[JURIST] Today is the deadline for filing amicus briefs in the University of Michigan affirmative action cases, scheduled for oral argument before the Supreme Court on April 1. Harvard University announced Monday that it and seven other major universities (Yale, Princeton, Dartmouth, Brown, Penn, Chicago, and Duke) had joined in filing an amicus brief in support of the affirmative action admissions policies applied by the University of Michigan Law School [official website] and the undergraduate College of Literature, Science, and the Arts. Read the Harvard amicus brief [PDF text]. Get more information on the Michigan cases from the University of Michigan [case background] (which hosts an online collection of amicus briefs supporting affirmative action admissions) and the Center for Individual Rights [case background] (collecting amicus briefs opposing affirmative action admissions).

UPDATE: It now looks like last-minute amicus filers have one more day, as Washington DC litigators Goldstein & Howe report this morning that the Supreme Court is closed today (due to snow) and that therefore, per the Supreme Court Rules, today does not count as a day on which filings are due.