CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — Nine years after it was filed, a federal judge has formally dismissed a lawsuit that challenged The Citadel's all-male admissions policy and helped open the gates of the state military college to female cadets.
"The Citadel has eliminated to the extent practicable the discriminatory effects of the past" and female cadets are in the position they would have been had the school never been male-only, U.S. District Judge C. Weston Houck wrote in the order filed late Thursday.
Shannon Faulkner sued in 1993 to become the college's first female cadet. She enrolled two years later under an order signed by Houck but left after less than a week, citing stress and her isolation as the only female cadet.
The following year, after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the all-male admissions policy at Virginia Military Institute was unconstitutional, The Citadel opened its gates to women.