The nine-campus UC system receives about $4.6 billion a year in federal funding, $2.1 billion of which supports the three national laboratories that UC runs for the U.S. Department of Energy.

University officials also discounted the possibility they would lose substantial funding and noted that they are in compliance with federal civil rights laws.

As a general matter, no federal law or regulation demands that schools and colleges employ affirmative action in hiring or admissions, government lawyers conceded.

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Affirmative action is permissible under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, said Judith Winston, general counsel for the U.S. Department of Education. It allows race to be taken into account, she said, but there is no affirmative-action requirement in the education law.

The bedrock civil rights law in education, Title VI says, No person in the United States shall, on the ground of race, color or national origin, be excluded from participation in or subjected to discrimination, under any program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.

In 1978, the U.S. Supreme Court in the Bakke case ruled that the University of California had wrongly denied admission to a highly qualified white student because of his race. It added, however, that race sometimes can be used as a plus factor for minority students to bring about diversity in a college class.

Ever since then, colleges have routinely used the race and ethnic background of minority students as one factor in their favor.

In separate TV interviews Sunday, White House Chief of Staff Leon E. Panetta and the Justice Department’s civil rights chief Deval L. Patrick condemned the UC Board of Regents for its decision last week to end the use of race as a factor in admissions and hiring.

When asked whether the move might cost the university a loss of federal funds, Panetta replied:Obviously we are going to be reviewing our contract laws and the provision of resources to that state. The bottom line here is what the president said:We ought not back away from the commitment of this country to equal justice and equal opportunity.

On Monday, however, White House aides pointed to the Justice Department as having initiated the review of grants and contracts to UC. And Justice Department officials in turn pointed to the Education Department as the key agency undertaking the review.

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Neither the White House nor the Justice Department pointed to a regulation or law that the university might be violating if it stops using race and ethnicity for hiring or admissions.

At the Education Department, officials cited three small grant programs that specifically require recipients to focus their efforts on aiding minorities. I don’t even know whether the University of California has one of those grants, but that’s what we are taking a look at, Winston said.