esquire.com – First Street bisects the very top of Capitol Hill in Washington. On the rather shady side—in very many ways—is where the United States Congress works. Across the street, the Supreme Court of the United States sits bathed in limitless sunshine, in the literal sense, if not the metaphorical one.

It has been quite a 24 hours on First Street at the top of Capitol Hill in Washington. Let’s start where the hammerlike summer sun coats the Court’s whitened sepulcher in a blinding glare. In brief, here’s what the Court decided on Thursday morning: It likely saved affirmative action by deciding that a woman named Abigail Fisher was not entitled to damages from a law school to which she wasn’t qualified to have been accepted in the first place. Then, the Court deadlocked, deciding not to decide, and leaving in place a ruling that potentially could bring chaos and ruin to four million people currently living in the United States.