O’Connor’s ruling added a time limit to the judgment, saying, “The Court expects that 25 years from now, the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary to further the interest approved today.” O’Connor’s judgment was way off, according to United for a Fair Economy researchers. The racial “parity date” at the existing pace of gradual equality was not twenty-five years, but five-hundred years, and for some racial disparities, thousands of years from 2003. The defenders of affirmative action were still relieved that O’Connor had saved it, for now.
