Supreme Court Agrees to Review University of Texas Affirmative Action Case

(Orin Kerr)

SCOTUSBlog has the scoop:

Returning for the first time in nine years to the ongoing controversy over the use of race in public college admissions, the Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to review the constitutionality of a broad affirmative action program used to admit the freshman class at the University of Texas at Austin. Because the Court's order did not put the case on an expedited schedule, it will go over for argument in the next Term, starting October 1. Filing of written briefs, however, will occur over the summer, while the Justices are in recess. The case is Fisher v. University of Texas (docket 11-345).

The Court's decision will be made by an eight-Justice Court, since the newest member, Justice Elena Kagan, has disqualified herself. She was the U.S. Solicitor General in March 2010, when the Justice Department filed a brief in this case in the Fifth Circuit Court.

Paul Horwitz weighs in with some (mostly humorous) predictions here.