Supreme Court accepts affirmative action case

The justices on Monday agreed to hear a challenge that could bring an end to the practice of considering race in college admissions. The court said it will take up lawsuits claiming that Harvard University and the University of North Carolina discriminate against Asian American applicants by giving preference to other races. The case puts affirmative action on trial and could end the practice in higher education.

What has happened in the case so far? Lower courts ruled in favor of the universities, citing prior Supreme Court decisions that allowed schools to consider the race of applicants to promote diversity. The most recent ruling came in 2016 when the justices ruled 4-3 against a woman who filed suit against the University of Texas. Two of the justices who voted for that decision are no longer on the court: Anthony Kennedy and the late Ruth Bader Ginsberg. Chief Justice John Roberts, who has served as a swing vote in some high-profile cases, was among the dissenters in the 2016 decision.

Dig deeper: Read Laura Edghill’s report in Schooled about an investigation into racial discrimination in Yale admissions.