California Voters to Revisit Affirmative Action - Higher Education: SACRAMENTO, Calif.—The fight over affirmative action in California’s higher education system is coming back.
Under a proposed constitutional amendment that passed the Senate on Thursday, voters would reconsider affirmative action programs at the University of California and California State University systems on the November ballot. SCA5 would remove certain prohibitions in place since 1996, when voters approved Proposition 209.
That initiative made California the first state to ban the use of race and ethnicity in public university admissions as well as state hiring and contracting.
The amendment under consideration in the Legislature would delete provisions in Proposition 209 that prohibit the state from giving preferential treatment in public education to individuals and groups based on race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin.
