CALABASAS : Soka to Offer Talk on Civil Rights ‘Myths’

Linda Chavez, who headed the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights under President Reagan, is unrepentant that, after all these years, she is still politically incorrect.

The Democrat-turned-Republican makes no apologies for having been a Latina torch-bearer for an English-only law or for being a longtime foe of affirmative action. “My mother says I have been stubborn since I was 2 years old,” she said.

Chavez, who will speak at Soka University next Wednesday said in a telephone interview that she welcomes a preview article because it “might generate some controversy and bring a few more people out.”

Her free talk, “The Civil Rights Movement: Rethinking Core Myths and Biases,” is part of the Calabasas school’s lecture series on human rights. She is the author of “Out of the Barrio: Toward a New Politics of Hispanic Assimilation.” Reservations are recommended. For information, call the school at (818) 878-3780.

These days the 48-year-old Chavez heads the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Equal Opportunity, which she founded to move the country “toward a society in which race/ethnicity is not the most important factor in deciding who gets a job or gets into a school.”

She tried for years, she said, to spur debate on affirmative action, to no avail. Even the conservative Reagan ducked the issue, she said, fearing a backlash.

“People don’t like racial preferences. The public has been consistent on this issue. What’s changed is . . . a lot of political leaders are saying things like I’ve been saying for a long time.”

As executive director of the Civil Rights Commission, she barnstormed the nation between 1987 and 1988, pushing for a national English-only law. Some called the idea an insult to Latinos. Chavez argued that most Latinos in the United States speak English as their primary language.

Her outspoken views have earned her enemies, however.

“Some people I know truly hate her,” said Dennis Falcon, a research associate with the Tomas Rivera Research Center at Claremont Graduate School, where he is enrolled in a Ph.D. program. “I wouldn’t be surprised if people picket the woman.”

Falcon, a Latino, says he is more “forgiving,” but disagrees with Chavez on affirmative action. A high-school dropout, Falcon says he felt fortunate to have been admitted to Cal State Long Beach under an affirmative action program.

Chavez, who grew up in a working-class family in Albuquerque, N.M., says: “One of the things that has always bothered me is that a whole lot of liberals engage in affirmative action out of noblesse oblige. I don’t like being on the receiving end of that. I want to be judged based on my own effort. I’m perfectly capable of competing.”