Affirmative action is a policy or a program that seeks to redress past discrimination of minorities through active measures in order to ensure equal opportunity, as in education and employment. In other words, it is policy that was established to hopefully eliminate racial preference and equalize the United States. The fight against discrimination has been a long lasting one that started with the case of Plessy vs. Ferguson, which ended in the desegregation of all schools (Ficker). Affirmative action was put into place in 1965 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Executive Order that mandated government contractors to “take affirmative action” in all aspects of hiring and employing minorities (Brunner). Upon its arrival, the policy
The Supreme Court ruling was in favor of the University of Michigan with a final vote count of five to four. “The Supreme Court ruled that although affirmative action was no longer justified as a way of redressing past oppression and injustice, it promoted a "compelling state interest" in diversity at all levels of society” (Brunner). The fact of the matter is that colleges and universities are in strong belief that diversity is an important part of education. It is for this reason that these students are getting accepted, not because of affirmative action. There are many minority students that would get accepted without affirmative action, but unfortunately the number of these students is not large enough to diversify a university. This is the reason students who may seem “under qualified” are getting accepted. As said before, affirmative action policies are merely to even the playing field and give every student the chance to reach their full potential. Universities have realized that the United States is a very diverse nation, and in order to prepare all of their students for the “real world,” diversity is necessary. David Sacks and Peter Thiel state, “[O]riginally conceived as a means to redress discrimination, racial preferences have instead promoted it,” and this is their main argument in A Case Against Affirmative Action. They argue that, by discriminating against white people, it