Cite as: 515 U. S. 200 (1995)
Stevens, J., dissenting
the reasoning in past cases. Such silence, however, cannot erase the difference between Congress' institutional competence and constitutional authority to overcome historic racial subjugation and the States' lesser power to do so.
Presumably, the majority is now satisfied that its theory of "congruence" between the substantive rights provided by the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments disposes of the objection based upon divided constitutional powers. But it is one thing to say (as no one seems to dispute) that the Fifth Amendment encompasses a general guarantee of equal protection as broad as that contained within the Fourteenth Amendment. It is another thing entirely to say that Congress' institutional competence and constitutional authority entitles it to no greater deference when it enacts a program designed to foster equality than the deference due a state legislature.7 The latter is an extraordinary proposition; and, as the foregoing discussion demonstrates, our precedents have rejected it explicitly and repeatedly.8
7 Despite the majority's reliance on Korematsu v. United States, 323 U. S. 214 (1944), ante, at 214-215, that case does not stand for the proposition that federal remedial programs are subject to strict scrutiny. Instead, Korematsu specifies that "all legal restrictions which curtail the civil rights of a single racial group are immediately suspect." 323 U. S., at 216, quoted ante, at 214 (emphasis added). The programs at issue in this case (as in most affirmative-action cases) do not "curtail the civil rights of a single racial group"; they benefit certain racial groups and impose an indirect burden on the majority.
8 We have rejected this proposition outside of the affirmative-action context as well. In Hampton v. Mow Sun Wong, 426 U. S. 88, 100 (1976), we held:
"The federal sovereign, like the States, must govern impartially. The concept of equal justice under law is served by the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of due process, as well as by the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Although both Amendments require the same type of analysis, see Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, 93 [(1976)], the Court of Appeals correctly stated that the two protections are not always coextensive. Not only does the language of the two Amendments differ, but more importantly, there may be overriding national interests which justify
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