Polls in California and nationwide suggest that women are much more critical of sex and race preferences than was suggested by their voting in last November’s election. Fighting for their political lives, feminists have launched a public-relations campaign that they hope will prove Assembly Speaker Willie Brown correct when he says that women will kill the proposed California “civil rights initiative” and save affirmative action. Last month, members of the National Organization for Women marched to the White House to support affirmative action; this month, they gathered 50,000 strong on the Mall to rally against everything from the “contract with America” to efforts to end preferential treatment on the basis of race of sex.
As a single professional woman, I have found the feminists’ unwavering endorsement of preferences bewildering. Why would women whose movement was founded on the presumption that women are as capable as men continue to demand special treatment? The notion that women need more from government than enforcement of anti-discrimination laws is paternalism. I have never seen a case where a woman who wanted to enter a particular profession was prevented from doing so because of her sex. So I was happy to be invited to testify on behalf of the Independent Women’s Forum at the congressional hearing on affirmative action earlier this month.
The atmosphere in the hearing room was tense. Professional feminists, adorned with anti-Gingrich buttons, dominated the audience, cheering wildly for panelists such as Mary Frances Berry, head of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. Giving an animated, if not agitated, defense of affirmative action, Berry warned of those who wanted to “turn back the clock” and cast aside gains of the civil-rights movement.
While Berry’s appeal for maintaining group preferences might have struck an inclusive theme 25 years ago, today the message sounded polarizing and divisive. She casually used pejorative phrases such as lily white in describing those who oppose affirmative action and was unapologetic, and even giggled, about employing the epithet when pressed by Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.). Perhaps most disturbing, however, was her statement that if people were judged only on objective, merit-based criteria such as standardized tests, “Asians and Jewish-Americans would hold the best jobs everywhere.” My initial reaction was, so what? Why should any of us be bothered if Jews and Asians–both groups that have suffered discrimination–occupy a disproportionate number of important positions in the workforce? Should we not judge them by the “content of their character” rather than on their ethnic heritage? Her comments suggest that her advocacy of group preferences is motivated not only by a desire to see that women and certain minorities succeed, but also by a hostility toward those who have succeeded despite pervasive discrimination.
Yet instead of gasps from the predominantly feminist audience at these remarks, most nodded and murmured in agreement. And when I took issue with Berry, Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) called my remarks demagogic. How is it demagoguery for women to be for equal opportunity based on merit and individual talent? Were the original feminists who espoused such ideals and told us that women can succeed if given an equal shot also demagogues?
Frank exemplifies the refusal of most affirmative-action advocates to engage in a reasoned exchange on group preferences. Frank could not even bring himself to acknowledge the pervasiveness of sex and race preferences, despite the 100 or so federal regulations containing such preferences. His allies simultaneously maintained, however, that removing these preferences would–you guessed it–”turn back the clock.” Reps. Jose Serrano (D-N.Y.) and John Conyers (D-Mich.) interrupted and snapped at panelists such as Manhattan Institute scholar Linda Chavez, who bemoaned the fact that her son, from a privileged upbringing, was offered university scholarships simply because he checked the “Hispanic” box on his applications.
The questions by the Democratic lawmakers symbolize the lack of a coherent intellectual or moral basis for maintaining the federal crazy-quilt of preferences, goals and timetables. Feminist leaders should examine their dogmatic adherence to policies with such a flimsy foundation, policies not even supported by the constituency they claim to represent.