| Civil Rights Initiative more Complex than Black and White Part 1 of a 3-part series on the Missouri Civil Rights Initiative By Christopher Fischer The Pointe Staff October 17th, 2007 A storm is brewing in the form of a lawsuit over the wording of a ballot title. The Missouri Civil Rights Initiative (MoCRI) filed a legal challenge this summer against Secretary of State Robin Carnahan for altering the wording on a ballot issue submitted to her office by the group in July. Summarizing a ballot initiative with a ballot title is common practice, but Tim Asher, Director of MoCRI says, “her directive is to prepare ballot title language that is neither intentionally argumentative nor likely to create prejudice. “Misleading statements like this ballot title are standard practice for those who support preferences and unequal treatment,” he said. The wording recommended by the Missouri Civil Rights Initiative for the November 2008 ballot reads,
The Secretary of State’s wording which Asher and MoCRI oppose reads, The court date is scheduled for December 17, although Asher says it’s anyone’s guess as to whether anyone from the Secretary of State’s office will be in court that day. “She won’t sit for a deposition nor will she provide anyone from her office to sit for one,” said Asher, who is being deposed next week. The Missouri Civil Rights Initiative is part of a larger movement spearheaded by Ward Connerly, a political figure from California who has had success with similar ballot issues in California, Washington state and Michigan. Connerly plans a “Super Tuesday” vote coinciding with the General Election in November 2008 which will include Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Colorado and Arizona. Lee Cokorinos, a columnist for the Equal Justice Society, calls these initiatives “right wing money ballot issues.” “This would turn the clock back in terms of race relations,” said Cokorinos. The Equal Justice Society bills itself as a “national advocacy group…advancing racial and social justice through law and public policy, communication and the arts, and alliance building.” “You have to take a look at who’s at the top,” said Cokorinos, adding that a very small number of “rich white men” were behind the large amount of money Connerly commands. Familiar names of donors to Connerly’s American Civil Rights Movement in California included San Diego Padres owner John Moores, Sr., News Corporation Rupert Murdoch, late Colorado beer magnate Joseph Coors, and Kansas City conservative political player John Uhlmann, all of whom have donated amounts in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to Connerly and his agenda. “That’s common to most ballot measures,” said Asher, citing the Stem Cell Research initiative voters approved in Missouri last year, where the majority of the money came from two individuals. Cokorinos believes some of the motivation relates to other political plans. “Race is a wedge issue, and the reason Jeb Bush didn’t want this sort of thing on the ballot in Florida is that he was worried it would bring more Democrats out to the polls,” Cokorinos said, referring to several years ago, when the Florida legislature pre-empted efforts by Connerly’s group and passed their own protections against race-preferential treatment in college admissions. Texas rejected putting a similar measure on the ballot in 1999, and instead came up with a compromise. The top 15 percent of students from all high schools in the state get a scholarship for their college education. Asher believes that this solution is better than nothing. “At least it’s a solution that is race neutral,” said Asher. He is no stranger to the issue of Affirmative Action as it relates to higher education. Asher was the Director of Admissions for North Central Missouri College, where he recruited from all over Missouri. It was then that he first became aware of what he calls race-preferential admissions practices. “I tried to change things that I saw as unfair. My supervisor put a halt to my efforts and effectively, well he didn’t renew my contract at the next available opportunity,” said Asher. It was then that he got in touch with Connerly’s organization. “Within weeks of my leaving, the college changed their admissions policies,” he added. Asher says the idea behind the Civil Rights Initiative is that one can’t just judge diversity by a single attribute such as skin color. “We all have different backgrounds, come from different places, have different hobbies and interests,” he said. “That is what diversity is.” He feels that the passage of this initiative will end reverse discrimination in the workplace and public contracting as well as education. Cokorinos disagrees. “My major problem with all of this is that it will be a reversal of the inclusiveness and diversity progress that has been made since these programs were put in to place,” he said. “Public services and contracts that were available only to whites for two hundred years were opened up to everyone with Affirmative Action, and the question we have to ask is, ‘do we want public agencies to serve and reflect the diversity of their citizens?’” Asher argues that Affirmative Action wouldn’t go away just because of the proposed amendment. He just wants to remove the preferences based on race and sex, he says. But before he and MoCRI can do that, they have to get the required number of signatures for their ballot by May 4 of 2008. And they can’t begin until a court decision is handed down regarding the ballot language. See the next edition of The Pointe for part two in this series, featuring an interview with Ward Connerly of the American Civil Rights Initiative Back to home page... |
