Dissent

The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that Michigan’s admissions policy is constitutional. Justices Anthony Kennedy, William Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia, and Clarence Thomas dissented. These justices did not believe that the law school’s admissions process was used to obtain a “critical mass”.

In part of Justice Thomas and Justice Scalia’s dissent they argued that if “Michigan could not remain an elite institution and admit students under a race-neutral system, the Law School should be forced to choose between its classroom aesthetic and its exclusionary admissions system." (http://ballotpedia.org)
They also challenged the length of time the admissions policy will be lawful. In part of Justice Thomas’s dissent he said, "I therefore can understand the imposition of a 25-year time limit only as a holding that the deference the Court pays to the Law School's educational judgments and refusal to change its admissions policies will itself expire. At that point these policies will clearly have failed to "'eliminate the [perceived] need for any racial or ethnic'" discrimination because the academic credentials gap will still be there… For the immediate future, however, the majority has placed its imprimatur on a practice that can only weaken the principle of equality embodied in the Declaration of Independence and the Equal Protection Clause.” (http://www.experiencefestival.com/a/grutter%20v.%20bollinger%20-%20the%20supreme%20court%27s%20decision/id/5103594)

Chief Justice Rehnquist felt that the school’s admissions policy was based on a quota system that was ruled unconstitutional in California v. Bakke. Using admissions statistics, the Chief Justice noted the “tight association between the percentage of applicants and admittees of a given race and argued that the numbers were far too precise to be dismissed as merely the result of the school paying 'some attention to [the] numbers.’” (http://www.cnn.com/2003/LAW/06/23/scotus.affirmative.action/)