The Michigan Supreme Court has refused to hear the appeal of BAMN and other MCRI opponents. Thus, despite the intense efforts of the Democrats and their BAMN allies, the people of Michigan will have the opportunity to vote to keep or ban racial preferences.
UPDATE [30 March 10:45PM]
The Associated Press reports:
LANSING, Mich. (AP) — A last-ditch effort to prevent voters from considering a proposal that would ban some affirmative action programs in Michigan has failed.
The Michigan Supreme Court decided not to hear an appeal of the case, meaning the issue will be allowed on the November ballot.
….
The decision is a victory for the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative, which has been leading the drive to let voters decide whether government and university admissions programs should be banned from giving preferential treatment to groups or individuals based on their race, gender, color, ethnicity or national origin.
The objections of BAMN, which are continuing, border on the bizarre. Consider:
A pro-affirmative action group called By Any Means Necessary had urged the Supreme Court to take up the issue. It disagrees with allowing the phrase “preferential treatment” to appear on the ballot. It also claims some signatures used to get the issue on the ballot were gained through misrepresentation, a charge MCRI denies.
BAMN, in short, objects to the phrase “preferential treatment” in the language of a ballot initiative whose purpose is to prevent state agencies from giving preferential treatment based on race, ethnicity, or gender.
But wait; there’s more!
BAMN attorney Shanta Driver on Thursday criticized the court’s decision not to hear the group’s appeal.
“This decision just says that the Supreme Court will not protect the voting rights of the people of Michigan,” she added. “The Supreme Court decision shows complete disdain and contempt for the voting rights of Michigan’s black, Latino and progressive white people.”
BAMN plans to hold a rally Friday at the state Capitol to present petitions asking Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm to step in.
BAMN’s idea of protecting the voting rights of the people of Michigan — no, strike that, and substitute: “BAMN’s idea of protecting the voting rights of the black, Latino, and progressive white people of Michigan” — is to prevent them from being able to vote on whether they want the state to continue giving preferences to some people based on their race or ethnicity.
What does BAMN want the governor to “step in” and do? Declare martial law? The governor has already stepped in it regarding this issue far more than she should.
You’d think the Democrats would be embarrassed to be associated with a group like BAMN, much less to have been working so closely with it to keep MCRI off the ballot.
In any event, the supporters of racial preferences consistently refuse to admit that what they are supporting, and all MCRI would bar, are in fact preferences based on race. For example, at a recent debate Wedenesday at Central Michigan University Kary Moss, executive director of the Michigan chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, complained that “By using the word ‘preference,’ it becomes a hot button.”
No, Ms. Moss. The “hot button” issue is the practice of awarding benefits and preferences based on race, not the use of the word “preference” to describe the practice.
Sometimes preferentialists are literally in denial. Thus, at the CMU debate Reginald Turner, president of the National Bar Association, went so far as to assert, “You find no preference for African-American students.”
If that were the case Mr. Turner would have nothing to fear from MCRI, since it would then ban nothing.
“You find no preference for African-American students.”
So it really is a question of open mental illness? Whatever else might be said about AA, no one can sanely deny that it entails preferring certain races over others. I love the way BAMN declares that ballot use of the word “preference” suddenly transforms AA into a “hot button issue.” Where have these people been for the past three to four decades anyway??
BAMN tried that same tacticts here in California when Prop 209 was on the ballot. Didn’t work here, either. Come November, I am hoping for BAMN’s worst nightmare – no more racial preferences in Michigan. Welcome to the 21st century.