My understanding is that they admitted it was in the past affirmative action cases. It's just that they first ruled it was actually OK because diversity was a 'compelling state interest' (Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, 1974 - the specific affirmative action program being challenged there was found to be too obviously racist, but otherwise AA was upheld) and then secondly that while it was racist, it was the just and necessary kind of racism that needed to go on for some more time as basically an additional form of reparations to the 'historically disadvantaged' sort of diverse vibrancy (Grutter v. Bollinger, 2003 - the writer of the majority opinion, Sandra Day O'Connor, opined that AA should go on for another 25 years or so).
My understanding is that they admitted it was in the past affirmative action cases. It's just that they first ruled it was actually OK because diversity was a 'compelling state interest' (Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, 1974 - the specific affirmative action program being challenged there was found to be too obviously racist, but otherwise AA was upheld) and then secondly that while it was racist, it was the just and necessary kind of racism that needed to go on for some more time as basically an additional form of reparations to the 'historically disadvantaged' sort of diverse vibrancy (Grutter v. Bollinger, 2003 - the writer of the majority opinion, Sandra Day O'Connor, opined that AA should go on for another 25 years or so).