DeFunis v. Odegaard

DeFunis v. Odegaard, legal case in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled (5–4) in a per curiam (unsigned) opinion on April 23, 1974, that a constitutional challenge to the use of affirmative action in the admissions policy of a state-operated law school was moot because, by the time the case was argued before the court, the plaintiff had nearly completed his education at the school. DeFunis v. Odegaard was the first constitutional challenge to the use of affirmative action in higher education to be heard by the Supreme Court.

Facts of the case

The case arose when Marco DeFunis, Jr., a white Jewish student of Spanish-Portuguese descent, applied for admission to the law school of the University of Washington in 1971. Although the school received about 1,600 applications, officials chose to admit only 150 students.

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During the time in which DeFunis applied to the law school, its admissions committee calculated all applicants’ predicted first-year averages (PFYAs) using their scores on the Law School Admissions Test (LSAT) as well as their junior- and senior-year grade point averages from undergraduate school. The admissions committee assigned less weight to the minority students’ PFYA scores and reviewed their applications separately from those of other applicants. In addition, the admissions committee accepted minority students whose PFYA scores were lower than those of their white counterparts. Although the committee did not establish quotas, it sought to include what it considered to be a reasonable number of minority students among the incoming class.

While DeFunis’s application was under review, 37 minority students were admitted. Of these, 36 had PFYA scores below those of DeFunis, and 30 had scores that were below a minimum threshold that officials had used to summarily reject other applicants. Of the 37, only 18 eventually enrolled in the law school. Forty-eight nonminority students who had PFYA scores below those of DeFunis were also admitted. Within that group, 23 students were veterans, and 25 were admitted presumably for other reasons, despite their low PFYA scores.

DeFunis was placed on a waiting list and subsequently notified that he had been denied admission to the law school. Consequently, he filed a lawsuit against the school, claiming that its admissions policy violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. A state trial court agreed with DeFunis and ordered school officials to admit him in the fall of 1971. However, after DeFunis started his studies, the Supreme Court of Washington reversed the trial court’s ruling, holding that the law school’s affirmative action program was justified by several state interests, including the state’s interest in achieving racial diversity in public education. The court argued that the school’s admissions policy would enable it to attain a racially diverse student body while also helping to alleviate the shortage of minority attorneys, prosecutors, judges, and public officials.

The Supreme Court’s ruling

DeFunis was permitted to remain in school pending the outcome of his appeal to the Supreme Court, which heard oral arguments on February 26, 1974. After oral arguments were heard, the court learned that DeFunis had registered for his final quarter of studies and that he would be permitted to graduate no matter how the Supreme Court ruled. Accordingly, five of the justices agreed that the case was moot and ordered it vacated and remanded to the Washington Supreme Court. In so ruling, the Supreme Court essentially sidestepped the merits of the case, discussing only the standards that it had applied in considering whether to accept the suit.

In a dissenting opinion, Justice William O. Douglas argued that the Supreme Court should have addressed the merits of the case in light of the importance of the equity issues that it presented. Another dissent, written by Justice William J. Brennan and joined by Justices Douglas, Byron R. White, and Thurgood Marshall, maintained that, because it was possible that DeFunis might not complete his studies, the court should have examined the issues in detail.

In later cases, the Supreme Court did address the constitutional issues raised by affirmative action; see Bakke decision (1978), Bollinger decisions (2003), and Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin (2016).