3 States Poised to Vote on Affirmative Action
By PETER SCHMIDT
State organizations affiliated with Ward Connerly’s American Civil Rights Institute said this month they had gathered more than enough signatures to get measures limiting affirmative-action preferences on the November ballots in Arizona and Nebraska.
With petitions submitted on behalf of a similar ballot measure in Colorado in March, there appears to be a good chance that three states will vote this fall on the proposals, all of which would bar public colleges and other state and local agencies from granting affirmative-action preferences in employment, contracts, and decisions related to education.
Mr. Connerly, the institute’s chairman, hoped to put similar measures on the ballots in Missouri and Oklahoma as well, but his organizations in those states failed to gather enough signatures before deadlines earlier this year.
Mr. Connerly’s Arizona organization, the Arizona Civil Rights Initiative, announced that it had submitted more than 330,000 petition signatures to state officials, well over 100,000 more than required under state law. His Nebraska organization, the Nebraska Civil Rights Initiative, announced that it had submitted more than 167,000 signatures, or at least 54,000 more than required.
A group that has opposed Mr. Connerly’s efforts, the Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration, and Immigrant Rights and Fight for Equality by Any Means Necessary, announced that it would file a lawsuit alleging that the petition signatures in Arizona had been gathered fraudulently. The group has filed a similar legal challenge in Colorado.