The U.S. Supreme Court upheld a Michigan voter initiative that bans affirmative action during the admittance process at public universities. 

The Supreme Court upheld the voter initiative Tuesday, which completely prohibits racial preferences during the admittance process, The New York Times reports. 

"This case is not about how the debate about racial preferences should be resolved," Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote in a controlling opinion, which was joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., and Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. "It is about who may resolve it. There is no authority in the Constitution of the United States or in this court's precedents for the judiciary to set aside Michigan laws that commit this policy determination to the voters."

Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented, saying the voter initiative puts a burden on minorities that is not faced by other college applicants. 

"The Constitution does not protect racial minorities from political defeat," she wrote. "But neither does it give the majority free rein to erect selective barriers against racial minorities." Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg joined the dissent.

In earlier cases, such as one from June that concerned the University of Texas, the court ruled that race-conscious admissions policies are permissible in states that want to use them. 

The new Supreme Court decision concerned whether or not voters can ban affirmative action programs. 

The vote in the case, Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, was 6-2. Justice Elena Kagan recused herself from the case because she had worked on the case as U.S. solicitor general. 

The Michigan initiative, which is known as Proposal 2, was a reaction to Grutter v. Bollinger, a 2003 Supreme Court decision that upheld the use of race as a factor in law school admissions to ensure diversity. 

Proposition 2 was approved in 2006 by 58 percent of Michigan voters. It amended the state's constitution to prohibit discrimination or preferential treatment in public education, public employment or government contracting. 

Groups that were pro-affirmative action sued to prohibit the law in regard to higher education. 

In 2012, the U.S. Court of Appeals in Cincinnati ruled 8 to 7 that the initiative violated the federal Constitution's equal protection clause. The court ruled that the law made it more difficult for marginalized minorities to make a change. 

The Supreme Court struck down measures to disfavor minorities in both 1969 and 1982, saying it restructured the political process. The precedents were featured in the appeals court's majority opinion. 

"A student seeking to have her family's alumni connections considered in her application to one of Michigan's esteemed public universities could do one of four things to have the school adopt a legacy-conscious admissions policy: she could lobby the admissions committee, she could petition the leadership of the university, she could seek to influence the school's governing board, or, as a measure of last resort, she could initiate a statewide campaign to alter the state's Constitution," Judge R. Guy Cole Jr. wrote for the majority.

"The same cannot be said," Judge Cole added, "for a black student seeking the adoption of a constitutionally permissible race-conscious admissions policy. That student could do only one thing to effect change: she could attempt to amend the Michigan Constitution -- a lengthy, expensive and arduous process - to repeal the consequences of Proposal 2."

Judge Jeffrey S. Sutton, a dissenting member of the appeals court, wrote in response: "A state does not deny equal treatment by mandating it." The majority opinion, he added, "transforms a potential virtue of affirmative action into a vice."

"If there is one feature of affirmative action programs that favors their constitutionality," he said, "it is that they grow out of the democratic process."

The appeals court's decision had a partisan divide; eight judges in the majority were nominated by Democratic presidents, and the seven judges in dissent were nominated by Republican presidents.