This on-line paper is now archived for perpetuity in the
National Library
of Australia
Sunday
24th August 1997
Associated links:
Search entire news archive by day |
Search entire news archive by text |
Definitive Lifestyle Guide to over 5000 Australian webs |
Global Web Builders Gold |
The Kid's Locker Room |
World Wide Websters |
Largest US State follows One Nation lead:
LOS ANGELES, Aug. 21—A federal appeals court ruled today that it will not reconsider an earlier decision by three of its judges upholding the constitutionality of California's voter-approved ban on preferences based on race and sex. The decision means the affirmative action ban could become law in a week.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said that a request by civil rights groups for a rehearing on Proposition 209 had failed to win approval by a majority of 18 judges voting on the issue. It did not disclose a voting breakdown.
In a strongly worded decision in April reflecting the politically charged nature of the issue, a three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit overturned a ban on enforcement of Proposition 209 imposed by a lower court just weeks after its November endorsement by voters. The initiative made California the first state to attempt to roll back affirmative action by barring preferential treatment in public hiring, contracting and education.
Mark Rosenbaum, legal director for the Southern California branch of the American Civil Liberties Union, said he will ask the 9th Circuit to continue a ban on enforcement of Proposition 209 while he appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court. If that fails, Rosenbaum said, he will ask the high court to stay enforcement of the measure while it considers whether to grant a review.
If neither court intervenes, the affirmative action ban can be enforced in seven days, Rosenbaum said. In that case, agencies from the state government in Sacramento to the smallest water district would have to reexamine their hiring and contracting practices and attempt to comply.
"We are extremely disappointed by the ruling and find it hard to understand how a majority of the court concluded that this case was not of `exceptional importance' to all citizens of California, which is the legal standard for granting a rehearing," Rosenbaum said.
Michael Carvin, who argued against preferences before the 9th Circuit on behalf of the Washington-based Center for Individual Rights, said he was confident the Supreme Court will not grant a review of the case.
"So much for the ACLU's Alice-in-Wonderland reading of the Constitution, whereby it is somehow discriminatory to end discrimination. The 9th Circuit has spoken loudly and clearly: Racial preferences are effectively dead in California," Carvin said.
Thomas Wood, co-author of Proposition 209 and executive director of the conservative California Association of Scholars, said the ban effectively is now the law and that "all levels of government in the state now have a duty to implement and enforce it."
Wood, who began his fight for the measure in 1991 with San Francisco area professor Glynn Custred, called the ACLU's position on the issue "the most extreme version of racial politics and political correctness that the country has yet seen."
Well it looks like the Philippines have something other in Australia than Pauline Hanson's One Nation to take exception to... and this time it is not fairy floss stuff this is "dinki-di" major crime.
The President, Fidel Ramos, ordered an investigation into reports that Filipino boys were being sold to paedophiles in Australia on Friday.
Ramos also ordered the interior and foreign secretaries to look into reports that Filipino boys are routinely flown to popular tourist resorts in Australia where they are sexually exploited. Ernesto Herrera said in Parliament on Thursday, "There are indications that the boys are being shipped out of Manila illicitly using either planes or pleasure boats.''
Herrera said, after Australian media reports on an alleged paedophile network on Australia's Great Barrier Reef. It is reported that the Whitsunday islands are used as the base for rich paedophiles to share the young Filipino boys around. Herrera, who has being waging a crusade against child prostitution, said his office had received information as early as 1995 that Filipino children were being sold to foreign paedophiles.
Making the
news.
Subject:
Launch of
One Nation at Ipswich
Now that One Nation has been active for a few months it is with interest
that I now tell you that there are so many people, just plain normal people
at work (I have a shift of 14 members at Parliament House in Canberra) who
espouse Pauline's view of this Country of ours and what we need to do to get
out from under the situation the major parties has brought us to. At my Lodge
there are both sides represented - for and against her views, but even the
members who speak against her view admit that she has some good points and
these are the people who only see what the media is letting them see.
I can only say to Pauline Hanson "Go Pauline, go. we need you and we need
a united Australia, united under that one great flag you wear so proudly".
Mark Smith
Subject: California's Proposition 209
Why is it that none of Australia's "mainstream" media are reporting on the
Citizen's Initiated Referendum that was passed last November? Proposition
209 changed the Californian constitution so that all citizens had to be treated
equally, and effectively outlawed affirmative action. (Refer attached documents)
This seems remarkably close to One Nation's policy.
If One Nation's policies are supposedly extremist, does that mean that America's
largest state is populated with a majority of extremists? Will Australia
stop trading with the USA due to their "extreme right-wing laws"?
I'm waiting (in vain, I strongly suspect), for the headline:
The opponents to proposition 209 have unsuccessfully appealed to the courts
to try to override the will of the people. (Refer Washington post article)
Who said all Americans respect democracy?
If you search on "Proposition 209" on the internet, you will find a wealth
of information on this topic. You will never find a whisper about it in a
Murdoch or Packer newspaper. That's why I love the internet.
Personal trivia, from
the global
office:
Another beautiful day in paradise.
Have a good one.
Canberra.
"American voters endorse One Nation policy".
Return to Australian National
News of the Day
See GLOBE International for
other world news.
