## Facts

- Texas law required the University of Texas at Austin (UT) to admit in-state applicants graduating in the top ten percent of their high school class, which filled most in-state freshman seats.
- UT filled remaining seats through a holistic review combining an Academic Index (class rank and test scores) and a Personal Achievement Index (essays and a score considering leadership and “special circumstances,” including race as one factor).
- Abigail Noel Fisher, a white Texas resident, applied for the Fall 2008 class outside the top-ten-percent route, was reviewed under the holistic process, and was denied admission.
- Fisher sued UT officials, alleging that considering race in undergraduate admissions violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
- The district court denied injunctive relief and granted summary judgment to UT, treating governing precedent as controlling.
- The Fifth Circuit affirmed, applying substantial deference to UT both as to its diversity interest and as to whether the plan was narrowly tailored.

## Issues

1. Whether the Fifth Circuit correctly applied strict scrutiny to UT’s consideration of race in undergraduate admissions.
2. What level of judicial deference, if any, is permissible when reviewing whether a race-conscious admissions plan is narrowly tailored.
3. Whether UT must show that workable race-neutral alternatives would not achieve the educational benefits of diversity before using race.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court vacated the Fifth Circuit’s judgment and remanded.
- The Court accepted existing precedent permitting consideration of race as one factor in admissions for the educational benefits of diversity and did not revisit that general rule.
- The Court held the Fifth Circuit erred by deferring to UT on narrow tailoring and by effectively shifting the burden to Fisher to disprove UT’s good faith.
- The Court directed lower courts on remand to conduct a rigorous review of how the admissions process operates and whether UT proved the necessity of using race in light of available race-neutral measures, including the Top Ten Percent Law.

## Legal Principles

- Government action classifying individuals by race is subject to strict scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause.
- A university may assert a compelling interest in the educational benefits of a diverse student body, and courts may give limited deference to the institution’s academic judgment that diversity supports its educational mission, absent racial balancing.
- No deference is owed on narrow tailoring; courts must independently determine whether race is used in a manner that evaluates applicants as individuals and does not make race the defining feature of an application.
- The burden of proof remains on the university to show its use of race is clearly justified and necessary to achieve the stated compelling interest.
- Narrow tailoring requires a showing, supported by evidence, that available workable race-neutral alternatives would not produce the educational benefits of diversity about as well and at tolerable administrative expense.

## Conclusion

The Court required genuine strict-scrutiny review of race-conscious admissions by limiting deference to the articulation of diversity’s educational benefits while demanding rigorous judicial testing of narrow tailoring, including whether workable race-neutral alternatives could achieve comparable diversity goals.


Fisher v. Univ. of Tex. at Austin, 570 U.S. 297 (2013)