Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/20-1199_l6gn.pdf
Page Number: 235

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

27 

JACKSON, J., dissenting 

till it by our own labor.’ ”104 

Today’s gaps exist because that freedom was denied far 
longer  than  it  was  ever  afforded.  Therefore,  as  JUSTICE 
SOTOMAYOR  correctly  and amply  explains,  UNC’s  holistic 
review program pursues a righteous end—legitimate “ ‘be-
cause it is defined by the Constitution itself.  The end is the 
maintenance  of  freedom.’ ”    Jones  v.  Alfred  H.  Mayer  Co., 
392 U. S. 409, 443–444 (1968) (quoting Cong. Globe, 39th 
Cong., 1st Sess., 1118 (1866) (Rep. Wilson)). 

Viewed  from  this  perspective,  beleaguered  admissions 
programs such as UNC’s are not pursuing a patently unfair,
ends-justified  ideal  of  a  multiracial  democracy  at  all.    In-
stead, they are engaged in an earnest effort to secure a more
functional  one.  The  admissions  rubrics  they  have  con-
structed  now  recognize  that  an  individual’s  “merit”—his 
ability to succeed in an institute of higher learning and ul-
timately  contribute  something  to  our  society—cannot  be 
fully determined without understanding that individual in
full.  There are no special favorites here. 

UNC has thus built a review process that more accurately
assesses merit than most of the admissions programs that
have existed since this country’s founding.  Moreover, in so 
doing,  universities  like  UNC  create  pathways  to  upward
mobility  for  long  excluded  and  historically  disempowered 
racial groups.  Our Nation’s history more than justifies this 
course  of  action.  And  our  present  reality  indisputably
establishes  that  such  programs  are  still  needed—for  the 
general  public  good—because  after  centuries  of  state- 
sanctioned  (and  enacted)  race  discrimination,  the  afore-
mentioned  intergenerational  race-based  gaps  in  health,
wealth, and well-being stubbornly persist. 

Rather than leaving well enough alone, today, the major-
ity is having none of it.  Turning back the clock (to a time 
before  the  legal  arguments  and  evidence  establishing  the 

—————— 

104 Foner 179.