For an unusually balanced article on the effects of California’s Proposition 209, precursor to the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative, see this column by Dawson Bell in the Detroit Free Press.
I found the following particularly interesting:
A summary of a recent poll, commissioned by opponents of 209, found that voters believe discrimination remains a problem and that government should do something about it.
David Mermin, who helped conduct the poll, said 15% of Californians responded that 209 had affected their lives negatively; 18% said the effect was positive, and 58% saw no difference.
But Paterson, a UC Berkeley-educated attorney, and other repeal advocates said public amnesia about 209 presents opponents with an opportunity to start fresh and avoid mistakes they made in 1996.
“The other side had a simple message,” Paterson said. “Discrimination is wrong; stop doing it. We never settled on a single message.”
The power of the message that “discrimination is wrong” is not its simplicity but its rightness, its resonance with the fundamental American principle that everyone should be treated “without regard” to race or religion.
In any event, the belief that government should “do something” about racial discrimination does not lead everyone, as it does so many liberals, to the belief that government should engage in racial discrimination.
UPDATE From Left Field [9 Sept.]
And from left field comes this opposing view.
In my view, all you need to know of it is that its authors describe Proposition 209, which barred state discrimination based on race or gender, as “the ballot initiative that ended equal opportunity programs in state employment, public education and public contracting.”
I hope the campaign debate over the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative makes it clear to any remaining doubters that advocates of racial preferences believe that “equal opportunity” now means racial discrimination.
