Lower and federal courts supported Weber's claim that Title VII[1] banned all forms of racial discrimination in employment whether against blacks or whites.

The majority (Brennan, Stewart, White, Marshall and Blackmun JJ) held that Title VII did not prohibit all kinds of affirmative action programs.

[3]The Court held that "Weber's reliance upon a literal construction of the statutory provisions" was "misplaced" since "the plan does not unnecessarily trammel the interests of white employees."

He quoted George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-four (1949) 181, where in a sudden jump, mid sentence, the government declares war on Eastasia instead, without blinking, and said this was like the approach to interpretation of the majority: Thus, by a tour de force reminiscent not of jurists such as Hale, Holmes, and Hughes, but of escape artists such as Houdini, the Court eludes clear statutory language, “uncontradicted” legislative history, and uniform precedent in concluding that employers are, after all, permitted to consider race in making employment decisions.He cited two senators explaining precisely that the bill would not require a deliberate attempt to maintain a racial balance, because that would be recruiting on the basis of race, which would be unlawful.

He explained the Senatorial exchange: [I]n the only exchange on the Senate floor raising the possibility that an employer might wish to reserve jobs for minorities in order to assist them in overcoming their employment disadvantage, both [Senators] concluded that Title VII prohibits such, in the words of the [Majority Opinion], "voluntary, private, race-conscious efforts to abolish traditional patterns of racial segregation and hierarchy.