Ignoring the People

VICTORIA SACKETT

Affirmative action can be viewed, in many important ways, as an issue not concerned with race. Public attitudes toward specific programs aimed at correcting historical policies of discrimination differ widely from attitudes toward minorities in general. The public is much more inclined to acknowledge the general need for corrective action than it is to approve specific proposals which claim to remedy past injustices. There is a definite cutoff point in support for policies aimed at ensuring equal opportunities for minorities and women. It appears where compensatory efforts cross swords with basic American values. Belief in individualism, an antipathy to preferential treatment and devotion to the principle of achievement through merit rather than ascriptive privilege prove to be stronger influences on public opinion than dedication to affirmative action programs.

One of the most comprehensive analyses of attitudes toward discrimination and affirmative action was compiled by Seymour Martin Lipset and William Schneider in 1978. They looked at nearly one hundred public opinion polls which covered every aspect of the issue from 1935 to 1977. Recently, Policy Review commissioned its own survey, conducted by Sindlinger and Company, which attempted to probe some of these same questions. A single poll, of course, cannot be exhaustive. Nonetheless, the Policy Review survey seems to confirm Messrs. Lipset and Schneider's earlier findings. People approve the idea of eliminating discrimination through laws. They balk at the notion of preferential treatment.

The Policy Review survey does not assess general attitudes toward minorities. However, the Gallup Organization in 1978 provided a comprehensive collection of surveys which serve to update earlier findings. The Gallup surveys showed a steadily increasing liberalization of attitudes on the part of the public, even in some of the most volatile areas of race relations. From 1958 to 1978, willingness to vote for a black for president doubled.

Question: There's always much discussion about the quali

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fications of presidential candidates - their education, age, race, religion and the like. If your party nominated a generally wellqualified man for president and he happened to be a Negro, would you vote for him? (Question wording varied slightly over the years.)

Source: Surveys by the Gallup Organization, latest that of July 21-24, 1978.

The increasing acceptance of a proposed black for president was accompanied by a commensurate growth in acceptance of the idea of a woman or a Jew for president, adding strength to the notion that tolerance was on the increase for all minorities. Question: Between now and the time of the conventions in 1980 there will be more discussion about the qualifications of presidential candidates — their education, age, religions, race, and the like. If your party nominated a woman for president, would you vote for her if she were qualified for the job?.... If your party nominated a generally well-qualified man for president and he happened to be a (Negro/Jew), would you vote for him? (Question wording varies somewhat over the years.)

Woman for president

1937 1949 1955 1958 1961 1963 1965 1967 1969 1971 1975 1978

Source: Surveys by the Gallup Organization, latest that of July 21-24, 1978 In Public Opinion, Dec./Jan. 1980.

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Over the same period, there had been a dramatic increase in tolerance expressed by whites toward blacks as neighbors even when the question was weighted to elicit more negative responses by asking whether people would move if blacks came to live in the neighborhood in great numbers.

Question: If blacks came to live next door, would you move? (Among whites.)

Would you move if blacks came to live in great numbers in your neighborhood? (Among whites.)

Source: Surveys by the Gallup Organization, latest that of July 7-10, 1978.

Even on the sensitive issue of intermarriage between races, tolerance had grown. Approval among adults of marriages between whites and blacks from 1968 to 1978 increased from 20 percent to 36 percent. A majority still objected to intermarriage, but the "disapprove" response declined from 72 percent in 1968 to 54 percent in 1978.

Louis Harris and Associates conducted their own surveys between October and November of 1978. In the interim between the Gallup and Harris surveys, and following the Lipset/ Schneider analysis, the Supreme Court had decided the Bakke case. On June 28, 1978, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Allan Bakke who had charged reverse discrimination in his efforts to enroll in the University of California medical school at Davis. The Supreme Court ruled that a university could not reserve a set number of places for minority applicants, thus denying white applicants the chance to be accepted for those slots, irrespective of their qualifications. At the same time, the Court stated that it was permissible for schools to include race along with other factors in deciding which applicants to admit.

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The decision itself does not appear to have had a negative effect on overall white attitudes toward minorities, as the Harris surveys revealed. The Harris surveys sampled whites separately from blacks, never presenting a response for the mixed population. In 1976, a Harris survey showed 12 percent of white respondents favoring "separation of the races" when presented with the question "Generally speaking, do you favor full racial integration, integration in some areas of life, or separation of the races?" 28 percent supported "full racial integration" and 48 percent opted for "integration in some areas of life." The 1978 Harris survey showed 35 percent wanting "full racial integration," 42 percent favoring "integration in some areas" and 16 percent favoring "separation of the races." The largest increase appeared in the desire for full integration, though there was also a slight upturn in the number preferring the more absolutist "separation of the races" alternative. Among blacks, 66 percent wanted "full racial integration" in 1978, another 22 percent wanted integration in "some areas" and only 7 percent favored a "separation of the races." The Harris survey confirmed the Gallup 1978 survey concerning interracial dating and marriage. Though there was a large degree of white negativity toward such practices, there was also a steady easing of attitudes evident since the 1963 survey. Also, to quote from the Harris survey analysis "The biggest shifts downward in white aversion arise if a black family moves in next door to you' (24 points down), 'a close friend or relative marries a black' (24 points down), 'your child brings a black child home for supper' (22 points down), and 'a black tries on the same suit of clothes (or dress) before you do in a clothing store' (18 points down).'

Messrs. Lipset and Schneider found that "there can be no doubt that a large majority of white Americans have come to accept the proposition that discrimination in hiring is wrong and that government should guarantee operation of the competitive merit or achievement principle by outlawing such discrimination. But every major national study shows that a sizable majority of Americans are also opposed to remedying the effects of past discrimination by giving any special consideration in hiring or school admissions."2

It is this broad conclusion that the Policy Review survey confirms, whilst deepening our knowledge of public attitudes on this

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complex question. The Sindlinger summary of these findings interestingly states that this poll was "the most difficult survey ever undertaken by Sindlinger in recent years." Questions were pretested and pollsters received "high proportions of no opinions on questions where the response should have been clear-cut, and low proportions of no opinion when higher ratios were in order." As a result the questions underwent "numerous revisions." A special problem was presented by the topic, namely race relations, since on this "attitudes simply cannot be broken down by hard core pro- or anti-camps. There has to be room for variations." In all, the format of questions went through nine revisions.

Consequently, in the first group of questions, namely Questions 1(a) to 1(e), the Sindlinger poll provided a general introductory statement:

In recent years, many people, including the U.S. Government, have endeavored to improve the social and economic status of minority groups such as Blacks or HispanicAmericans as well as women. Some of these activities on racial and sexual discrimination have become very controversial with some people - while other people have paid no attention or have not expressed themselves. I am going to read you some various positions being taken on the subject of minority or racial and sexual discrimination. As I read each position -- will you please tell me your degree of agreement or disagreement. That is, where you agree is your agreement strong or mild? Conversely, when you disagree is your disagreement strong or mild?

The questions which followed were intended to be variations. upon the general theme introduced in this statement and to offer respondents the choice of policies ranging from reliance on voluntary action to government enforcement of affirmative action quotas. The first question was worded as follows: "First is the position that government should take no action - instead we should rely on the people as citizens, business firms and universities to get rid of racial and sexual discrimination on a voluntary basis. How do you agree or disagree on this?" The responses were distributed as follows: