In its most sweeping endorsement of affirmative action and the first ruling explicitly upholding affirmative action for women, the Supreme Court has upheld voluntary plans that help qualified women and members of minority groups gain jobs traditionally dominated by white men. (Author/MSE)

The text of Judge John H. Pratt order dismissing the "Adams" college desegregation case is presented. (MLW)

A highly divided federal appeals court has ordered that South Carolina allow a woman to enter the Citadel, an all-male military college, unless it establishes a comparable program for women or allows the Citadel to become a private institution. Litigation arose over the Citadel's rejection of a woman applicant. (MSE)

A decision in the case involving the "Silver Spring Monkeys" and National Institutes of Health research left open the possibility of suing the federal agency in state courts, possibly making it easier for animal-rights groups to block some animal research. However, the ruling addresses only a narrow jurisdictional question. (MSE)

A federal appeals court ruled that judges may not dismiss handicapped-discrimination lawsuits against universities solely on the basis of official university statements that allegedly discriminatory practices are appropriate for the academic programs involved. The decision keeps alive a case in which a dyslexic student could not take a…

Supporters of Black colleges have said that the threat of court-imposed penalities was an invaluable asset in efforts to win state funds and block proposals to close Black colleges. That leverage is gone with a recent ruling by a federal judge. (MLW)

A new bill specifically states that an entire institution is covered by antidiscrimination laws if it receives any federal support. The bill was designed to counteract the effects of a 1984 Supreme Court decision involving Grove City College, and it applies to sex, age, disability, and racial discrimination laws. (MSE)

A federal judge has ruled that the National Collegiate Athletic Association's (NCAA) program of mandatory, random drug tests of athletes is constitutionally sound and that the NCAA does not act as a state agent. A University of Washington runner involved in the litigation will appeal the decision. (MSE)

The U.S. Supreme Court has struck down parts of the Communications Decency Act as violating the First Amendment. The law was predicted to wreak havoc on the Internet and connected campus computer networks. The 1996 law was aimed at protecting children from pornography but threatened the availability of a wide range of materials,…

A federal jury has decided that the University of Iowa did not discriminate against three female professors in eliminating their department, but the jury found the university guilty of retaliating when the women spoke out. The case arose over closure of an all-female dental hygiene program. (MSE)

A Supreme Court ruling found that federal programs or policies based on race must meet a legal test of strict scrutiny, requiring the program to demonstrate a compelling government interest and be narrowly tailored. Legal experts suggest that few federal affirmative action programs currently meet the standard. (MSE)

In a case concerning the National Institutes of Health and Stanford University (California), a federal judge has ruled that government agencies cannot require researchers receiving federal funds to submit research results for review before release to the public. Such a preview is seen as threatening academic freedom. (MSE)

A recent Supreme Court ruling that Mississippi's colleges are segregated and should consider mergers of predominantly white and historically black colleges has put pressure on black college alumni groups to help keep their institutions alive as an educational option. The Black College Alumni Leadership Consortium is establishing a political action…

With legal threats against them mounting, trustees of public and private colleges alike are hearing mixed and vague messages about how much they personally have at stake in lawsuits aimed at their institutions' affirmative-action policies. Few cases in either federal or states courts provide guidance on trustees' potential individual liability.…

Administrators at several public institutions have filed complaints with state labor relations boards, claiming that their faculty have managerial status and should be barred from collective bargaining, as in a 1980 Supreme Court case concerning the private Yeshiva University. (MSE)