Connerly Cashes In

The American Conservative
The anti-preferences activist gets rich off of affirmative action.
By Michael Brendan Dougherty

This was supposed to be a banner year for Ward Connerly, the former University of California regent and the Right’s most visible anti-affirmative-action activist. His 2000 biography, Creating Equal: My Fight Against Racial Preferences, was re-released in February. His latest book, Lessons From My Uncle James, was set to hit shelves this summer. More significantly, he was to be the driving force behind a series of ballot initiatives that would have forbidden state governments from “grant[ing] preferential treatment to any group or individual on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin in areas of public contracting, public education, or public employment.” He marketed this effort as Super Tuesday for Equal Rights.
George Will gave his imprimatur to Connerly and his mission in a Washington Post column: “Will the superstitions surrounding race ever fade away? Not before governance is cleansed of the sort of race-based policies opposed by Connerly, who intimately knows the increasing absurdity of racial classifications and the folly of government preferences based on them.”
But Connerly’s plans are unraveling. His biography is absent from most stores and barely registered in conservative book clubs. His second book is mysteriously delayed. His ballot ambitions were scaled back, first from 10 states to five. Then legal challenges and organized opposition winnowed the tally down to just two.
This is unfortunate because anti-affirmative-action ballot measures usually pass when put to a vote. Connerly would know. He and the nonprofit organizations he founded helped three such measures pass—in California in 1996, Washington in 1998, and Michigan in 2006.
But don’t spend too much sympathy on Ward Connerly. The Right’s point man on affirmative action doesn’t need political successes to be a success. While his plans sputter and his former achievements are overturned, Connerly is still being handsomely rewarded. Once he received favored status from the conservative movement, his future was guaranteed. As an activist, Connerly has made millions opposing affirmative action. As a businessman and consultant, he has also made hundreds of thousands in large part because of it. [To read the entire article, go to: http://www.amconmag.com/article/2008/sep/22/00016/ ]