Civil Rights Initiative Upheld

Good news yesterday for the Colorado Civil Rights Initiative (CCRI). The Detroit News reports that a federal court has rejected legal attempts to undo the same sort of measure that was recently approved by Michigan voters:

A federal judge Tuesday upheld the constitutionality of a Michigan law that prohibits racial and gender preferences in government hiring and public university admissions.

“To impugn the motives of 58 (percent) of Michigan’s electorate, in the absence of extraordinary circumstances which do not exist here, simply is not warranted on this record,” U.S. District Judge David Lawson wrote.

Michigan voters approved the constitutional amendment known as Proposal 2 in November 2006.

Several groups — including the NAACP and By Any Means Necessary — as well as minority high school and college students challenged the measure, saying it would reduce minority enrollment in public universities.

Among the arguments in the lawsuits was that Proposal 2 violated the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution as well as federal statutes.

Lawson rejected the claim. “The Court believes that Michigan may limit the ability of discrete groups to secure an advantage based upon a racial classification without offending the Fourteenth Amendment,” he wrote.

Petitions already have been submitted for CCRI to make the state ballot here. As a result, Colorado voters likely will be deciding this November whether they want to outlaw state-sponsored discrimination “on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin.”