There is a curve of time that separates Heman Sweatt and Cheryl Hopwood. It has been a long while since that spring afternoon in 1950 when, as a first-year Yale law student, I heard the promise of freedom in the voice of Thurgood Marshall. Since then, I have observed commendable progress, lately some tragic retrogression, and now I see even more clearly that, in the long, bloody history of race relations in America, there is no more time for foolishness.

RELATED ARTICLE: Present Enrollment

The University of Texas at Austin, School of Law Student Enrollment Demographics for the 1997 Entering Class

Black                     (1%)
Mexican American          (6%)
Other Minority            (10%)
White                     (83%)

SOURCE: [C] A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr., Jeff Ross, and Linda Yush. Compiled by Judge Higginbotham and associates, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.

RELATED ARTICLE: Past Enrollment

The University of Texas at Austin, School of Law Student Enrollment Demographics for the 1998 Entering Class

Black                    (8%)
Mexican American        (11%)
Other Minority           (2%)
White                   (79%)

SOURCE: [C] A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr., Jeff Ross, and Linda Yush. Compiled by Judge Higginbotham and associates, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.

A. Leon Higginbotham Jr. is a retired chief judge emeritus of the United States Court of Appeals, the Public Service Professor of Jurisprudence at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, Counsel to the law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison in their New York and Washington offices, and the author of In the Matter of Color and Shades of Freedom (Oxford University Press).