Opinion ID: 2471196
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Political Process Equal Protection Analysis

Text: The Equal Protection Clause guarantees racial minorities the right to full participation in the political life of the community. It is beyond dispute ... that given racial or ethnic groups may not be denied the franchise, or precluded from entering into the political process in a reliable and meaningful manner. [1] Seattle, 458 U.S. at 467, 102 S.Ct. 3187. But the Equal Protection Clause reaches even further, and prohibits a political structure that treats all individuals as equals, yet more subtly distorts governmental processes in such a way as to place special burdens on the ability of minority groups to achieve beneficial legislation. Id. (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). [T]he State may no more disadvantage any particular group by making it more difficult to enact legislation in its behalf than it may dilute any person's vote or give any group a smaller representation than another of comparable size. Hunter, 393 U.S. at 393, 89 S.Ct. 557. The Supreme Court's statements in Hunter and Seattle clarify that equal protection of the laws is more than a guarantee of equal treatment under the law substantively. It is also an assurance that the majority may not manipulate the channels of change in a manner that places unique burdens on issues of importance to racial minorities. In effect, the political process theory hews to the unremarkable belief that, when two competitors are running a race, one may not require the other to run twice as far, or to scale obstacles not present in the first runner's course. Ensuring the fairness of political processes, in particular, is essential, because an electoral minority is by definition disadvantaged in its attempts to pass legislation; and discrete and insular minorities are especially so given the unique hurdles they face. Cf. United States v. Carolene Prods. Co., 304 U.S. 144, 152 n. 4, 58 S.Ct. 778, 82 L.Ed. 1234 (1938). Ensuring a fair political process is nowhere more important than in education. Education is the bedrock of equal opportunity and the very foundation of good citizenship. Brown v. Bd. of Educ., 347 U.S. 483, 493, 74 S.Ct. 686, 98 L.Ed. 873 (1954). Safeguarding the guarantee that public institutions are open and available to all segments of American society, including people of all races and ethnicities, represents a paramount government objective. Grutter, 539 U.S. at 331-32, 123 S.Ct. 2325 (quoting Br. for United States as Amicus Curiae 13). Moreover, universities, and in particular, law schools, represent the training ground for a large number of our Nation's leaders.... [T]o cultivate a set of leaders with legitimacy in the eyes of the citizenry, it is necessary that the path to leadership be visibly open to talented and qualified individuals of every race and ethnicity. Id. at 332, 123 S.Ct. 2325 (citation omitted). Therefore, in the context of education, we must apply the political process protection with the utmost rigor given the high stakes. Of course, the Constitution does not protect minorities from political defeat: Politics necessarily produces winners and losers. We must therefore have some way to differentiate between the constitutional and the impermissible. And Hunter and Seattle do just that. They provide the benchmark for when the majority has not only won, but also rigged the game to reproduce its success indefinitely.

The Supreme Court in Hunter addressed a situation where the citizens of Akron, Ohio overturned a fair housing ordinance enacted by the City Council. 393 U.S. at 386, 89 S.Ct. 557. The citizenry did more than merely repeal the ordinance, however. It amended the city charter through a referendum to require the approval of a majority of the electorate before any ordinance regulating real estate on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin or ancestry  past or future  could become effective. Id. at 387, 390 n. 6, 89 S.Ct. 557. In other words, only ordinances based on the identified factors required approval of the majority; ordinances based on any other factor required only a vote by the City Council: In essence, the amendment changed the requirements for the adoption of one type of local legislation: to enact an ordinance barring housing discrimination on the basis of race or religion, proponents had to obtain the approval of the City Council and of a majority of the voters citywide. To enact an ordinance preventing housing discrimination on other grounds, or to enact any other type of housing ordinance, proponents needed the support of only the City Council. Seattle, 458 U.S. at 468, 102 S.Ct. 3187 (describing Hunter ). The effect was not only to halt operation of the existing fair housing ordinance, but also to erect a barrier to any similar ordinance in the future. Hunter, 393 U.S. at 389, 89 S.Ct. 557. The Court found that the disparity between the process for enacting a future fair housing ordinance and that for enacting any other housing ordinance place[d] special burden[s] on racial minorities within the governmental process by making it substantially more difficult to secure enactment only of legislation that would be to their benefit. Id. at 390-91, 89 S.Ct. 557. While the enactment treated Negro and white, Jew and gentile in an identical manner, the Court found that the reality is that the law's impact falls on the minority. Id. at 391, 89 S.Ct. 557. That the law had been enacted via a popular referendum did not save it from implementing a real, substantial, and invidious denial of the equal protection of the laws. Id. at 392-93, 89 S.Ct. 557.
In Seattle, a case identical in many respects to the one we confront here, the Supreme Court applied Hunter to strike down a state statute, also enacted via a referendum, that prohibited racially integrative busing. Seattle, 458 U.S. at 487, 102 S.Ct. 3187. Prior to the referendum, Seattle School District No. 1 (District) had implemented a school desegregation plan  making extensive use of mandatory reassignments  to accelerate its program of desegregation. Id. at 460-61, 102 S.Ct. 3187. The District was under no obligation to adopt this plan: Following Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483, 74 S.Ct. 686, 98 L.Ed. 873 (1954), and 349 U.S. 294, 75 S.Ct. 753, 99 L.Ed. 1083 (1955), school boards had been charged with the affirmative duty to take whatever steps might be necessary to integrate schools that were unconstitutionally segregated because of racial discrimination, Green v. Cnty. Sch. Bd., 391 U.S. 430, 437-38, 88 S.Ct. 1689, 20 L.Ed.2d 716 (1968), but there had been no finding that the de facto segregation in Seattle's schools was the product of discrimination. Nonetheless, the school board implemented the plan to accelerate its existing program of voluntary busing, which some constituencies saw as insufficiently alleviating racial imbalances. Seattle, 458 U.S. at 460, 102 S.Ct. 3187. In response, Seattle residents drafted a statewide measure, Initiative 350, providing in relevant part that no school board... shall directly or indirectly require any student to attend a school other than the school which is geographically nearest or next nearest the student's place of residence. Id. at 462, 102 S.Ct. 3187 (alteration in original) (internal quotation mark omitted). Though the initiative was worded as a general ban on all forms of mandatory busing, its myriad exceptions made its real effect to eliminate school reassignments for racial purposes only, except where a court ordered such reassignments to remedy unconstitutional segregation. Id. at 462-63, 102 S.Ct. 3187 (noting that Initiative 350 was phrased so as not to prevent any court of competent jurisdiction from adjudicating constitutional issues relating to the public schools). Initiative 350 made it on the Washington ballot and passed by a substantial margin, attracting over 65% of the statewide vote. Id. at 463, 102 S.Ct. 3187. The Court found that Initiative 350, like the Akron city charter amendment, violated the Equal Protection Clause. Id. at 487, 102 S.Ct. 3187. Relying on Hunter and the Court's summary affirmance of Lee v. Nyquist, 318 F.Supp. 710 (W.D.N.Y. 1970) (three-judge panel), aff'd, 402 U.S. 935, 91 S.Ct. 1618, 29 L.Ed.2d 105 (1971), the Court stated that these two cases yielded a simple but central principle: While laws structuring political institutions or allocating political power according to neutral principles are not subject to challenges under the Fourteenth Amendment, a different analysis is required when the State allocates governmental power nonneutrally, by explicitly using the racial nature of a decision to determine the decisionmaking process. Seattle, 458 U.S. at 469-70, 102 S.Ct. 3187 (internal quotation marks omitted). Echoing Hunter, the Court explained that this distinct analysis is necessary because such non-neutral allocations of power place[] special burdens on racial minorities within the governmental process, thereby making it more difficult for certain racial and religious minorities than for other members of the community to achieve legislation that is in their interest. Id. at 470, 102 S.Ct. 3187 (internal quotation marks, citations, and brackets omitted). The Court dismissed the argument that Initiative 350 was not intended to prevent busing for racially-integrative purposes, and explained why Initiative 350 violated the simple but central principle animating Hunter and Nyquist. Seattle, 458 U.S. at 471, 102 S.Ct. 3187. First, as a threshold matter, the Court concluded that desegregation of the public schools, like the fair housing ordinance in Hunter, at bottom inures primarily to the benefit of the minority, and is designed for that purpose. Id. at 472, 102 S.Ct. 3187. The Court reasoned that, while white as well as Negro children benefit from exposure to ethnic and racial diversity in the classroom, desegregation is of primary benefit to minority children because these children can achieve their full measure of success only if they learn to function in  and are fully accepted by  the larger community. Attending an ethnically diverse school may help accomplish this goal by preparing minority children for citizenship in our pluralistic society. Id. at 472-73, 102 S.Ct. 3187 (internal quotation marks omitted). Because racial minorities therefore had reason to consider busing for integration to be `legislation that is in their interest,' the racial focus of Initiative 350 ... suffices to trigger application of the Hunter doctrine. Id. at 474, 102 S.Ct. 3187 (quoting Hunter, 393 U.S. at 395, 89 S.Ct. 557 (Harlan, J., concurring)). Second, having concluded that Initiative 350 targeted a busing program that inures primarily to the benefit of the minority, the Court held that the practical effect of Initiative 350 is to work a reallocation of power of the kind condemned in Hunter. Id. As the Court explained, Initiative 350, like the amendment to the city charter in Hunter, did more than repeal the school board's busing program: The initiative removes the authority to address a racial problem  and only a racial problem  from the existing decisionmaking body, in such a way as to burden minority interests. Those favoring the elimination of de facto school segregation now must seek relief from the state legislature, or from the statewide electorate. Yet authority over all other student assignment decisions, as well as over most other areas of educational policy, remains vested in the local school board.... As in Hunter, then, the community's political mechanisms are modified to place effective decisionmaking authority over a racial issue at a different level of government. Id. By removing authority over busing for racial purposes from the school board and placing this authority at a more remote level of government, Initiative 350 required those championing school integration to surmount a considerably higher hurdle than persons seeking comparable legislative action, and disadvantaged those who would benefit from laws barring de facto desegregation. Id. at 474-75, 102 S.Ct. 3187 (internal quotation mark omitted). Accordingly, the Court held that Initiative 350, in placing special burdens on racial minorities, violated the Equal Protection Clause. Id. at 470, 102 S.Ct. 3187. In sum, Hunter and Seattle require us to apply strict scrutiny to enactments that change the governmental decisionmaking process for determinations with a racial focus. Seattle, 458 U.S. at 470, 102 S.Ct. 3187; Hunter, 393 U.S. at 391, 89 S.Ct. 557; cf. Carolene Prods., 304 U.S. at 153 n. 4, 58 S.Ct. 778 (arguing that more exacting judicial scrutiny is required when the majority curtails the operation of those political processes ordinarily to be relied upon to protect minorities).
Hunter and Seattle thus expounded the rule that an enactment deprives minority groups of equal protection of the laws when it: (1) has a racial focus, targeting a goal or program that inures primarily to the benefit of the minority; and (2) works a reallocation of political power or reordering of the decisionmaking process that places special burdens on a minority group's ability to achieve its goals through that process. Seattle, 458 U.S. at 470, 102 S.Ct. 3187; Hunter, 393 U.S. at 391, 89 S.Ct. 557. Applying this rule here, we conclude that Proposal 2 targets a program that inures primarily to the benefit of the minority and reorders the political process in Michigan in such a way as to place special burdens on racial minorities.
The first prong of the Hunter/Seattle test requires us to determine whether Proposal 2 has a racial focus. See Seattle, 458 U.S. at 473, 102 S.Ct. 3187. The Court explained that the question is not whether members of the racial majority both favored and benefited from the program or policy at issue, but whether the policy targeted by the law at bottom inures primarily to the benefit of the minority, and is designed for that purpose. Id. at 472, 102 S.Ct. 3187. In Seattle, the Court observed that programs  in that context, the busing of children to increase the number of integrated schools  furthering the education of minority children enable them to function in  and ... [be] fully accepted by  the larger community. Id. at 473, 102 S.Ct. 3187. Such programs do so, the Court explained, through preparing minority children for citizenship in our pluralistic society, while ... teaching members of the racial majority to live in harmony and mutual respect with children of minority heritage. Id. (internal quotation marks and citation omitted); see also Grutter, 539 U.S. at 330-32, 123 S.Ct. 2325 ([T]he [University of Michigan] Law School's [race-conscious] admissions policy promotes cross-racial understanding, helps to break down racial stereotypes, and enables [students] to better understand persons of different races.... [T]he diffusion of knowledge and opportunity through public institutions of higher education must be accessible to all individuals regardless of race or ethnicity. (fourth alteration in original) (internal quotation marks omitted)). The Seattle Court then concluded that Initiative 350 had a racial focus, because it is enough that minorities may consider busing for integration to be `legislation that is in their interest.' Seattle, 458 U.S. at 474, 102 S.Ct. 3187 (quoting Hunter, 393 U.S. at 395, 89 S.Ct. 557 (Harlan, J., concurring)). Proposal 2, like Initiative 350, has a racial focus, because the Michigan universities' affirmative-action programs inure[] primarily to the benefit of the minority, and [are] designed for that purpose, for the reasons articulated by the Court in Seattle. See id. at 472, 102 S.Ct. 3187. Just as the desegregative busing programs at issue in Seattle were designed to improve racial minorities' representation at many public schools, see id. at 460, 102 S.Ct. 3187, race-conscious admissions policies increase racial minorities' representation at institutions of higher education, see, e.g., Grutter, 539 U.S. at 316, 328-33, 123 S.Ct. 2325 (describing the University of Michigan Law School's minority-student-enrollment aims); Gratz, 539 U.S. at 253-56, 123 S.Ct. 2411 (describing admissions policies at the University of Michigan regarding underrepresented minority groups). Indeed, underrepresented minorities lobbied for the adoption of such policies at Michigan's universities in the first place for this reason, ( see Anderson Report, Dist. Ct. Docket No. 222 Ex. L, at 16-23), and, further, the unrebutted evidence in the record indicates that Proposal 2 will likely negatively impact minority representation at Michigan's institutions of higher education, ( see Connerly Dep., Dist. Ct. Docket No. 222 Ex. A, at 119-21; Spencer Dep., Dist. Ct. Docket No. 203 Ex. D, at 100-01; Wu Dep., Dist. Ct. Docket No. 203 Ex. F, at 78; Zearfoss Dep., Dist. Ct. Docket No. 205 Ex. 3, at 56-57). Ample evidence thus grounds our conclusion that race-conscious admissions policies inure[] primarily to the benefit of the minority. See Seattle, 458 U.S. at 472, 102 S.Ct. 3187. Yet the Attorney General argues, and we previously suggested, that the now-defunct Michigan admissions policies benefitted women as well, and that saves them. See Coal. II, 473 F.3d at 250-51. Our prior suggestion does not bind us, see Certified Restoration Dry Cleaning Network, L.L.C. v. Tenke Corp., 511 F.3d 535, 542 (6th Cir.2007), and we now reject it. The Supreme Court made it clear that even policies benefitting the majority  let alone another minority  may have a racial focus, so that lens does not clarify anything. See Seattle, 458 U.S. at 472, 102 S.Ct. 3187. In fact, it serves only to blur what is in reality a clear test: The question is not whether the challenged law burdens minority interests and minority interests alone, Coal. II, 473 F.3d at 250, but whether the law targets policies that minorities may consider in their interest, Seattle, 458 U.S. at 472, 102 S.Ct. 3187. Even a cursory examination of the cases confirms this understanding. In Hunter, the ordinance likewise burdened non-racial minorities, including Catholics, Hispanics and numerous other groups (which, grouped together, would constitute a majority of the electorate), but the Court held that the law had a racial focus. 393 U.S. at 387, 89 S.Ct. 557. The same was true of the policy at issue in Nyquist, and the Court again agreed that it had a racial focus. 318 F.Supp. at 716-17. Likewise, as explained above, the race-conscious admissions policies stymied by Proposal 2 are in the interest of racial minorities and inure primarily to their benefit, so the polices have a racial focus as well. This conclusion is not impacted by the fact that increased representation of racial minorities in higher education also benefits students of other groups and our nation as a whole. Cf. Grutter, 539 U.S. at 327-33, 123 S.Ct. 2325 (describing the varied benefits supporting Michigan's compelling interest in increasing racial diversity at public institutions of higher education). Similar benefits accrued to children at integrated public schools under Seattle's desegregative busing plan, which the Supreme Court explicitly recognized: [I]t should be ... clear that white as well as Negro children benefit from exposure to ethnic and racial diversity in the classroom... [by] teaching members of the racial majority to live in harmony and mutual respect with children of minority heritage. Seattle, 458 U.S. at 472-73, 102 S.Ct. 3187. Nonetheless, the Seattle Court found that the wider benefits of the busing plan did not serve to distinguish Hunter, for we may fairly assume that members of the racial majority both favored and benefited from Akron's fair housing ordinance. Id. at 472, 102 S.Ct. 3187. By the same token, race-conscious admissions policies' wider benefits do not undermine the conclusion that their primary beneficiaries are racial minorities. We therefore find that the race-conscious admissions policies now barred by Proposal 2 inure primarily to the benefit of racial minorities and that Proposal 2, insofar as it prohibits consideration of applicants' race in admissions decisions, has a racial focus.
The second prong of the Hunter/Seattle test asks us to determine whether Proposal 2 works a reallocation of political power or reordering of the political process that places special burdens on racial minorities. See Seattle, 458 U.S. at 470, 102 S.Ct. 3187; Hunter, 393 U.S. at 391, 89 S.Ct. 557.