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fsfur^' <br />Even if hiring quotas were warranted, quotas and penalties for <br />failing to meet quotas would not be workable with 34 defendant <br />cities. These cities have police departments as small as 6 and as <br />large as 101 officers. Some cities already have a higher <br />percentage of blacks than the applicant pool; and some may be <br />unable, despite their best efforts, to hire qualified black <br />applicants. If an overall quota were established, there would be <br />no way of ascertaining which city or cities were responsible for <br />failing to meet it. <br />Even if the record supported the conclusion that further <br />hiring of African Am;ericans were required to remedy the effects of <br />past discrimination, an order to meet specified hiring goals would <br />not be justified. <br />As It recently confirmed, the Supreme Court views any race- <br />conscious classification with "strict scrutiny.N 44.Moreover, even <br />when such classifications are justified, their use must be limited. <br />designed only to remedy the wrong that justifies them.^^ <br />The hiring process at issue in this case involves two separate <br />steps. Candidates seeking e.m.ploym.ent with one or more of the 36 <br />member cities are first required take a written test <br />administered by Defendant MFRS. The names of candidates passing <br />the written test (and thereby "eligible" for hiring by a member <br />‘*Adarand Ccnstri' -crs., Tr.v. v. Per.a. 115 S.Ct. 2097 (1995). This leval of <br />scrutiny means that r«ce-casec classifications are suspect even when they are <br />ostensibly ’benign." Id. <br />•'Missouri V. Jenkins, 115 S.Ct. 2038 (1995), (noting that the "principle <br />that the nature and scope of t.he remedy are to be determined by the violation <br />.means simply that federal-court decrees must directly address and relate to the <br />constitutional violation itself.*' <br />28