Affirmative Action the Best Way to Achieve a Colorblind Society
Nov. 07, 2006— -- Supporters of a ballot initiative in Michigan -- Proposition 2 -- have waged a tough campaign to ban the use of race or sexin employment and college admissions.
Its defenders say they want a colorblind society.
But intruth, affirmative action is one of the best ways toachieve it.
There are at least five reasons for defendingaffirmative action.
First, it has helped integratethe United States, bringing millions of women into positionsof authority and providing role models for countlessyoung people. It has been a factor in theAfrican-American middle-class reachingunprecedented levels in recent decades.
Affirmativeaction has diversified the nation's work force,provided a leg up to the underprivileged and allowedpeople to learn from those who have differentbackgrounds.
Second, a ban on affirmative action will havedivisive and exclusionary consequences.
Ten yearsafter former University of California's Regent WardConnerly led the effort to abolish affirmative actionthrough California's initiative process, only 96blacks gained admittance to UCLA -- or 2 percent of thefreshman class -- in 2006. That's a step in the wrongdirection.
The third reason to defeat Proposition 2 is that foesof affirmative action have targeted the wrong program.
If we want to talk about fairness, why not abolish theadvantages that certain students -- athletes andchildren of alumni, for starters -- receive on theircollege applications? Why not do more to promotecollege loans for low-income students of allethnicities and races, and expand initiatives thatretrain the unemployed so they can find new jobs?
The fourth reason we should support affirmative actionis that it implicitly recognizes that racism is stilla fact of American life. There is racism in politicsand people of prejudice in powerful positions in ourdemocracy.
In Tennessee, for instance, the Republican NationalCommittee offered innuendo about black men and whitewomen intermingling when it aired a racist commercialshowing a scantily clad white woman telling Rep.Harold Ford Jr. --
Matthew Dallek, a former Democratic speechwriter onCapitol Hill, is the author of "The Right Moment:Ronald Reagan's First Victory and the Decisive TurningPoint in American Politics."
