectuate a compelling governmental interest.  The court of appeals’ majority 
acknowledged that the MBE program “is designed to remedy past discrimination,” 
and that remedying past discrimination “may be” a compelling governmental 
interest.  However, the court of appeals’ majority concluded: 
 
“While remedying past discrimination may be a compelling interest, we find 
it hard to envision a situation in which a race-based classification is narrowly 
tailored.  The MBE program, as defined in R.C. 122.71(E)(1), is not narrowly 
tailored.  The MBE program’s racial classification appears to be based on the 
presumption that caucasians and other minority groups are not disadvantaged, 
socially or economically, but that all members of the listed minority groups are 
socially and economically disadvantaged.  The statute is both under-inclusive and 
over-inclusive.  There may be socially and economically disadvantaged business 
owners who are excluded from the program simply because of their race, and at 
the same time, there may be business owners who are not socially and 
 
 
104
economically disadvantaged yet eligible to participate in the program simply 
because they are among the four enumerated minority groups.” 
 
The court of appeals majority construed Adarand, 515 U.S. 200, 115 S.Ct. 
2097, 132 L.Ed.2d 158, to mean that “race may, in some circumstances, create a 
presumption of disadvantage, but that other races cannot be excluded based solely 
on statutory presumptions such as the one in R.C. 122.71(E)(1).”  (Emphasis 
added.)  The court of appeals’ majority stated, “The goal of the MBE program 
ideally should be maximizing the opportunity for all Ohio citizens who are 
economically or socially disadvantaged.”  Accordingly, the court of appeals held 
that “the state’s MBE program is a race per se classification which, as applied to 
the facts of this case, was unconstitutionally applied to deny appellee MBE 
certification.”  Therefore, the court of appeals affirmed the judgment of the trial 
court remanding the matter to ODAS for consideration of appellee’s application 
for MBE recertification without regard to race. 
 
The fundamental flaw in the court of appeals’ analysis is that it completely 
disregards the state’s compelling interest in apportioning approximate percentages 
of public contracting opportunities for the benefit of the specific minority groups 
listed in R.C. 122.71(E)(1).  The court of appeals majority thought that the goal of 
Ohio’s program should “ideally” be to maximize public contracting opportunities 
for all economically or socially disadvantaged Ohio citizens.  However, that is not 
what Ohio’s MBE program was designed to do.  The purpose of the MBE program 
was not to aid every disadvantaged business enterprise in the state — it was 
designed and continues to exist to redress past, documented racial discrimination 
against the particular minority groups listed in R.C. 122.71(E)(1).  To hold that 
members of all races must be allowed to participate in a program that was 
explicitly designed to redress documented racial discrimination against certain 
 
 
105
discrete minorities is a non sequitur.  As the amici in this case point out:  
“Permitting all races to participate in a program explicitly designed to remedy 
discrimination against certain discrete minorities abandons the State’s original 
compelling interest — erasing the lingering effects of race discrimination.” 
 
In our judgment, Ohio’s MBE program is not defective under the narrow-
tailoring prong of strict scrutiny simply because the program does not apply to 
everyone.  If the program were to fail for that reason alone, it is difficult to 
imagine how any program expressly designed to ameliorate documented racial 
discrimination against certain identifiable minority groups could ever survive 
strict scrutiny.  Moreover, the court of appeals’ majority, in finding it “hard to 
envision” a situation in which a racial classification could ever be narrowly 
tailored, apparently subscribed to the very notion that Adarand clearly rejected, 
i.e., the notion that strict scrutiny is strict in theory, but fatal in fact.  In Adarand, 
the United States Supreme Court stated: 
 
“Finally, we wish to dispel the notion that strict scrutiny is ‘strict in theory, 
but fatal in fact.’ * * *  The unhappy persistence of both the practice and the 
lingering effects of racial discrimination against minority groups in this country is 
an unfortunate reality, and government is not disqualified from acting in response 
to it.  As recently as 1987, for example, every Justice of this Court agreed that the 
Alabama Department of Public Safety’s ‘pervasive, systematic, and obstinate 
discriminatory conduct’ justified a narrowly tailored race-based remedy.  See 
United States v. Paradise, 480 U.S., at 167 [107 S.Ct. at 1064, 94 L.Ed.2d at 221] 
(plurality opinion of Brennan, J.); id., at 190 [107 S.Ct. at 1076, 94 L.Ed.2d at 
235] (Stevens, J., concurring in judgment); id., at 196 [107 S.Ct. at 1079-1080, 94 
L.Ed.2d at 239] (O’Connor, J., dissenting).  When race-based action is necessary 
to further a compelling interest, such action is within constitutional constraints if 
 
 
106
it satisfies the ‘narrow tailoring’ test this Court has set out in previous cases.”  
(Emphasis added.)  Adarand, 515 U.S. at 237, 115 S.Ct. at 2117, 132 L.Ed.2d at 
188. 
 
We find that Ohio’s MBE program, which defines minority business 
enterprise with specific reference to race, is neither impermissibly underinclusive 
nor impermissibly overinclusive in its application to the facts of this particular 
case, or, for that matter, in its application in general.  Thus, we reject the 
conclusion of the court of appeals to the contrary. 
 
As to the question of underinclusiveness, the fact that the MBE program 
does not apply to all races comports with the compelling state interest that gave 
rise to the program’s adoption and implementation.  R.C. 122.71(E)(1) defines 
“minority business enterprise” as business enterprises that are “owned and 
controlled by United States citizens, residents of Ohio, who are members of one of 
the following economically disadvantaged groups:  Blacks, American Indians, 
Hispanics, and Orientals.”  The information that was considered by the General 
Assembly at the time Ohio’s MBE program was first adopted in 1980 included 
information concerning the four specific minority groups specified in the 
definition quoted immediately above.  For instance, the finding of discrimination 
and the need for action in Ohio Bldg. Chapter, AGC, Franklin C.P. Nos. 78CV-05-
2343 and 79CV-01-247, unreported, pertained to the specific minority groups 
listed in Section 13, Am.Sub.H.B. No. 618, 137 Ohio Laws, Part II, 3100, 3129 — 
i.e., the same racial minority groups now listed in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) — Blacks, 
American Indians, Hispanics, and Orientals.  Moreover, if the General Assembly 
had decided to randomly pick additional minority groups for inclusion into the 
MBE program, such as, for instance, persons of Lebanese ancestry, the MBE 
program would almost certainly fail under strict scrutiny.  See, e.g., Croson, 488 
 
 
107
U.S. at 506, 109 S.Ct. at 728, 102 L.Ed.2d at 890, wherein the United States 
Supreme Court specifically warned against the “random inclusion” of minority 
groups in an MBE set-aside plan.  Further, we are aware of no evidence that, for 
instance, persons of Lebanese ancestry have suffered disadvantage and 
discrimination in the area of state contracting opportunities to the same degree and 
to the same extent that the minority groups listed in the current version of R.C. 
122.71(E)(1) were determined to have suffered.  Nevertheless, the court of 
appeals’ majority thought that the MBE program should “ideally” apply to all of 
Ohio’s disadvantaged businesses, and the court of appeals infused that concept 
into its holding in this case.  However, deciding what Ohio’s MBE program 
ideally is or should be is not a proper function for the judiciary.  See, generally, 
Fullilove, 448 U.S. at 485, 100 S.Ct. at 2778, 65 L.Ed.2d at 929 (finding that 
federal MBE program limiting benefits to specified minority groups was not 
underinclusive simply because the remedial objectives of the legislation had not 
been extended to all disadvantaged groups, since “[s]uch an extension would, of 
course, be appropriate for Congress to provide; it is not a function for the courts”). 
 
The court of appeals’ majority also determined that the racial classification 
in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) was defectively overinclusive, i.e., that the MBE program 
could conceivably bestow a benefit on certain MBEs that could not be justified on 
the basis of remedying the lingering effects of prior identified discrimination.  
However, as to the question of overinclusiveness, we do not view appellee’s 
arguments in this case as even challenging the MBE program on that ground.  
Appellee’s arguments in this case are that the program is underinclusive.  That is, 
appellee wants the MBE program to be upheld, but with appellee participating in 
its benefits.  Therefore appellee’s only objectives here are to be included in the 
program.  Appellee does argue at one point in its brief that under the state’s 
 
 
108
application of the program, “a company such as Honda of America qualifies as an 
MBE only if it can prove 51% Japanese ownership.”  However, appellee 
challenges the program only as it was administratively applied to deny appellee’s 
application for MBE recertification.  Further, there is absolutely no evidence in 
this case that Ohio’s MBE program is or has been operated in a grossly 
overinclusive manner.  This case is not about Honda of America or whether, in 
anyone’s wildest imagination, that corporation could ever qualify for participation 
in Ohio’s MBE program.  This is not a case involving any particular award of any 
particular state contract to any particular business enterprise.  Moreover, even if 
we were to assume that, on the facts of this case, appellee had standing to raise a 
claim that R.C. 122.71(E) is facially overinclusive, appellee specifically denies 
having raised any such challenge to the MBE program.  In its brief, appellee 
specifically concedes that “Ritchey Produce never challenged the facial validity of 
the State’s MBE program.”  Thus, under these circumstances, and on the basis of 
the facts giving rise to this appeal, we seriously question the propriety of the court 
of appeals’ determination whether the MBE program, as applied in this case, is 
defectively overinclusive. 
 
In any event, the court of appeals’ determination that the racial classification 
in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) is impermissibly overinclusive was apparently based upon 
the same flawed reasoning that drove the court to the conclusion that the program 
was defectively underinclusive.  Therefore, it bears repeating that the purpose of 
the MBE program was to ameliorate the effects of a pattern of past, documented 
racial discrimination in which the state had participated to the detriment of the 
racial or ethnic minority groups listed in R.C. 122.71(E)(1).  Contrary to the 
conclusion reached by the court of appeals, the MBE program is not a program 
that was designed to benefit all of Ohio’s citizenry.  The court of appeals observed 
 
 
109
that, as a result of the program, “[t]here may be socially and economically 
disadvantaged business owners who are excluded from the program simply 
because of their race, and at the same time, there may be business owners who are 
not socially and economically disadvantaged yet eligible to participate in the 
program simply because they are among the four enumerated minority groups.”  
However, given the purposes of Ohio’s MBE program, we believe that this 
observation simply does not justify the court of appeals’ holding in this case. 
 
In assessing the appropriateness of race-conscious remedies, courts have 
generally looked to several factors, including “the necessity for the relief and the 
efficacy of alternative remedies; the flexibility and duration of the relief, including 
the availability of waiver provisions; the relationship of the numerical goals to the 
relevant labor market; and the impact of the relief on the rights of third parties.”  
Paradise, 480 U.S. at 171, 107 S.Ct. at 1066, 94 L.Ed.2d at 223.  In light of these 
and other factors, we find that Ohio’s MBE program satisfies constitutional 
requirements. 
 
Much could be said concerning the appropriateness of the remedial relief 
embodied in Ohio’s MBE program.  However, we limit ourselves to only the 
following general observations. 
 
First, as outlined in our discussion in Part IV, above, Ohio’s MBE program 
was enacted only after a host of earlier efforts designed to increase minority 
participation in state contracting opportunities had failed to eliminate the effects of 
racial discrimination in the area of state contracting.  See, also, Keip, 713 F.2d at 
174 (“The General Assembly had evidence that earlier efforts to increase minority 
participation in state business by various methods short of those contained in the 
MBE act, such as ‘goals’ set by executive orders and administrative regulations, 
had not been successful”).  Further, as ODAS correctly points out, the MBE 
 
 
110
program has continually operated in conjunction with alternative race-neutral 
measures to increase minority participation in public contracting opportunities, 
and in conjunction with a host of other state-sponsored programs providing 
“assistance to minority business owners, with no impact whatsoever on non-
minority businesses.”  Ohio’s MBE program was and continues to be a central, 
necessary, and indispensable part of a remedial puzzle.  It remains a valid remedial 
and prophylactic device that forms the foundation of the great wall that currently 
separates Ohio from the discriminatory tendencies of its past in the area of state 
construction and procurement contracting. 
 
Second, Ohio’s MBE program is unquestionably flexible.  All set-aside 
requirements are to be met “approximately” (see, e.g., R.C. 123.151[C][1] and 
125.081[A]), and, as the state points out, the waiver provisions of the MBE 
program (see, e.g., 123.151[C][3] and [4]), and the set-aside requirements have 
been applied in a flexible manner. 
 
Third, the numerical goals of the program have a direct relationship to 
Ohio’s contracting market.  In Croson, 488 U.S. 469, 109 S.Ct. 706, 102 L.Ed.2d 
854, the United States Supreme Court disapproved the city of Richmond’s MBE 
program because “the city [did] not even know how many MBE’s in the relevant 
market [were] qualified to undertake prime or subcontracting work in public 
construction projects.”  Id. at 502, 109 S.Ct. at 726, 102 L.Ed.2d at 887.  However, 
the court in Croson compared that situation to the situation in Keip, 713 F.2d 167, 
wherein the Sixth Circuit upheld Ohio’s set asides by relying on the percentage of 
minority businesses in the state compared to the percentage of state purchasing 
contracts awarded to minority firms.  Croson at 502, 109 S.Ct. at 726, 102 L.Ed.2d 
at 887.  As set forth in our discussion in Part IV, above, the General Assembly had 
a vast array of evidence before it demonstrating, among other things, that minority 
 
 
111
businesses constituted approximately seven percent of all Ohio businesses, but 
were receiving less than one-half of one percent of all state purchasing contracts.  
The state contends, and we agree, that a program requiring that approximately five 
percent of the state’s construction contracts and approximately fifteen percent of 
the state’s contracts for supplies and services, etc., be set aside for Ohio MBEs 
was a modest response to a demonstrably grave situation.  The goals of Ohio’s 
program were directly related to Ohio’s contracting market and were clearly not 
excessive — a far cry from the set-aside program struck down in Croson. 
 
Fourth, nonminority contractors are not wholly precluded from participation 
in contracts that are set aside for MBEs.  For instance, the definition of “minority 
business enterprise” in R.C. 122.71(E) encourages legitimate collaborative 
partnerships and joint ventures between nonminority contractors and minority 
group members.  As the court in Keip noted, nonminority contractors may 
participate in contracts set aside for award to minority business enterprises in a 
number of ways, including “by having up to 49% ownership or control of a 
minority establishment.”  Id., 713 F.2d at 174; R.C. 122.71(E)(1) and (2). 
 
Fifth, Ohio’s MBE program contains administrative definitions and 
procedures to ensure participation by qualified MBEs only, although the case at 
bar may not be a prime example of that fact.  The facts of this case do demonstrate, 
however, that complaints of improper certification are taken seriously and that 
administrative errors in the application of the program can be easily rectified.  
Administrative definitions also add clarity to the statutory (R.C. 122.71[E][1]) 
identification of the particular minority groups encompassed in the program.  See 
Ohio Adm.Code 123:2-15-01(A)(6) through (9) (defining “Blacks,” “American 
Indians,” “Hispanics,” and “Orientals” with particularity).  Additionally, the 
administrative rules provide for careful scrutiny of applications for MBE 
 
 
112
certification, so that spurious minority-front entities will be identified during the 
investigative process and will be excluded from the program.  Ohio Adm.Code 
123:2-15-01.  Further, MBE certification may not be granted for a period 
exceeding one year, and applicants must annually revise their applications and 
information for purposes of MBE recertification.  See, e.g., Ohio Adm.Code 
123:2-15-01(C).  This process ensures that only qualified MBEs remain in the 
program. 
 
Sixth, the General Assembly has provided for harsh criminal penalties to 
discourage unjust participation in the MBE program.  Specifically, anyone who 
intentionally misrepresents himself or herself as owning, controlling, operating, or 
participating in a minority business enterprise for purposes of participating in the 
benefits of the program is guilty of a criminal offense, i.e., theft by deception.  
R.C. 123.151(I) and 125.081(F). 
 
Seventh, the definition of “minority business enterprise” in R.C. 
122.71(E)(1) contains an appropriate geographic limitation for the program, i.e., 
MBEs are defined as those businesses that are “owned and controlled by United 
States Citizens, residents of Ohio.”  Thus, unlike the program struck down in 
Croson, 488 U.S. 469, 109 S.Ct. 706, 102 L.Ed.2d 854, which applied to MBEs 
from anywhere in the country, the General Assembly appropriately limited the 
benefits of Ohio’s MBE program to Ohio’s MBEs. 
 
Eighth, the operation of Ohio’s MBE program is subject to continuing 
reassessment and reevaluation.  For instance, R.C. 123.151(H) imposes stringent 
reporting requirements pertaining to the contracting obligations of ODAS and 
other state agencies, as well as a mechanism to ensure compliance by affected state 
agencies.  Moreover, the program is now and has always been subject to 
continuing reassessment and review by the General Assembly.  The General 
 
 
113
Assembly has, for example, revisited the provisions of R.C. 123.151 on six 
separate occasions since 1980.  Additionally, recent media accounts from 
throughout the state indicate that the General Assembly is currently preparing to 
revisit the MBE program in 1999.  Thus, Ohio’s MBE program is obviously not a 
program that the General Assembly established and then promptly forgot about.  
Rather, Ohio’s MBE program is a matter that has continually occupied the 
attention of the legislature ever since the program was first established, and it is 
certainly a matter that will continue to occupy the attention of the General 
Assembly for some time to come. 
 
Ninth, and finally, the burdens imposed on non-MBEs by virtue of the set-
aside requirements are relatively light.  Indeed, with specific reference to appellee, 
the burden it has been asked to bear as a result of the set-aside provisions of R.C. 
125.081(A) has been virtually nonexistent.  After all, appellee was mistakenly 
allowed to participate in the program and has actually benefited from it for quite 
some time.  In any event, there is no question that where remedial race-based state 
action is necessary to eliminate the effects of past discrimination, innocent persons 
may be called upon to bear some of the burden of the remedy.  See, e.g., Wygant, 
476 U.S. at 280-281, 106 S.Ct. at 1850, 90 L.Ed.2d at 273.  Suffice it to say that 
the burdens placed on those not entitled to participate in the benefits of the MBE 
program are diffused, to a considerable extent, to a wide group of individuals and 
entities, and that the burdens are minimal indeed.  Additionally, those burdens are 
merely an incidental consequence of the MBE program, not part of the program’s 
objective. 
 
Accordingly, upon consideration of a host of factors, including the factors 
outlined immediately above, we find that Ohio’s MBE program is sufficiently 
narrowly tailored to pass constitutional muster.  Thus, we are satisfied that Ohio’s 
 
 
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program need not be invalidated under either prong of the strict scrutiny test 
formulated by the United States Supreme Court. 
VI 
 
The rationale for requiring strict judicial scrutiny of all governmental racial 
classifications, we are told, is as follows: 
 
“ ‘Absent searching judicial inquiry into the justification for such race-based 
measures, there is simply no way of determining what classifications are “benign” 
or “remedial” and what classifications are in fact motivated by illegitimate notions 
of racial inferiority or simple racial politics.  Indeed, the purpose of strict scrutiny 
is to “smoke out” illegitimate uses of race by assuring that the legislative body is 
pursuing a goal important enough to warrant use of a highly suspect tool.  The test 
also ensures that the means chosen “fit” this compelling goal so closely that there 
is little or no possibility that the motive for the classification was illegitimate 
racial prejudice or stereotype.’ ”  Adarand, 515 U.S. at 226, 115 S.Ct. at 2112, 132 
L.Ed.2d at 181, quoting Croson, 488 U.S. at 493, 109 S.Ct. at 721, 102 L.Ed.2d at 
881-882. 
 
The classification set forth in R.C. 122.71(E)(1), defining “minority 
business enterprise” with specific reference to race, was clearly not motivated by 
illegitimate notions of racial inferiority, illegitimate racial prejudice, or stereotype, 
or “simple racial politics.”  Thus, if the purpose of strict scrutiny really is to smoke 
out any such illegitimate motivations for a governmental racial classification, we 
are absolutely convinced that, when all the smoke has cleared, no such illegitimate 
motivations may be attributed to Ohio’s General Assembly.  There is simply no 
illegitimate use of race that is plainly visible on the facts of this case. 
VII 
 
 
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ODAS’s hearing examiner found that Ritchey, the sole owner of appellee 
Ritchey Produce, was Lebanese and that, therefore, Ritchey did not fit within the 
meaning of the term “Orientals” in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) for purposes of qualifying 
his business as a “minority business enterprise.”  ODAS adopted the report and 
recommendation of the hearing examiner and denied appellee’s application for 
MBE recertification.  The court of appeals majority, having decided this case as it 
did, never reached the issue whether a person of Lebanese ancestry is included 
within the meaning of term “Orientals” in R.C. 122.71(E)(1).  We have already 
stated our disagreement with the court of appeals’ conclusion on the constitutional 
question.  For the reasons that follow, we find that the administrative order 
denying appellee’s application for MBE recertification was supported by reliable, 
probative, and substantial evidence, and was in accordance with law. 
 
The term “Orientals” in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) is nowhere defined in the statute.  
However, Ohio Adm.Code 123:2-15-01(A)(9) defines “Orientals” to mean “all 
persons having origins in any of the original people of the Far East, including 
China, Japan and Southeast Asia.”  ODAS’s hearing examiner looked to this 
definition and a host of other definitions and sources, including the common 
definitions of the terms “Orient” and “Oriental” that were considered in DLZ 
Corp., 102 Ohio App.3d 777, 658 N.E.2d 28.  In DLZ Corp., the Court of Appeals 
for Franklin County considered the question whether the term “Orientals” in R.C. 
122.71(E)(1) includes businesses owned and controlled by persons with origins in 
the country of India or, geographically, the Indian subcontinent, and stated: 
 
“Since the issue presented in this case involves statutory construction, 
specifically, whether the term ‘Orientals’ includes people with origins in India, we 
are guided by R.C. 1.42, which states, in pertinent part: 
 
 
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“ ‘Words and phrases shall be read in context and construed according to 
the rules of grammar and common usage.’ 
 
“Further, the Supreme Court of Ohio has stated that words left undefined by 
statute are to be interpreted by using their usual, common and everyday meaning.  
See State v. S.R. (1992), 63 Ohio St.3d 590, 595, 589 N.E.2d 1319, 1323; State ex 
rel. Celebrezze v. Allen Cty. Bd. of Commrs. (1987), 32 Ohio St.3d 24, 27, 512 
N.E.2d 332, 334.  Therefore, we initially look to common dictionary definitions to 
assist in determining the meaning of the term ‘Orientals.’ 
 
“Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary (1987) 832, defines ‘Oriental,’ 
in pertinent part as:  ‘a member of one of the indigenous peoples of the Orient.’  
‘Orient’ is then defined in Webster’s as:  ‘ * * * 2 cap: EAST * * *.’  Id.  The term 
‘oriental’ is further defined in Webster’s as:  ‘ * * * 1 often cap:  of, relating to or 
situated in the Orient * * * 4 cap: of, relating to, or constituting the biogeographic 
region that includes Asia south and southeast of the Himalayas [and] the Malay 
archipelago west of Wallace’s line * * *.’  Id. 
 
“The Random House Dictionary of the English Language (2 Ed.1987) 1365, 
defines ‘oriental’ as:  ‘ * * * 3. (cap.) Zoo-geog. belonging to a geographical 
division comprising southern Asia and the Malay Archipelago as far as and 
including the Philippines, Borneo, and Java.  * * * -n. 5. (usually cap.) a native or 
inhabitant of the Orient.  * * * ’  Id.  The Orient is then defined as ‘ * * * 1. the 
Orient, a. the countries of Asia, esp. East Asia.’  Id. 
 
“Lastly, Webster’s Third New International Dictionary of the English 
Language  (1976) 1591, defines ‘oriental’ as:  ‘* * * a member of one of the 
indigenous peoples of the Orient (as a Chinese, Indian, or Japanese).’  All of these 
definitions include within the meaning of the term ‘Oriental’ or ‘the Orient’ either 
people with origins in India or, geographically, the Indian subcontinent.  
 
 
117
Therefore, a plain reading of the term ‘Oriental’ as used in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) 
includes those businesses owned and controlled by persons with origins in the 
country of India.”  DLZ Corp., 102 Ohio App.3d at 780-781, 658 N.E.2d at 30-31. 
 
ODAS’s hearing examiner found that none of the definitions referred to in 
DLZ Corp. and none of the other materials considered by the examiner supported 
the notion that the use of the term “Orientals” in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) includes 
people of Lebanese descent.  The hearing examiner took notice of the fact that 
Lebanon is situated on the eastern border of the Mediterranean Sea and is not a 
country of east or south Asia.  The Director of Administrative Services adopted 
the report and recommendation of the hearing examiner and denied the application 
for recertification of Ritchey Produce. 
 
To support the contention that a person of Lebanese ancestry is oriental, 
appellee refers us to the Oxford English Dictionary (2 Ed.1989) for a definition of 
the term “Orient.”  That dictionary defines “Orient” as “1.  That region of the 
heavens in which the sun and other heavenly bodies rise, or the corresponding 
region of the world, or quarter of the compass; the east.  Now poetic or rhet.”  Id. 
at 929.  The term “Orient” is further defined as:  “2.  That part of the earth’s 
surface situated to the east of some recognized point of reference; eastern 
countries, or the eastern part of a country; the East; usually, those countries 
immediately east of the Mediterranean or of Southern Europe, which to the 
Romans were ‘the East’, the countries of South-western Asia or of Asia generally 
* * *; occas., in mod. American use, Europe or the Eastern Hemisphere.  Now 
poetic or literary.”  Id.  Appellee also refers us to Judge G. Gary Tyack’s 
concurring opinion in the court of appeals:  “The concept of ‘Orient’ and ‘oriental’ 
dates at least as far back as ancient Greece.  The area to the east of the Greek city-
states was the ‘Orient.’  The people who occupied that area were, by definition, 
 
 
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‘oriental.’ ”  In his concurrence, Judge Tyack went on to say:  “Since modern 
Lebanon is to the east of Greece, modern Lebanon is situated in the area which 
traditionally was considered the Orient.  Mr. Ritchey’s ancestry would, therefore, 
be from the Orient, qualifying him and his business for consideration as a Minority 
Business Enterprise.” 
 
To the Romans, to the people of ancient Greece, and to other ancient 
civilizations and societies, the term “Orient” and “oriental” may have indeed 
referred to the area of the world that is currently occupied by modern Lebanon.  
However, we agree with ODAS’s determination that the common, ordinary, and 
everyday meaning of the term “Orientals,” at least as that term is generally used 
and understood today, simply does not refer to people of Lebanese ancestry or, 
geographically, to the country of Lebanon.  Accordingly, we find that the term 
“Orientals,” as that term is used in R.C. 122.71(E)(1), does not include people of 
Lebanese ancestry.  Thus, ODAS’s determination denying appellee’s application 
for MBE recertification was supported by the evidence and was in accordance 
with law.  Therefore, ODAS’s final adjudication order should be, and hereby is, 
approved. 
VIII 
 
We are aware that Judge James L. Graham of the United States District 
Court for the Southern District of Ohio, Eastern Division, recently decided, by 
order dated October 30, 1998, that “Ohio Revised Code Section 123.151 and all 
rules, regulations and practices promulgated thereunder, which provide for and 
implement racial or ethnic preference provisions for the awarding of State 
construction contracts and State construction subcontracts violate the Equal 
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States 
Constitution.”  Associated Gen. Contrs. of Ohio, Inc. v. Drabik (Oct. 30, 1998), 
 
 
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S.D.Ohio No. C2-98-943, unreported, at 1-2, 1998 WL 812241.  Additionally, 
Judge Graham enjoined the defendants in that litigation from “implementing or 
enforcing the provisions of Ohio Revised Code §123.151 and all rules, regulations 
and practices promulgated thereunder which provide for racial or ethnic 
preferences for the awarding of state construction contracts and subcontracts.”  Id. 
at 2. 
 
Judge Graham’s order dealt only with state construction contracts and 
subcontracts.  In contrast, the case at bar deals with the denial of an application for 
MBE recertification of a business that was formerly certified to bid on state 
purchasing contracts for goods and services, i.e., contracts set aside under R.C. 
125.081(A) — not R.C. 123.151.  Nevertheless, we recognize that our conclusions 
herein concerning the constitutionality of Ohio’s program are at odds with the 
rationale of Judge Graham’s order.  In any event, we specifically wish to avoid a 
direct conflict between the case at bar and the specific requirements of Judge 
Graham’s order in Associated Gen. Contrs. of Ohio, Inc.  Thus, we limit our 
holding today to the area of state procurement contracting.  We do so in the 
interests of state and federal judicial comity and because the facts of the case at 
bar are amenable to a limited holding. 
IX 
 
The United States Supreme Court has looked at governmental racial 
classifications with great skepticism and general disfavor, but the court has yet to 
outlaw the use of benign or remedial race-based measures of the type at issue here.  
All governmental racial classifications are inherently suspect and thus require the 
most exacting judicial examination.  However, Ohio’s MBE program should be 
upheld unless it is clearly unconstitutional beyond a reasonable doubt.  While 
there may be some legitimate questions concerning Ohio’s MBE program, and the 
 
 
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question might even be a close one, we are not convinced beyond a reasonable 
doubt that Ohio’s MBE program is unconstitutional.  We have reviewed the 
program under the strict scrutiny test, and we are satisfied that it passes 
constitutional muster under the United States Supreme Court’s guiding precedents. 
 
For all of the foregoing reasons, we hold that the provisions of R.C. 125.081 
requiring that approximately fifteen percent of the state’s purchasing contracts be 
set aside for competitive bidding by minority business enterprises only and the 
provisions of R.C. 122.71(E) defining “minority business enterprise” with explicit 
reference to race are constitutional as applied to deny minority-business-enterprise 
status to a business owned and controlled by a person of Lebanese ancestry.  
Further, we hold that Ohio’s Minority Business Enterprise Program as it relates to 
the state’s purchasing contracts is sufficiently narrowly tailored to pass 
constitutional muster.  Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the court of 
appeals, vacate the judgment of the trial court, and reinstate the order of ODAS 
denying appellee’s application for MBE recertification. 
Judgment reversed. 
 
MOYER, C.J., RESNICK, F.E. SWEENEY, PFEIFER and LUNDBERG STRATTON, 
JJ., concur. 
 
COOK, J., concurs in judgment. 
FOOTNOTES: 
1. 
R.C. 123.151(C)(3) sets forth a procedure by which the prime construction 
contractor can seek a waiver or modification of the minority-participation 
requirements of R.C. 123.151(C).  Specifically, R.C. 123.151(C)(3) provides: 
 
“Where a contractor is unable to agree to the provision required by division 
(C)(2) of this section because, having made a good faith effort, the contractor is 
unable to locate qualified minority businesses available to accept subcontracts or 
 
 
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sell materials or services, the contractor may apply to the coordinator and the set 
aside review board created under division (C)(4) of this section for a waiver or 
modification of the provision.  The coordinator shall review the application and 
shall make a recommendation to the board to allow or disallow the request.  After 
receipt of the coordinator’s recommendation, the board shall review the request.  If 
the board finds that the contractor has made a good faith effort to locate and reach 
agreement with minority business subcontractors and materialmen or service 
providers but has been unable to do so due to circumstances beyond the reasonable 
control of the contractor, it may authorize the contract to include, in lieu of the 
provision required by division (C)(2) of this section, a provision stipulating a 
lesser percentage of the total value of the contract to be designated for minority 
business subcontractors and materialmen or it may waive such provision entirely, 
or stipulate a higher percentage of services permissible in contracts specified in 
division (A) of section 153.50 of the Revised Code.  If the board does not grant 
the contractor’s application for waiver or modification, and if the contractor is 
unable to agree with the provision required by division (C)(2) of this section, the 
contractor’s bid shall be deemed nonresponsive to the specifications for which the 
bid was submitted.” 
2. 
Ohio Adm.Code 123:2-15-01(A)(6) through (8) define “Blacks,” “American 
Indians,” and “Hispanics” as follows: 
 
“(6)  ‘Blacks’ means all persons having origins in any of the black racial 
groups of Africa. 
 
“(7)  ‘American Indians’ means all persons having origins in any of the 
original peoples of North America, and who maintain cultural identification 
through tribal affiliation or community recognition. 
 
 
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“(8)  ‘Hispanics’ means all persons of Spanish or Portuguese culture with 
origins in Mexico, South or Central America or the Caribbean Islands, regardless 
of race.” 
 
In 1995, the Franklin County Court of Appeals determined that the term 
“Orientals” in R.C. 122.71(E)(1) includes businesses owned and controlled by 
persons with origins in the country of India or, geographically, the Indian 
subcontinent.  DLZ Corp. v. Ohio Dept. of Adm. Serv. (1995), 102 Ohio App.3d 
777, 780-781, 658 N.E.2d 28, 30-31. 
3. 
Appellee also argues that Ohio’s MBE Program, as administratively applied, 
violates the equal protection component of the Fifth Amendment to the United 
States Constitution.  The equal protection guarantee of the Fifth Amendment is 
coextensive with that of the Fourteenth.  See, generally, Adarand Constructors, 
Inc. v. Pena (1995), 515 U.S. 200, 115 S.Ct. 2097, 132 L.Ed.2d 158.  However, a 
Fifth Amendment equal protection analysis is appropriate where the equal 
protection challenge is based on the actions of the federal government.  Id.  
Therefore, our analysis in this case focuses on the Equal Protection Clause of the 
Fourteenth Amendment, since that amendment explicitly governs the actions of 
the states on the subject of equal protection. 
4. 
In March 1996, Governor George V. Voinovich issued Executive Order 96-
53V, entitled “Socially and Economically Disadvantaged Business Policy.”  The 
order directed ODAS’s Equal Opportunity Center to begin cross-certifying MBEs 
that had federal disadvantaged-business-enterprise (“DBE”) status as both MBEs 
and Ohio DBEs.  The order also directed ODAS to begin establishing a system of 
certifying Ohio DBEs on the basis of economic and social disadvantage.  The 
Governor’s order directed all cabinet-level state agencies, beginning in 1997, to 
establish a goal that five percent of their available contracting dollars in the area of 
 
 
123
construction, goods, and services be awarded through open and competitive 
bidding to Ohio DBEs.  In June 1997, Governor Voinovich issued Executive 
Order 97-14V.  The 1997 order changed the name of the “Socially and 
Economically Disadvantaged Business Policy” to the “Historically Underutilized 
Business Policy,” and required cross-certification of MBEs with federal DBE 
status as historically underutilized businesses, or “HUBs.”  The 1997 order, which 
is substantially similar to the 1996 order, is set out below: 
 
“WHEREAS, the Voinovich/Hollister Administration is committed to 
making all state services, benefits and opportunities available without 
discriminating on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability, 
age or ancestry; and 
 
“WHEREAS, the State of Ohio recognizes that a significant number of 
struggling businesses are owned by Ohio citizens who are competitively 
underutilized because of their social and economic status; and 
 
“WHEREAS, the State of Ohio has a duty to secure the best available 
product at the lowest possible price and can best [do] so by assuring that as many 
qualified businesses as possible compete for every available contract; and 
 
“WHEREAS, the State of Ohio recognizes the need to encourage, nurture 
and support the growth of economically and socially underutilized businesses to 
foster their development and increase the number of qualified competitors in the 
marketplace; 
 
“NOW THEREFORE, I, George V. Voinovich, Governor of the State of 
Ohio, by virtue of the power and authority vested in me by the constitution and the 
statutes of the State of Ohio, do hereby order the following: 
 
 
124
 
“1.  the Director of Minority Affairs for the Office of the Governor shall 
provide oversight and policy guidance to all state agencies in the implementation 
of this Executive Order. 
 
“2.  The Department of Administrative Services’ State Equal Opportunity 
Division shall immediately: 
 
“a.  begin cross-certifying and recognizing those minority business 
enterprises (MBEs) which also have federal disadvantaged business enterprise 8(a) 
status (DBEs) as historically underutilized businesses (HUBs); 
 
“b.  begin designating and maintaining a list of all federally registered DBEs 
which are not certified MBEs but which are interested in doing business with the 
State of Ohio as HUBs; 
 
“c.  begin establishing a system of certifying Ohio HUBs which is based on 
a requirement that the business owner show both social and economic 
underutilization in order to become certified.  The Department of Administrative 
Services’ Equal Opportunity Division shall establish Ohio guidelines which mirror 
the federal law, where appropriate, for determining: 
 
“1.  economic disadvantage based on the relative wealth of the company 
seeking certification as well as the personal wealth of the owner(s) of the 
company; 
 
“2.  social disadvantage based on one of two ways:  (1) a rebuttable 
presumption when the business owner shows membership in a traditionally 
recognized racial minority group; or (2) by showing personal disadvantage due to 
color, ethnic origin, gender, physical disability, long-term residence in an 
environment isolated from the mainstream of American society, location in an area 
of high unemployment, or other similar cause not common to most small business 
persons; 
 
 
125
 
“d.  establish standards to determine when a business should be graduated as 
a result of achieving success to such a degree that the benefits of a state sponsored 
program are no longer necessary and the business can no longer be fairly 
considered to be disadvantaged.  Businesses should also be removed after a period 
of time whether or not they have graduated from the program subject to the 
following: 
 
“1.  those standards which determine success on an economic basis shall be 
adjusted to reflect inflation and market fluctuation; 
 
“2.  graduation or removal in cases of family owned businesses should be 
judged on their individual merits and not be based on a previous owner/family 
member’s business success; 
 
“3.  a program extension of two years shall be provided even though the 
business has graduated provided the owner participates in mentoring, partnering or 
joint venturing with a new HUB; 
 
“4.  a business removed for non disciplinary reasons or graduated from the 
program may re-enter the program after one year provided that it meets all 
eligibility requirements. 
 
“e.  implement an outreach and education program which includes an 
aggressive recruiting component to assure that all disadvantaged businesses which 
might be eligible to compete for Ohio’s contracting and procurement dollars 
become certified to do so; 
 
“f.  establish a system to assist all other cabinet-level state agencies in 
identifying and utilizing HUBs in their contracting processes; and 
 
“g.  implement a system of self reporting as well as periodic on site 
inspections which will ensure that businesses registered as HUBs are actually 
 
 
126
owned and operated by individuals who are economically and socially 
disadvantaged; and 
 
“h.  provide to me, by December 31, 1997, and by December 31 of each year 
thereafter, a detailed report outlining and evaluating progress made in 
implementing this executive order. 
 
“3.  The Department of Development shall assist in the outreach and 
recruitment of HUBs and shall provide assistance to The Department of 
Administrative Services’ Equal Opportunity Division as needed in certifying new 
HUBs.  Provide business development services to HUBs in the developmental and 
transitional stages of the program.  The Department of Development shall also 
provide a report to me, by December 31, 1997, and by December 31 each year 
thereafter on their progress of assisting in the implementation of this executive 
order. 
 
“4.  Every Cabinet-Level State Agency shall, within the constraints of 
statutory authority and as otherwise provided by law: 
 
“a.  take appropriate steps to foster, support and encourage the participation 
of historically underutilized businesses and encourage such businesses to compete 
for construction contracts and the procurement of goods and services; 
 
“b.  cooperate with The Department of Administrative Services’ Equal 
Opportunity Division and the Department of Development in identifying and 
developing HUBs; and 
 
“c.  beginning in 1997, set a goal that 5% of their available contracting 
dollars in the areas of construction, goods, and services, be awarded through an 
open and competitive process to HUBs; and 
 
“d.  provide The Department of Administrative Services’ Equal Opportunity 
Division with quarterly reports on HUB utilization. 
 
 
127
 
“Effective with this order, I revoke all Executive Orders issued which are 
inconsistent with this Order.” 
5. 
All future references to the plurality in Wygant v. Jackson Bd. of Edn. 
(1986), 476 U.S. 267, 106 S.Ct. 1842, 90 L.Ed.2d 260, are to the plurality 
consisting of Chief Justice Burger and Justices Powell, Rehnquist, and O’Connor, 
unless otherwise indicated. 
6. 
We note, in passing, that in Ohio Contractors Assn. v. Keip (Dec. 15, 1982), 
S.D.Ohio No. C-2-82-446, unreported, reversed (C.A.6, 1983), 713 F.2d 167, the 
United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio determined that 
Judge George E. Tyack’s findings of discrimination in Ohio Bldg. Chapter, AGC 
v. Jackson (Sept. 28, 1979), Franklin C.P. Nos. 78CV-05-2343 and 79CV-01-247, 
unreported, against the minority groups listed in Section 13, Am.Sub.H.B. No. 
618, 137 Ohio Laws, Part II, 3100, 3129, were findings of “societal” as opposed to 
“unlawful” discrimination.  Keip, S.D.Ohio No. C-2-82-446, unreported, at 13, fn. 
7.  While this view of the district court is interesting, we are obviously not bound 
by it.