<P> By five to two the Supreme Court held that the affirmative action plan was lawful . The majority (Brennan, Stewart, White, Marshall and Blackmun JJ) held that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 did not prohibit all kinds of affirmative action programs . They held that the plan of affirmative action must first be transitional in nature and serve in fact to correct situations of imbalance by restoring equality at the starting point and should not set out to reproduce them artificially even when the effects of past discrimination have been wiped out . An affirmative action plan has to be (1) necessary (2) aiming to correct a statistical imbalance (3) not result in an absolute bar to hiring non-minority people (4) temporary, with an end date or goal (5) allow flexibility for hiring non-minorities . </P> <P> Chief Justice Burger, dissenting, said he might vote for this if he were a member of Congress, but he was not and the Civil Rights Act 1964 Title VII explicitly prohibited this form of discrimination . Not having affirmative action was agreed to be the position when the Act was passed . He finished by quoting Benjamin Cardozo, The Nature of Judicial Process (1921) 141, warning to beware of the' good result' and judges exceeding their authority to get it . </P> <P> Justice Rehnquist dissented . He quoted George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty - four (1949) 181, where in a sudden jump, mid sentence, the government declares war on Eastasia instead, without blinking, and said this was like the approach to interpretation of the majority . </P> <Table> <Tr> <Td> "</Td> <Td> Thus, by a tour de force reminiscent not of jurists such as Hale, Holmes, and Hughes, but of escape artists such as Houdini, the Court eludes clear statutory language, "uncontradicted" legislative history, and uniform precedent in concluding that employers are, after all, permitted to consider race in making employment decisions . </Td> <Td>" </Td> </Tr> </Table>

United steelworkers of america v. weber case brief