Calif. May Let Voters Decide Whether to Repeal Ban on Racial Preferences

The California State Senate on Thursday voted to put a proposed constitutional amendment before voters that would repeal the state’s ban on the use of race in college admissions, according to the Los Angeles Times and The Fresno Bee.

The measure, known as Senate Constitutional Amendment 5, passed on a party-line vote of 27 to 9, with Democrats relying on their two-thirds supermajority to send the proposal to the State Assembly.

The measure would ask voters if they wanted to repeal key portions of Proposition 209, a ballot measure that was approved in 1996. It would roll back provisions that bar the use of race- and gender-based preferences in college admissions.

Sen. Ed Hernandez, the Democrat who wrote the proposal, said that a “blanket prohibition” on the use of race in admissions had been a mistake, adding that the state is “still suffering the consequences today.”

In 2011, Gov. Jerry Brown, a Democrat, vetoed a similar effort to let colleges consider race in admissions decisions.