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24  STUDENTS FOR FAIR ADMISSIONS, INC. v. PRESIDENT 

AND FELLOWS OF HARVARD COLLEGE 
GORSUCH, J., concurring 

both  leapt  almost  immediately  to  its  “voluminous  legisla-
tive  history,”  from  which  they  proceeded  to  divine  an  im-
plicit  “congressional  intent”  to  link  the  statute  with  the 
Equal Protection Clause.  438 U. S., at 284–285 (opinion of 
Powell,  J.);  id.,  at  328–336  ( joint  opinion  of  Brennan,
White,  Marshall,  and  Blackmun,  JJ.).    Along  the  way,  as
Justice Stevens documented, both opinions did more than a 
little cherry-picking from the legislative record.  See id., at 
413–417.  Justice  Brennan  went  so  far  as  to  declare  that 
“any  claim  that  the  use  of  racial  criteria  is  barred  by  the
plain language of the statute must fail in light of the reme-
dial purpose of Title VI and its legislative history.”  Id., at 
340.  And once liberated from the statute’s firm rule against 
discrimination  based  on  race,  both  opinions  proceeded  to 
devise  their  own  and  very  different  arrangements  in  the 
name of the Equal Protection Clause.

The moves made in Bakke were not statutory interpreta-
tion.  They were judicial improvisation.  Under our Consti-
tution,  judges  have  never  been  entitled  to  disregard  the
plain  terms  of  a  valid  congressional  enactment  based  on
surmise about unenacted legislative intentions.  Instead, it 
has always been this Court’s duty “to give effect, if possible,
to  every  clause  and  word  of  a  statute,”  Montclair  v. 
Ramsdell, 107 U. S. 147, 152 (1883), and of the Constitution 
itself,  see  Knowlton  v.  Moore,  178 U. S.  41,  87  (1900).    In 
this country, “[o]nly the written word is the law, and all per-
sons are entitled to its benefit.”  Bostock, 590 U. S., at ___ 
(slip op., at 2).  When judges disregard these principles and
enforce  rules  “inspired  only  by  extratextual  sources  and
[their]  own  imaginations,”  they  usurp  a  lawmaking  func-
tion “reserved for the people’s representatives.”  Id., at ___ 
(slip op., at 4).

Today,  the  Court  corrects  course  in  its  reading  of  the 
Equal Protection Clause.  With that, courts should now also 
correct course in their treatment of Title VI.  For years, they