Roger Clegg, vice president of the Center for Equal Opportunity, spoke against race-based college admissions at the University of Texas School of Law on Tuesday.
Clegg said there is a discrepancy between the original meaning of the term affirmative action and what it currently represents. When the term was first used in an executive order from John F. Kennedy, it referred to proactive measures to end discrimination.
"The only kind of affirmative action at issue is the kind where people are treated differently because of race or ethnicity," Clegg said.
The lecture was sponsored by the UT Law Federalist Society, The Austin Review, Young Conservatives of Texas, Texas Review of Law and Politics, College Republicans at Texas and the Heart of Texas Chapter of the Free Republic.
"Conservative speakers don't come to campus often - it's a leftist campus that likes to bring left speakers," said Sachiv Mehta, vice chairman of College Republicans. "I hope people realize the legality issue of affirmative action and how it is blatantly unconstitutional."
Clegg filed a brief in last summer's Supreme Court case involving affirmative action at the University of Michigan, in which he argued that the desire for diversity is not reason enough to warrant race-based admissions. The argument that diversity is necessary and warrants affirmative action is not compelling, he said.
"People have started thinking that somehow university educations are improved if you have a certain racial and ethnic mix," Clegg said. "It baffles me that the court could think the diversity rationale rises to a level of compelling."
The Michigan decisions last year led to the announcement that the University would use race holistically in admissions starting in fall 2005.
"If we are to be citizens of this university and in particular, the world, then we need to know how we communicate, how we can live together and how we can grow together," said Brenda Burt, director of the Multicultural Information Center. "If we are going to be in business together, we need to know how we can improve our bottom line."
Burt said she thinks the decision to use race-based admissions is a good step.
"We've all been miseducated, so we need to learn more about the diverse cultures of the world, in particular the people that we're going to school with."
College Republicans of Texas, one of the lecture's sponsors, hope the decision is overturned at the University.
"Just because they implement it doesn't mean we can't fight it," Mehta said.
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