Sec. 2. Findings
632 words·~3 min read·
/bill/119/s/3433/is/section-2·A research copy — for the controlling text, always check the official state or federal source. Not legal advice.
Congress finds the following: The United States of America was founded on the truth that all men are created equal. To secure this promise, the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment guarantees to every person within the jurisdiction of a State—regardless of race or color—the equal protection of its laws. The Fifth Amendment extends that same principle with respect to the Federal Government. The Supreme Court affirmed in Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College, 600 U.S. 181 (2023), that colleges and universities violate the guarantee of equal protection when they engage in race-based admissions policies, including by maintaining racial quotas or preferences for admission.
The Court further held that universities could not use facially neutral tools to admit students based on race. The ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College reaffirmed a core constitutional prohibition against racial quotas and preferences. Despite the clarity of the Constitution, Congress has for decades funded a series of grant programs qualifying institutions of higher education based on the certified racial or ethnic balance of their student bodies.
These Minority-Serving Institution programs include over $350,000,000 in grant money. These grant programs, many of which are not open to Historically Black Colleges and Universities or Tribal Colleges and Universities, intentionally treat colleges and universities differently based on the racial demographics of their students. Such programs condition hundreds of millions in Federal funding on the maintenance of racial quotas. The Minority-Serving Institution grant programs violate the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States by classifying and awarding money to institutions based on the race or ethnicity of their students.
In addition, the Minority-Serving Institution programs provide a financial incentive for colleges and universities to discriminate on the basis of race in admissions. Decades of Supreme Court precedents have held that the spending power of Congress, although broad, is not unlimited, and that it would exceed the constitutional authority of Congress for Federal funding to induce invidious discrimination. As constituted, these grant programs exceed the spending power of Congress because they induce invidious discrimination.
The Minority-Serving Institution programs also play a part in the immigration crisis in the United States. The largest Minority-Serving Institution programs are the Hispanic-Serving Institution programs. Those programs rely on purely ethnic categories without regard to whether the qualifying enrolled students are citizens of the United States. As greater numbers of aliens have been waved across the southern border, the programs induce colleges and universities to discriminate against citizens of the United States.
A large and complex bureaucracy has arisen to support illegal aliens at Minority-Serving Institutions. Race and ethnicity are arbitrary proxies for need. Minority-Serving Institution programs siphon resources from constitutionally sound programs that help people in the United States who are in need. One-third of undergraduate students in the United States receive funding through the Federal Pell Grant program established in title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965 ( 20 U.S.C. 1070 et seq. ).
The Pell Grant program makes college financially possible for students in the United States of all races and ethnicities. Yet colleges that enroll large numbers of Pell recipients are ineligible for hundreds of millions in Federal funding unless they maintain the appropriate racial balance. Meanwhile, rampant inflation in the cost of postsecondary education has diminished the impact of the grants available to needy students in the United States. Increasing the funding available for the Federal Pell Grant program under title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965 ( 20 U.S.C. 1070 et seq. ) and the total maximum Federal Pell Grant award will constitutionally increase the educational opportunities available to all needy people in the United States regardless of race or ethnicity, including the educational opportunities of people in historically disadvantaged communities.
Connectionstraces to 1
Traces to 1 document
1 reference not yet in our index
- 600 U.S. 181
Citation graph
cites case law
Cites 2Cited by 0 across 0 sources