"Don't believe the hype. People can be won over if you do the work," Arnwine said. The location of the association's twenty-third annual conference tied into the recent squabble between Texas Attorney General Dan Morales and Norma Cantu, assistant education secretary for the Office for Civil Rights, over the interpretation of Hopwood, which originated at the University of Texas School of Law and banned the use of race in admissions. The conflict apparently ended when Cantu backed down from her previous position that the U.S. Supreme Court's Bakke decision had precedence over Hopwood. In the 1978 Bakke decision, justices allowed race as a criterion in college admissions in the interest of diversity.
Cantu and Morales declined invitations to address the conference. However, their absence did not escape notice. During her speech, Jackson Lee made references to their disagreement and told conference participants, "I want you to go home and say, `Bakke is the law of the land.'"
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