United States Sixth Circuit

In a challenge to a statewide ballot initiative which amended the Michigan Constitution to prohibit discrimination or preferential treatment based on race or gender in the operation of state public employment, public education, or public contracting, the court grants a prospective law school student's emergency motion to stay a preliminary injunction which would have prevented enforcement of the amendment. The court finds that the prospective student had a strong likelihood of reversing the injunction because, while the First and Fourteenth Amendments permit states to use racial and gender preferences under narrowly defined circumstances, they do not mandate them, and accordingly they do not prohibit a state from eliminating them.

Appellate Information

• Decided 12/29/2006
• Published 01/02/2007

Judges

• Before SUHRHEINRICH, BATCHELDER, and SUTTON, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Sixth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Center for Individual Rights, Washington, DC, Kerry L. Morgan, Pentiuk, Couvreue & Kobiljal, Wyandotte, MI, Michael E. Rosman, Kerry L. Morgan, for Proposed Intervenors-Appellants/Petitioners.


• For Appellees:
  
• George B. Washington, Scheff & Washington, Detroit, MI, for Plaintiffs-Appellees., James E. Long, Asst. Atty. General, Office of the Attorney General Tort Defense Division, Lansing, MI, for Defendants-Appellees.