A Proactive Progressivism
Rather than playing Whack-A-Mole with conservative ballot initiatives, Colorado activists are trying to get voters to say “yes” to affirmative action.
By Erica Williams
August 6, 2008
Erica Williams, Policy and Advocacy Manager at Campus ProgressFor years, progressives have been playing whack-a-mole with ballot initiatives in state after state. That is, instead of using their time and resources to proactively push for proposals, progressives have been repeatedly forced to fight against anti-progressive initiatives proposed by cynical conservatives. They have been largely unsuccessful in their efforts to beat back attacks on civil rights, reproductive rights, labor rights, and gay rights. Such attacks will continue—until the left throws a wrench in the conservative game plan.
The good news is that in Colorado, a state that’s been targeted for an anti-affirmative action ballot initiative, they’re starting to. Colorado progressives have proposed their own grassroots pro-affirmative action ballot initiative called Amendment 82.
If passed, Amendment 82 would prohibit discrimination and preferential treatment based on race, gender, ethnicity, or religion. It would also define "preferential treatment" as adopting quotas or awarding points based only on race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin. That way, certain identifiers can still be taken into consideration in decisions about public employment, education, and contracting. They just can’t be the only factor.
The amendment would also preserve the state’s right to establish or maintain eligibility for a federal program based on these identifiers and protect court-ordered remedies to discrimination in civil rights cases. In other words, Amendment 82 protects and advances the original intent and integrity of affirmative action programming: to promote equal opportunity. And even more importantly, it gives progressives a positive, proactive message around which to organize and mobilize.
(illustration by Matt Bors)Affirmative action has already lost a lot of ground in California and Michigan to anti-affirmative action poster-child Ward Connerly. Arizona and Nebraska are also facing anti-affirmative action initiatives this fall. Activists in Colorado expect their pro-affirmative action campaign to be more effective than a “vote no” campaign against Connerly’s initiative. And let’s hope so.
Progressives often fall short on a “vote no” strategy—not just on affirmative action defeats in California and Michigan, but on a number of other stalwart progressive issues that have taken a state-by-state beating over the past decade.
Ballots this fall show a frightening number of anti-choice, anti-gay marriage, and anti-affirmative action initiatives across the country. The conservative ballot strategy could be losing steam due to years of deceptive practices, divisive messaging, and an overall national ideological shift.
According to the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center, progressives are now realizing the value of “yes” campaigns as a tool in pushing a pro-progressive policy agenda on issues like health care, civil rights, renewable energy, economic security, and stem cell research.
Winning a “vote no” campaign is particularly difficult when faced with widespread lack of education and deception about the issue at stake. For affirmative action, equal opportunity proponents spend valuable time and resources debunking myths. It takes time to explain to a voter that that the “civil rights” initiative proposed by Connerly is the opposite of furthering civil rights. But a counter initiative, like Amendment 82, allows progressives to set their own terms, giving voters a clear picture of what they stand to gain by supporting affirmative action.
A “vote yes” campaign could be just the nudge that the progressive movement needs to end its reactive streak and to reclaim the high ground on pro-civil rights, pro-women’s rights, pro-children’s rights, and many other proactive, progressive issues.
Erica Williams is the Policy and Advocacy Manager at Campus Progress.
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These anti-affirmative action initiatives have been fraudulently misrepresented. Voters on initiatives need what legislators get: public hearings, expert testimony, amendments, reports, etc. The best project for such deliberative process is the National Initiative for Democracy, led by former Sen. Mike Gravel: Vote.org.. Also healthydemocracyoreg… and cirwa.org
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