RACE-BASED AID AT COLLEGES UPHELD

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, February 6, 1993                   TAG: 9302060034
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium
RACE-BASED AID AT COLLEGES UPHELD
A federal appeals court on Friday affirmed the Education Department's authority to allow, at least temporarily, the continuation of race-based scholarships at tax-supported colleges.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals unanimously upheld a lower court's decision that dismissed a lawsuit by seven white students who said minority scholarships violated the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
The students, represented by the conservative Washington Legal Foundation, contended that 45,000 minority-exclusive scholarships for blacks, Hispanics and native Americans make less scholarship money available for white students.
They argued that former Education Secretary Lamar Alexander was unreasonable in delaying a ban on scholarships awarded solely on a racial basis. After several fits and starts on the issue, the department proposed the ban in December 1991.
Under heavy congressional pressure, Alexander agreed last June to delay implementing the new policy until after a General Accounting Office study of the issue is completed sometime later this year.
"The relatively brief period that has passed hardly qualifies as unreasonable agency delay," said Circuit Judge Harry T. Edwards, writing for the three-member court panel.
The appeals court said the students still could bring discrimination suits against individual colleges. A suit by a Hispanic student challenging racially exclusive scholarships for blacks at the University of Maryland is pending in U.S. District Court in Baltimore.
In the meantime, the department's 1980 policy encouraging affirmative action scholarship awards to overcome past discrimination against minorities remains in effect.

by Archana Subramaniam by CNB