Class Challenges Affirmative-Action Ban
SAN FRANCISCO (CN) - In a federal class action, Hispanic and black students say California Proposition 209's ban on affirmative action "has created a racial caste system" by admitting a disproportionate number of white and Asian students into the University of California system.
The class compares Prop. 209 to the Tuskegee experiment - in which the government left poor black sharecroppers with untreated syphilis, so it could study the progression of the fatal disease - and Plessy v. Ferguson's notorious "separate but equal" ruling. It claims that Prop. 209 passed in 1996 only because California's white majority electorate "overrode the overwhelming opposition" of minority voters. "Proposition 209 promised a 'color blind' Constitution. But that was and is a lie," the complaint states. It says that Prop. 209 actually "has been the sentry at the gate, denying the plaintiffs the chance for an equal and integrated education as promised by the Fourteenth Amendment."
The class compares Prop. 209 to the Tuskegee experiment - in which the government left poor black sharecroppers with untreated syphilis, so it could study the progression of the fatal disease - and Plessy v. Ferguson's notorious "separate but equal" ruling. It claims that Prop. 209 passed in 1996 only because California's white majority electorate "overrode the overwhelming opposition" of minority voters. "Proposition 209 promised a 'color blind' Constitution. But that was and is a lie," the complaint states. It says that Prop. 209 actually "has been the sentry at the gate, denying the plaintiffs the chance for an equal and integrated education as promised by the Fourteenth Amendment."
Also called the California Civil Rights Initiative, the campaign for Prop. 209 was led by African-American UC Regent Ward Connerly, an opponent of affirmative action and racial preferences, which he claims actually discriminate against minorities.
This class action, led by the Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration and Immigrant Rights and Fight for Equality by Any Means Necessary (BAMN), claims Prop. 209 discriminates against poor minority