Woman Named to Anti-Affirmative Action Campaign

The new chairman of the troubled initiative campaign to quash affirmative action programs in California sought to widen the effort’s appeal Wednesday, appointing a woman as his statewide co-chair and distancing the campaign from anyone who supports it out of bigotry or “bad will.”

Sacramento businessman Ward Connerly’s move, announced at a Los Angeles news conference, was the latest salvo in the battle by supporters and opponents of the anti-affirmative action measure known as the California Civil Rights Initiative to make their positions more palatable to a wider range of voters.

Connerly’s announcement that Bay Area attorney Pamela Lewis will become a co-chair of the campaign means that two of the more public leaders of the effort will play against type: Connerly, who took over as chairman of the initiative campaign one month ago, is black, and Lewis is a woman and a Democrat.

Lewis could not have been more pointed about the symbolism of her presence.

“If it isn’t clear to you already, it should be: This issue is not an angry white man’s issue,” she said in her opening remarks.

The event was strikingly symmetrical with a news conference held last week by opponents of the initiative. In warning then that a clause in the measure would allow discrimination against women and girls, the opponents touted the presence in their ranks of Republican businesswomen.

The initiative will be on the November ballot if supporters can gather almost 700,000 valid voter signatures by late February.

Because the campaign is just beginning, neither side appears to have made major gains across enemy lines. Although some Republican women have come to the aid of initiative opponents, the major movers against it remain largely liberal-leaning civil rights organizations and women’s groups.

And despite Connerly’s announcement Wednesday, activist proponents remain largely conservative and Republican. Connerly, for example, was appointed to the UC Board of Regents by Gov. Pete Wilson and led the fight there against affirmative action. A former GOP state chairman is an initiative vice chairman, and the campaign’s finance director is a high-ranking San Diego County Republican.

Organizers of the anti-affirmative action measure are trying to break beyond partisan boundaries, in part to avoid accusations that they are playing on the emotional and divisive turf of racial politics. They have cited last year’s Proposition 187, the controversial anti-illegal immigrant measure, as a campaign they do not want to emulate.

In keeping with that, Connerly repeatedly tried to reach out to others in his remarks.

“We all know that our society is not colorblind,” he said. “We know that there is still discrimination in our society and I think that most reasonable people want to wipe that from the face of the land.

“I can tell you this: I have not met anyone in the last year as I have fought this issue that I believe is really a bigot. I know they’re there, but I haven’t met anybody that I would put into that category.

“I am not worried about this campaign being polluted by people of bad will. But I can say this to you: If there are those people there, we don’t want them.”

A spokeswoman for the campaign against the measure emphasized that her group is diverse and has attracted the support of myriad women’s and civil rights groups, including the usually nonpartisan YWCA.

“Obviously, [Connerly] doesn’t want voters to know about the impact this is going to have on women and girls,” said Katherine Spillar, national coordinator for the Feminist Majority and a leader in the anti-initiative effort. The initiative “is going to gut those laws [protecting equal rights] and he wants to deflect attention going to the impact this is going to have.”

The initiative says that neither the state nor any government entity shall “discriminate against or grant preferential treatment” to anyone in public employment, public education or public contracting.

Its supporters argue that it would restore fairness to government operations and would curb affirmative action programs that discriminate against non-favored groups. Opponents counter that affirmative action programs are needed to assure the rights of women and minorities in the face of workplace discrimination.

The opponents also argue that a clause in the measure would allow discrimination against women and girls that is currently outlawed under the state Constitution. USC law professor Erwin Chemerinsky said in a report that the initiative would “substantially lessen the protection against gender discrimination” that California women currently have.

In his news conference Wednesday, Connerly said that recent fund-raising gains had put the initiative campaign on solid financial footing after months in limbo. Although he would not specify how much money the campaign has on hand, Connerly said last week that $500,000 had come in in the last three weeks.

“This campaign is alive and well,” he said.

About half of the needed signatures have been collected, Connerly said, and the remainder are to be collected by the end of January. That schedule would allow organizers three weeks to collect “insurance” signatures to make sure the measure reaches the ballot.