by Steve Thomas
Staff Writer
More than 23 years ago, when the Civil Rights Movement was moving, a conference was held to discuss affirmative action. Although time has passed, some Houston-area professionals say they see a new war against civil rights in the form of anti-affirmative action legislation and court decisions.
"In the Civil Rights Movement, what we fought for was equality, and what we settled for was affirmative action," said Valory Harvey, president of the California Association of Equal Rights Professionals.
Texas' and California's anti-affirmative action programs seemed to highlight the 23rd annual conference, titled "Kaleidoscope: Visioning for the Future," of the American Association for Affirmative Action held in Houston last week.
Criticism focused on the Hopwood vs. Texas decision, which led to the abolition of race-based admissions selections, and the California Civil Rights Initiative, also known as California Proposition 209, which outlaws using race or gender in hiring and contracting for public programs and for college admissions.
The seminar on Hopwood, presented by Barbara Arnwine, executive director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights under Law, and Barry Shapiro, founder of Managing Diversity Successfully and Preventing Sexual Harassment, a management consulting firm, was popular with Texas professionals who have had to deal with Hopwood and its effects directly.
"The number of Latinos and African-Americans applying to schools in California and Texas is dropping," Arnwine said. "The University of Texas has only five African-American and Latino students in a class size of 50. That is just the number of people accepted, not enrolled. We have the possibility and probability of seeing zero minority students enrolled. Take away affirmative action and you have resegregation."
Arnwine's lecture was titled "Locked up or Locked Out, the defense of affirmative action in the late 1990s." She stated her discussion was a reflection of how minorities are either locked up or locked out of opportunity in today's society.
"We have a society in serious trouble," Arnwine said. "Who would have thought in the late 1990s we would have fair-housing discrimination, Hopwood, Proposition 209 and Texaco? We are talking about the future progress of minorities in our society."
Shapiro also discussed strategies for defeating anti-affirmative action measures.
"We need to do more public relations work on the principles of affirmative action," Shapiro said. "Our opposition has snowed people. We need to stop the misinformation conducted by our enemies to portray affirmative action as a preference. We need to portray it as a public policy issue."
After the seminar, U.S. Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee spoke at the awards luncheon about affirmative action and the perspective from Washington.
"Hopwood was a narrow decision," Lee said. "There is still lots of work to be done. But I think people realize diversity is better for everyone and affirmative action opens doors."
The seminar ended with Arnwine addressing the hype of Hopwood and Proposition 209. "Don't believe the hype. Keep working hard. We can win. Don't allow people to break down your spirit. At next year's conference we will have some victories to celebrate."