A federal appeals court on Friday struck down Michigan’s 2006 ban on the consideration of race and gender in public-university admissions and government hiring in the latest round of the decade-long fight over the University of Michigan’s affirmative action policies, reports the New York Times. The 2-to-1 ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati, said the voter-approved ban “unconstitutionally alters Michigan’s political structure by impermissibly burdening racial minorities.”