'U' to issue response to original suit

The University is scheduled to submit an official response today to the ongoing lawsuit challenging its use of affirmative action in the undergraduate admissions process.

The lawsuit, filed Oct. 14, claims the University's use of race as a factor in admission to the College of Literature, Science and the Arts violates the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.

Vice President for University Relations Walter Harrison said he could not comment on the specifics of the response.

"While I cannot divulge the content of our answer, I believe members of the University community can expect us to offer a strong defense of our policies and an affirmation of our goal of retaining a diverse student body," Harrison said.

Michael Greve, executive director of the Center for Individual Rights, the Washington, D.C.-based thinktank that brought the suit against the University, said he does not expect anything of importance to be revealed in the response.

"At these early stages, there are never any breakthroughs," Greve said. "This is run-of-the mill stuff. Are we terribly concerned? No."

The University's response comes a month after its original due date. Through a verbal agreement between the University and CIR, the deadline was moved back from Nov. 3 to Dec. 3.

University Law School professors said that usually such responses are just formalities, but defendants can ask for certain parts of the motion to be dismissed. They speculated that the University might claim that certain parties named in the suit are inappropriate.

The defendants named in the suit are the University, LSA, former University President James Duderstadt and University President Lee Bollinger.

- Daily Staff Reporter Jeffrey Kosseff contributed to this report.

KEVIN KRUPITZER/Daily Law second-year students Rocky Dhir, Wendy Maranty and Colin Wexler do research in the Law Library. A class-action lawsuit challenging the Law School's admissions policies is expected to be filed today.

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