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Page Number: 203

64  STUDENTS FOR FAIR ADMISSIONS, INC. v. PRESIDENT 

AND FELLOWS OF HARVARD COLLEGE 
SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

through present); id., at 24–25 (explaining that the univer-
sity’s  “experience  is  largely  consistent  with  other  schools 
that do not consider race as a factor in admissions,” includ-
ing, for example, the University of Oklahoma’s most pres-
tigious campus).

The  costly  result  of  today’s  decision  harms  not  just  re-
spondents and students but also our institutions and dem-
ocratic society more broadly.  Dozens of amici from nearly
every sector of society agree that the absence of race-conscious
college admissions will decrease the pipeline of racially di-
verse college graduates to crucial professions.  Those amici 
include the United States, which emphasizes the need for 
diversity in the Nation’s military, see United States Brief 
12–18, and in the federal workforce more generally, id., at 
19–20  (discussing  various  federal  agencies,  including  the 
Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Office of the Direc-
tor  of  National  Intelligence).  The  United  States  explains
that “the Nation’s military strength and readiness depend
on a pipeline of officers who are both highly qualified and 
racially  diverse—and  who  have  been  educated  in  diverse
environments  that  prepare  them  to  lead  increasingly  di-
verse forces.”  Id., at 12.  That is true not just at the military 
service  academies  but  “at  civilian  universities,  including 
Harvard,  that  host  Reserve  Officers’  Training  Corps 
(ROTC)  programs  and  educate  students  who  go  on  to  be-
come officers.”  Ibid.  Top former military leaders agree.  See 
Brief  for  Adm.  Charles  S.  Abbot  et al.  as  Amici  Curiae  3 
(noting  that  in  amici’s  “professional  judgment,  the  status
quo—which permits service academies and civilian univer-
sities to consider racial diversity as one factor among many
in their admissions practices—is essential to the continued 
vitality of the U. S. military”).

Indeed, history teaches that racial diversity is a national
security imperative.  During the Vietnam War, for example, 
lack of racial diversity “threatened the integrity and perfor-