Group Sues Atlanta Over Its Affirmative Action Program

A nationwide anti-affirmative action group sued Atlanta on Thursday for its policy of setting aside a third of city contracts for female- and minority-owned businesses.

The Southeastern Legal Foundation had threatened the federal suit for months, while Mayor Bill Campbell and other black politicians vowed to fight “to the death.”

Atlanta, birthplace of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and a proud symbol of black economic achievement, started the program in 1975 under Maynard Jackson, the city’s first black mayor.

Campbell, who as a child was the first black to integrate a North Carolina school system, has previously likened the foundation to the Ku Klux Klan.

“The program has strengthened our economy and helped remedy past and present discrimination,” Campbell said Thursday. “Diversity and equal opportunity have made our city appealing and great.”

The foundation’s president, Matthew J. Glavin, began his challenge on June 14 with a letter to Campbell demanding that the city abandon the program or face a lawsuit.

On Thursday, Glavin said he was still willing to negotiate, though he said any settlement would require that the city abolish the program.

In 1995, the Supreme Court curtailed the federal government’s freedom to give special help to racial minorities. Affirmative action foes argue that set-asides hand out work on the basis of race and are therefore unconstitutional.

In a key 1989 decision, the court struck down a Richmond, Va., affirmative-action plan and made it far more difficult for communities nationwide to set aside certain percentages of jobs, construction contracts or other sought-after treatment for racial minorities.