The University of Michigan, true to form, has begun exploring ways to get around the ban on racial preferences imposed by the passage of the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative. One attempt it is exploring is using the ostensibly separate, private Michigan Alumni Association to do what the University can no longer do itself, fund minority scholarships. According to this thorough article in the Michigan Daily, however, there are some serious obstacles standing in the way of this effort.
Faced with the effects of Proposal 2, which banned affirmative action in Michigan, the University of Michigan’s Alumni Association is looking for ways to prevent a drop-off in minority enrollment.
One way being considered is … using the Alumni Association to offer more scholarships to minority students, University officials said.
Those officials, however, may have just put their institution’s foot in its mouth: for university officials to say they are “using” the alumni association to do what they themselves cannot do is to deny the very independence and separateness of the alumni association that, so the university hopes, might allow it to provide race-based financial aid.
There are also other indications of a close nexus between the university and the alumni association:
The recommendation for the Alumni Association to increase its funding for scholarships was part of a preliminary report by the Diversity Blueprints Task Force. But the group’s final report — released last month — did not make any specific suggestions about the Alumni Association financing scholarships on a wider scale.
University Provost Teresa Sullivan said task force members wanted to include more general suggestions and save specific projects for a later, more in-depth report.
Obviously the university lawyers have begun to raise some warning signs.
Sullivan also said there is uncertainty about the legality of the Alumni Association’s contributions. She said the Alumni Association must be seen as a separate entity from the University for legal purposes. In 1992, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled that the private, nonprofit alumni association of the University of Toledo — a public institution — was subject to state law because it had close ties to the university.
While this end run is still in the planning states some university official should suggest that the Alumni Associate rewrite its “Mission Statement,” which states both that it is “independent” but also that it is “a committed partner of the University.”
ADDENDUM
See here for a suggestion that the University of Virginia may be involved in a similar end run around a controlling Fourth Circuit opinion.
i wonder whether that affects the alumni association’s tax exemption (presumably it’s tax exempt). i need to do some research.
Legal question.
How far can a university employee go in encouraging or aiding a private group to do what the university cannot legally do.
Another way of stating it. Can a university employee say they are acting merely as a private citizen in a matter concerning the university?
Even if the Alumni Association is considered a private actor, why don’t race-specific scholarships violate civil rights statutes?
Good question. As I’ve argued here many times, if the principle of the Bob Jones case were applied consistently, no tax exempt organization — like alumni associations or Bill Gates’ foundation — would allowed to keep their exemptions if they engaged in racial discrimination.