Affirmative Action: California Fights for Rights Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit ------------------------- Via Workers World News Service Reprinted from the November 13, 1997 issue of Workers World newspaper ------------------------- CALIFORNIANS MARCH FOR AFFIRMATIVE ACTION By Richard Becker Sacramento, Calif. A spirited and diverse crowd of more than 10,000 people marched and rallied outside the State Capitol in Sacramento, Calif., on Oct. 27 to support affirmative action. Unions, students, churches and community organizations mobilized an impressive turnout, especially for a weekday demonstration. The rally's central focus was the call to overturn the anti-affirmative-action Proposition 209, passed in 1996 by a margin of 54 percent to 46 percent. The implementation of Proposition 209 sharply reduced the number of African American and Latino students admitted to state universities this fall. This rollback of civil rights has engendered a new wave of resistance on campuses. Busloads of students from the University of California at Berkeley, San Francisco State University, and many other colleges and high schools joined the Oct. 27 march. Many marchers carried signs calling for an end to discrimination against Native people. Reservations in the state have become a special target of attack by Gov. Pete Wilson and Attorney General Dan Lundgren, who are attempting to shut down Indian casinos. Among the speakers at the rally were Native leaders Henry Duro and Priscilla Hunter, United Farm Workers President Arturo Rodriguez and Vice President Dolores Huerta, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, entertainer Casey Kasem, and the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who initiated the call for the march. A week after the rally, the U.S. Supreme Court continued on its path of upholding attacks on affirmative action by declining to hear a constitutional challenge to Proposition 209. On Nov. 3 the court let the anti-affirmative-action law stand. The legal fight against Proposition 209 will continue, with the case against it proceeding in the lower courts. But the Supreme Court ruling shows again that mass mobilizations like the Oct. 27 march in Sacramento are needed to defend affirmative action now more than ever. - END - (Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint granted if source is cited. For more information contact Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail: ww@workers.org. For subscription info send message to: info@workers.org. Web: http://workers.org) ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytrc-11.07.97-03:58:35-28628