When California Took the Lead on Civil Rights

As they face a “billionaire tax” and choose a new governor, Californians might recall the time they took the lead in civil rights. Items missing from the November 3 ballot, on the other hand, offer possibilities to regain national leadership in significant ways.

Californians are as diverse as they come but 30 years ago they rejected a racist system of college admissions. The California Civil Rights Initiative (CCRI), Proposition 209 on the November 5, 1996, ballot, ended racial and ethnic preferences in state education, employment, and contracting. The measure passed 54 to 46 percent, and the disaster opponents predicted never occurred.

As longtime California resident Thomas Sowell showed in Intellectuals and Race, minority enrollment increased at University of California campuses beyond Berkeley and UCLA. The number of African-American and Hispanic students graduating from the UC system went up, including a 55 percent increase in those graduating in four years with a GPA of 3.5 or higher.

And contrary to common belief, CCRI did not end “affirmative action.”

Under CCRI, state colleges and universities could still cast the widest possible net for admissions and extend a hand to students on an economic basis. What they could not do was admit students on the basis of skin color and ethnic ancestry.

These realities were lost on recurring Gov. Jerry Brown, then out of office. As state attorney general, Brown claimed Proposition 209 violated the U.S. Constitution because it goes beyond the federal Equal Protection Clause in outlawing preferences and discrimination. The courts, and the people, didn’t think so.

In all his time in public life, Jerry Brown never once cited Sowell, author of books such as The Economics and Politics of Race, Affirmative Action Around the World, and Basic Economics. Neither did Brown’s protégé, Gavin Newsom, who boasts ties to the Brown, Pelosi and Getty families.

In 2020, Gov. Newsom supported Proposition 16, which would have repealed Proposition 209. Californians rejected the measure by a margin of 57.23 to 42.77, greater than the margin of victory in 1996. In 2023, Gov. Newsom badmouthed CCRI even after the U.S. Supreme Court restricted race-based admissions.

On Gov. Newsom’s watch, the University of California built a vast DEI bureaucracy. UCLA created a vice chancellor for “equity, diversity, and inclusion” with a salary of $440,000 and UC Santa Barbara offered $430,000 for a DEI administrator. Dismantling that wasteful bureaucracy is not the only way California could restore leadership.

As they ponder the billionaire tax, Proposition 40 on the November 3 ballot, they might recall the , Proposition 13 from 1978. After it passed in a landslide, Gov. Brown proclaimed himself a “born-again tax cutter,” which was never true. The recurring governor, who ran for president three times, bequeathed a state with some of the highest income and sales taxes in the nation.

Gov. Newsom provided no relief, and the people pushed back with the , which in the style of Proposition 13 gave voters final approval on future taxes and fees imposed by state and local governments. In 2024, Brown and Newsom pressured a compliant state supreme court to have the measure taken off the ballot. Some key items never get on in the first place.

The California Coastal Commission (CCC) overrides the elected governments in scores of cities and counties. The commissioners can nix major desalination plants, oppose SpaceX launches from Vandenberg Space Force Base, and run roughshod over property rights without ever facing the voters. The same goes for the bureaucrats of the California Air Resources Board (CARB), who impose the regulation that keeps gasoline prices among the highest in the nation.

California can regain national leadership by eliminating these unelected bodies, cutting taxes, and dismantling a wasteful DEI bureaucracy that defies the civil rights victory of 1996. Whatever happens on November 3, the people will be watching.

Lloyd Billingsley is a policy fellow at the Independent Institute in Oakland, California.