The American Greek system has long been the site of fierce resistance to integration. Until quite recently, African Americans, Jews, Asians, and other ethnic and religious minorities found themselves excluded from the bonds of membership. Sororities at the University of Arkansas, for instance, remained entirely segregated until 2004, while the Greek system at the University of Alabama did not begin to desegregate until 2013. It is little wonder that students around the country increasingly view the Greek system as a deep cavity of racial isolation on otherwise diverse campuses.
But can anything be done? Many observers remain skeptical that universities will adopt meaningful reform. They argue that administrators resist cracking down on segregated Greek organizations because the schools have become “bedeviling[ly]” dependent on the fraternities and sororities. The Greek system, for example, provides thousands of students with on-campus housing, Greek alumni donate generous sums during fundraising campaigns, and fraternities provide a kind of social programming that is “highly attractive to legions of potential students.” It takes little imagination to see how these entanglements might encourage universities to overlook the troubling racial composition of the Greek organizations.
This Article argues that, if colleges will not act, civil rights law can serve as a pressure point and a site of intervention. Specifically, I contend that fraternity and sorority housing violates the Fair Housing Act (FHA). The consequences of this argument are significant. Across the country, there are thousands of buildings on university campuses dedicated to Greek life. In the SEC alone, there are almost 200 sorority houses. “A conservative estimate of the collective value of [the nation’s Greek] houses … is $3 billion.” If my argument holds, universities will need to integrate or shutter many of these stately homes, or else sever them from their campuses.
Professor of Law, University of Arkansas. I wish to thank Emma Kromm, Ella Bunnell, Scott Lowder, Gabriel Gassmann, Sage Mason, Charlie Jiang, Tanveer Singh, and Nicole Clowney for their helpful comments and suggestions.
