A thin majority of Michigan voters favors a nascent effort to change the state Constitution to ban affirmative action.
A Detroit News/Local4/ Mitchell poll of 600 voters found 52 percent support a state constitutional amendment to outlaw the use of race as a consideration for university admissions and government hiring and contracts; 39 oppose it and 9 percent are undecided.
At first blush, the findings seem like good news to backers of a petition drive to collect more than 317,000 signatures to put an affirmative action ban on the November 2004 ballot. But the majority is slim, and full-fledged campaigning is months away.
"The bottom line is that it's difficult, at this point, to say if the proposal would win or lose," said pollster Steve Mitchell, president of Mitchell Research & Communications, Inc.
The findings are echoed by a poll to be released today by Inside Michigan Politics, claiming voter support for a ban on affirmative action by 55 percent to 36 percent. The survey by Marketing Resource Group of Lansing for Inside Michigan Politics, a political and government newsletter, polled 600 statewide voters.
Both surveys have an error margin of 4 percentage points.
Sylvia Murphy of Dearborn Heights does not support the ban.
"They should leave it like it is," said Murphy, who believes any type of ban would hurt diversity efforts. "Then blacks wouldn't have the opportunity to get in."
The polls are the first in Michigan since the U.S. Supreme Court issued twin decisions June 23 that upheld the consideration of race in admissions at the University of Michigan Law School.
The rulings do not, however, prevent states from enacting laws repealing affirmative action. California activist Ward Connerly has launched a $1 million campaign to put the issue to Michigan's voters.
Connerly's group, the American Civil Rights Initiative, led similar, successful efforts to ban the consideration of race in California and Washington.
Connerly is traveling to Michigan in mid-October to organize the petition drive, which will cost about $1 million and begin Jan. 1.
The campaign is expected to be one of the most expensive and inflammatory ballot measures in Michigan's history, said Craig Ruff, president of Public Sector Consultants, a Lansing think tank.
Corporations and unions are expected to spend heavily to defeat Connerly's measure, but Ruff said swaying voters' opinions could prove challenging.
"Affirmative action is a value-laden issue that has little to do with fact, information and controversy," Ruff said.
Activists on both sides claimed they have more support than the polls indicate.
State Rep. Jack Brandenburg, R-Harrison Township, a leader in the ballot drive, claimed five weeks of door-to-door campaigning has revealed "outstanding support" for a prohibition on affirmative action. But Kary Moss, director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan, argued that there's "popular support for fixing the legacy of discrimination."
The Detroit News/Local4/ Mitchell Poll also found that a majority opposes any attempt to legalize gay marriage or civil unions in Michigan. Voters favor banning gay marriage 51 percent to 38 percent and oppose civil unions, 53 percent to 39 percent.
Gay marriages are not recognized in Michigan, but state and local lawmakers are beginning to weigh in on the issue. A resolution asking Congress for an anti-gay marriage amendment to the U.S. Constitution is pending in the state Senate; and the Lapeer County Commission voted 5-2 last week in urging the Legislature to put a state constitutional amendment before the voters.
