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When the history of civil rights in our time is finally written—though no history is ever “finally” written of course—honest writers will mark the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling in the Harvard and University of North Carolina affirmative action admissions cases as a key turning point in restoring the principle of equal rights as understood by the founders.
Further, the better histories will note they key role of one person: Edward Blum, the founder of Students for Fair Admissions that brought the Harvard/UNC cases.
Edward is modest and self-effacing about his role, but it was a long slog to get to the finish line successfully, and there were many disappointments, setbacks, and equivocal rulings along the way in a constitutional story that is nearly 60 years old at this point. In surveying the story arc of Edward’s efforts, I am reminded of Lord Randolph Churchill’s succinct description of Disraeli’s political career in Britain. It was, Lord Randolph said, “Failure, failure, failure, partial success, renewed failure—complete and ultimate triumph.”
Edward would say, and I agree, that the triumph isn’t complete or ultimate yet, but the blow stuck with the ruling in the Harvard/UNC case is proving instrumental in the Trump administration’s current efforts to end the abusive regime of DEI.
In the conversation that follows I ask Edward how he got committed to this cause in the first place, some interesting inside aspects of the cases, and where we go from here.