California wants to restore positive discrimination

According to the new plan, the old Amendment 209 will be excluded from the California Constitution prohibiting state and private institutions from granting privileges to state residents based on their gender and race, writes LA Times.

Photo: Shutterstock

Democrat Shirley Weber of San Diego has proposed voting in the November 2020 election to repeal the 1996 California Constitutional Amendment that abolished affirmative action. After an emotional debate, the California State Assembly approved the proposal.

California voters will be asked to vote on whether to repeal a 24-year ban on affirmative action policies. Supporters of the measure see it as critical in the context of the national push for racial justice. The measure would repeal California's Amendment 209, which prohibits public and private institutions from granting benefits to individuals based on their race or gender.

This means that after the abolition of this amendment to colleges and to work in California, African Americans, Hispanics and women will be the first to be accepted.

The 1996 amendment caused intense controversy, primarily related to the admission of applicants to higher education institutions. Its current opponents believe it has contributed to widening social inequalities in education and employment and disadvantaged African Americans and Latinos. Assemblywoman Shirley Weber (D-San Diego) said that “the coronavirus pandemic and ongoing police violence against Black people highlight deep-rooted social inequalities and serious flaws in our laws and prove that race and gender are still play a huge role in the lives of Americans."

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The Assembly approved a new constitutional amendment, ACA 5, which will move to the state Senate shortly. The Senate will vote on her confirmation on June 25, 2020, after which she will be placed on the official ballot on November 3, 2020. Only two Republican lawmakers opposed the proposed amendment. Republican Rep. Stephen Choi of Irvine said that "giving privileges based on race is itself racist, and giving privileges based on gender is sexist." Republican Rep. James Gallagher of Yuba said ACA 5 still won't end racial discrimination in the education system because unions won't allow bad teachers to be fired in poor areas and they continue to provide poor quality instruction in public schools.

“We can go on and on about the importance of affirmative action for getting racial and sexual minorities into college and employment, but it will do nothing to help black and Hispanic children graduate from high school and obtain a basic education,” Gallagher said. “The problem is much more complex and lies in the fact that minorities are often deprived of the opportunity to receive a quality school education.”

Despite Republican objections, more than twenty Assembly members said the 1996 amendment was as outdated as the 1996 campaign promise to create a society "without racial privilege."

“Amendment 209 did not eliminate racism in society,” said Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez (D-San Diego), pointing out that pre-1996 affirmative action policies helped her get a law degree.

“It is clear that many black and Latino children are not able to obtain a higher education right now because they do not have the privilege of going to college,” she added.

An overwhelming majority of Assembly members supported asking state voters to reconsider negative attitudes toward affirmative action policies. The current unanimity stands in stark contrast to the atmosphere in the 2014 Assembly, when an attempt to repeal an outdated amendment caused significant divisions in the Capitol. Some lawmakers backed away after advocates warned that a return to affirmative action would make it harder for Asian students to get into college. The same arguments were heard at the end of today's two-hour debate. Campbell Democrat Evan Lowe said the majority of constituents who called his office urged him to vote against ACA 5. He said Chinese Americans believe that “those who worked hard and did well in school deserve to go to college.” " However, other lawmakers said the Asian American community's views on the topic are less clear.

“Some opponents of the new amendment are trying to convince us that all Asian Americans are against affirmative action, but that is not true at all,” said San Francisco lawmaker David Chiu. “I constantly hear from my constituents that they want to see more like-minded teachers, school principals, university presidents and firefighters, and more bilingual police officers.” But current legislation prevents this."

The possibility of amending existing legislation was already discussed in 2017. Then Asian-American state legislators asked gubernatorial candidates, including Gavin Newsom, to consider whether the race of college applicants should be taken into account. Newsom and other Democratic candidates have spoken out in support of affirmative action policies, while Republicans have been cagey.

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The "affirmative action" policy proposed by the University of California, Davis, is one of the most frequently discussed topics in California. In 1978, the US Supreme Court upheld it. In 1995, conservative activists decided the state electorate would support its repeal and drafted a ballot measure to ban it in the state Constitution. Proposition 209 proposed prohibiting any attempt to grant privileges to state residents based on their gender or race. The project was approved on November 5, 1996 with the support of 55% of voters. Since then, a large number of scientific studies have been conducted that analyze the results of the adoption of this amendment. Its opponents firmly believe that it has failed to eliminate racial, gender and economic discrimination. Representative Weber, who represents the Democratic Party and helped create a number of bills to eradicate social inequality, believes that in the early 1990s California provided significant assistance to entrepreneurs of color and women entrepreneurs. However, this positive trend disappeared after the passage of Amendment 209.

“Certainly, repealing Amendment 209 will not solve all the problems,” she said. “But this is one of the tools we have to use to prove that California is a land of great opportunity.”

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