Some judicial polling points. A new Quinnipiac poll was released today that asked respondents about their opinion on the recent Supreme Court cases, Parents Involved in Community Schools Inc. v. Seattle School District and Meredith v. Jefferson County (KY) Board of Education, which limited the way in which public schools could use race to shape student enrollment. It reports a majority in favor of this decision:

39. As you may know, the Supreme Court recently ruled that public schools may not consider an individual's race when deciding which students are assigned to specific schools. Do you agree or disagree with this ruling?

                        Tot     Rep     Dem     Ind    



Agree                   71%     79%     64%     71%    
Disagree                24      17      30      24     
DK/NA                    5       3       6       5      

However, a Washington Post-ABC News poll taken in July shows a different result:

43. As you may know, the Supreme Court recently restricted how local school boards can use race to assign children to schools. Some argue (this is a significant setback for efforts to diversify public schools), others say (race should not be used in school assignments). On balance, do you approve or disapprove of this decision?

             Approve     Disapprove     No opinion
7/21/07        40            56             4

Why this discrepancy--71% v. 40%? The Post speculates it's because the Post's question includes "context"--"Some argue (this is a significant setback for efforts to diversify public schools), others say (race should not be used in school assignments)."--while the Quinnipiac poll does not. While this "context" inclusion may indeed have shaped the response of individuals to this question, couldn't one perhaps also wonder if changes in date might also explain part of this difference? The Quinnipiac poll was taken from Aug. 7-13 (a few weeks after the Post poll), so couldn't another possibility be that Americans thought more about this ruling and decided they agreed with it? So both polls could be accurate for their respective polling periods--but some Americans might have changed their minds. Maybe? Perhaps another new poll will come out to confirm or disprove this speculation?