On Dec. 4, Barbara A. Perry, a professor of government at Sweet Briar, will attend oral arguments at the U.S. Supreme Court in Meredith v. Jefferson County Board of Education and Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1. Both cases challenge policies that use race as a factor in assigning kindergarten through 12th-grade students to public schools.

Barbara PerryPerry is the author of a forthcoming book (2007), “The Michigan Affirmative Action Cases: Gratz, Grutter, and the Triumph of Sandra Day O’Connor,” which examines two previous decisions whose precedents may be on the line in the Jefferson County and Seattle cases. O’Connor’s vote tipped the balance in the 2003 University of Michigan Law School ruling, which upheld affirmative action in the interest of achieving racial and ethnic diversity in professional education.

Perry, a Supreme Court scholar and former judicial fellow at the Supreme Court, is a native of Louisville, Ky., where Meredith originates. Coincidentally, she is near the heart of the current controversy while serving a fellowship at the University of Louisville’s McConnell Center this year. She has had the opportunity to speak to legal counsel from both sides in the case.

Jefferson County has voluntarily continued its race-based school-assignment plan since federally mandated desegregation via busing was lifted in 2000. As in the related Seattle case, parents of white students in Louisville who could not attend the schools of their choice sued the district, asserting that the plan violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.

“Housing patterns in Louisville are such that if students attended the closest school, they would become re-segregated,” Perry said. “The school district’s argument is more related to diversity now and its benefits for children in school, and once they’re in the workforce. Part of that argument is strategic, because diversity is the basis on which the Supreme Court has upheld affirmative action in higher education.”

Perry said she is fortunate to have a seat for the December oral arguments, which are in high demand. School districts across the country employ school assignment plans similar to those at issue in the Louisville and Seattle cases, and the Court’s ruling could have far-reaching implications.

In addition to her most recent research on the Michigan cases, Perry is a frequent observer of Supreme Court proceedings and has interacted with most of the justices. She has followed its inner workings since serving as the judicial fellow from 1994 to 1995 in the Office of the Administrative Assistant to the Chief Justice. An expert profile on Perry can be viewed at http://www.sbc.edu/news/perry.html.

— By Jennifer McManamay, SBC staff writer