One of the authors of the 1996 state initiative that banned the
consideration of race in state hiring will ask members of the
California Republican Party on Saturday not to endorse a
controversial initiative that would prohibit most state agencies
from collecting racial data. Thomas Wood, president of Americans
Against Discrimination and Preferences and co-writer of Proposition
209, wants the state to continue collection of racial data and
hopes voters will reject the Racial Privacy Initiative. He fears
that if they don’t, Proposition 209 could be difficult to
enforce. Californians will vote in March of 2004 on the Racial
Privacy Initiative, which, like Proposition 209, was a brain-child
of University of California Regent Ward Connerly. Wood will address
the Republican Party’s initiative committee at the annual GOP
state convention Saturday in Sacramento. The committee is currently
considering a resolution calling for the party’s endorsement
of the RPI. If passed in the committee, the resolution will be
voted on by a full board, which would likely vote with the
committee’s endorsement, Wood said. Given that the GOP will
also be choosing a new party chair and considering whether to
attempt to recall Democratic Gov. Gray Davis, Wood hopes his
opposition to an endorsement that might otherwise sail through does
not go overlooked. In 1996, the state GOP endorsed Proposition 209,
helping it to victory. Now Connerly, Wood and others are asking,
will the RPI get the same boost?
Opposition ““ now from both sides Many liberals and
moderates have already condemned the RPI. When the UC Student
Association voted to oppose the measure last summer, they derided
it as an “information ban.” Student Regent Dexter
Ligot-Gordon, who disagrees with both Proposition 209 and the RPI,
agrees with Wood’s idea that racial data is important.
“The thing that we agree upon (is) … we need the
information to enforce our laws,” Ligot-Gordon said. Wood,
who was once executive director of the California Association of
Scholars, said, “I’m an academic. The more information,
the better.” Wood’s specific argument is likely to
appeal to conservative voters. Wood asks: If the state cannot
collect racial data, how can it examine whether preferences in
hiring or university admissions are being granted to certain racial
groups? “You’re going to unravel Proposition 209 if you
vote for this thing,” he said. He sees no connection between
the elimination of race as a factor in hiring and admissions and
the banning of data collection. In fact, he argues that such data
is needed to ensure the groups that Proposition 209 seeks to
protect are not discriminated against. Connerly said Proposition
209 can be enforced without racial data collection because alleged
violations would have to be examined on a case-by-case basis. He
added that Wood does not really understand what the RPI is about.
The intent of the RPI, Connerly said, is not to prevent the state
from using racial preferences but to change how Californians view
the concept of race itself. People will vote for the RPI “if
(they) believe government should move away from these little boxes
and let us be individuals,” Connerly said. But Connerly does
not have overwhelming support ““Â even from those who
supported him in 1996. Proposition 209’s second author, Glynn
Custred, an anthropology professor at California State University,
Hayward, has chosen not to take a public stance. There are points
to both Connerly’s and Wood’s arguments, he said.
Custred is not even sure how he’ll vote himself.
The UCLA example Much of Wood’s argument rests on UCLA
admissions figures. In a draft report citing multiple studies,
including research conducted by UCLA statistics Professor Richard
Berk, Wood argues that in the four years between the end of
affirmative action and beginning of comprehensive review,
admissions figures in 2002 may suggest the university improperly
employed affirmative action. When applicants’ academic
qualifications are equal, Wood writes, Asian students were admitted
at lower rates than whites, whereas black and Latino students fared
substantially better than whites. “Before comprehensive
review, ethnicity was in fact an important predictor of who was
admitted to UCLA,” Berk said. After mentioning other studies
that found racial preferences were used at medical schools, Wood
writes in the report that “the foregoing statistics are
probably grounds for a lawsuit.” If race admissions data was
not kept, Asians and whites would perhaps not be protected as they
should under Proposition 209, Wood said. The report states there is
no proof the UC broke the law, but a court could decide the UC
would have to prove it complied with Proposition 209 if a case was
filed. While Wood’s figures can raise suspicions, it would be
difficult to prove the UC violated the law. Before comprehensive
review was used for undergraduates applying to the fall 2002 term,
all applicants were evaluated using multiple criteria. A portion of
students were judged by a process essentially equivalent to
comprehensive review. The complexity of the UC admissions process
makes it unreasonable to look for discrimination by looking only at
race and academic scores of an applicant group, Connerly said.
Other than race, “there might be a host of reasons why the
university selected “˜Student A’ over “˜Student
B’ under comprehensive review,” Connerly said. If the
RPI passes next year, it would not change UC admissions policies.
Currently the university blacks out racial information before
passing applications on to officials. “As it stands now, it
does not take into account race or ethnicity,” said UC press
aide Luvonne Luquis. Applicants can voluntarily include information
revealing their race in personal statements, which could continue
even if the RPI becomes law. Connerly said while this makes it
possible for an admissions officer to use preferences, if an
applicant ever had reason to suspect discrimination, a case should
be filed for reasons specific to that individual ““ rather
than broad trends. “If you file a case, you file it on the
basis of your own experiences,” he said.