Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/20-1199_hgdj.pdf
Page Number: 136.0

Cite as:  600 U. S. ____ (2023) 

5 

KAVANAUGH, J., concurring 

quotation  marks  and  alteration  omitted).  The  Court 
therefore  concluded  that  race-based  affirmative  action 
programs 
racial 
in  higher  education, 
classifications, must be “limited in time.”  Ibid. 

like  other 

that 

conclusion 

The  Grutter  Court’s 

race-based 
affirmative  action  in  higher  education  must  be  limited  in 
time followed not only from fundamental equal protection 
principles,  but  also  from  this  Court’s  equal  protection 
precedents  applying  those  principles.  Under  those 
precedents,  racial  classifications  may  not  continue 
indefinitely.  For example, in the elementary and secondary
school context after Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 
483  (1954),  the  Court  authorized  race-based  student
assignments for several decades—but not indefinitely into 
the future.  See, e.g., Board of Ed. of Oklahoma City Public 
Schools v. Dowell, 498 U. S. 237, 247–248 (1991); Pasadena 
City  Bd.  of  Ed.  v.  Spangler,  427  U. S.  424,  433–434,  436 
(1976);  Swann  v.  Charlotte-Mecklenburg  Bd.  of  Ed.,  402 
U. S. 1, 31–32 (1971); cf. McDaniel v. Barresi, 402 U. S. 39, 
41 (1971).

In those decisions, this Court  ruled that the  race-based 
“injunctions  entered  in  school  desegregation  cases”  could 
not  “operate  in  perpetuity.”  Dowell,  498  U. S.,  at  248. 
Consistent  with  those  decisions,  the  Grutter  Court  ruled 
that  race-based  affirmative  action  in  higher  education 
likewise could not operate in perpetuity.  

As of 2003, when Grutter was decided, many race-based
affirmative action programs in higher education had been
operating for about 25 to 35 years.  Pointing to the Court’s
precedents  requiring 
that  racial  classifications  be 
“temporary,” Croson, 488 U. S., at 510 (plurality opinion of 
O’Connor, J.), the petitioner in Grutter, joined by the United
States, argued that race-based affirmative action in higher 
education could continue no longer.  See Brief for Petitioner 
21–22,  30–31,  33,  42,  Brief  for  United  States  26–27,  in 
Grutter v. Bollinger, O. T. 2002, No. 02–241.