Affirmative action is a policy in the United States with its primary purpose to increase opportunities for minorities and women. Affirmative action policy seeks to increase opportunities by favoring minorities and women in the hiring process, promotions, college admissions, and the awarding of government contracts ("Affirmative Action" n. p.). As originally conceived, affirmative action attempted to eliminate discrimination and provide a source of opportunity for those less fortunate. In reality, affirmative action did not eliminate discrimination at all; discrimination was merely reversed. The policy is not only a form of reverse discrimination, and unconstitutional, but it has completely failed to reach its intended goals as well. Many American citizens believe that the abolition, or at least the restructure of affirmative action would be beneficial to the American people.

The fact that the implementation of the affirmative action policy in the United States has resulted in reverse discrimination is clearly evident. First, the affirmative action program contradicts the very principles that the Constitution proclaims to be true. The fundamentals of the Constitution are based upon

Is not the sole purpose of our educational system to prepare the leaders of the future to be successful individuals? Affirmative action hurts minorities and women who do not posses the qualifications necessary to succeed in certain institutions. Placing individuals in an environment where they do not have the chance to succeed only destroys their once promising futures.

The current affirmative action policy discriminates against talented, qualified individuals. The affirmative action policy overlooks talent and skill in order to reach government induced quotas. Colleges must turn down many deserving students. Universities reject thousands of qualified white students per year in order to keep "quota spaces" empty. The affirmative action policy is wrong.

In 1993 racial double standards in the admissions process came to an end, and the black students who were not accepted to Berkeley began to matriculate to other highly respected institutions. These universities prepared them to become economic and social successes instead of drop outs and failures. The result for Berkeley University was an increase in the percentage of black students actually graduating from the university (Rinder n.p.). The affirmative action policy's goal is not for minorities to be accepted into a certain college or university, but for the minority to actually graduate from that college or university.

On March 6, 1961, President John F. Kennedy issued Executive Order 10925. President Kennedy created a committee designed for "Equal Opportunity Employment." This committee was designed to develop the appropriate "affirmative steps," to create a country where individuals are treated "without regard to their race" (Grapes 44-46). The affirmative action policy that is currently used does not possess these same characteristics of the civil rights law. The current policy contradicts the words stated by President Kennedy in Executive Order 10925. President Kennedy created a committee with the sole intent of eliminating racial discrimination.

An example of the ill conceived effects of the affirmative action program developed at The University of California at Berkeley. Throughout the 1980's the number of black students enrolled at the university increased rapidly due to "double standard admissions." Interestingly enough, this rapid increase in enrollment of black students d

Some common words found in the essay are:
Affirmative Action, Berkeley University, Dr King's, President Kennedy, Constitution Supporting, Dr Kane, Constitution United, affirmative action, Berkeley Throughout, Harvard University, Opportunity Employment, action policy, affirmative action policy, black students, action program, affirmative action program, minorities women, white males, government induced, martin luther king, martin luther, president kennedy, luther king, dr martin luther, president john kennedy,
Approximate Word count = 1593
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)