BY JON HILLSON AND CRAIG HONTS

NORTHRIDGE, California - After weeks of controversy, veteran Los Angeles civil rights figure Joe Hicks and ultrarightist Republican politician David Duke squared off over the issue of affirmative action in front of a capacity crowd of 770 students at California State University, Northridge (CSUN) on September 25.

An additional 350 students watched the debate in a nearby auditorium, while up to 1,000 more students argued the issue outside the Student Union. More than 150 campus and Los Angeles city police officers were present, and those attending the live debate were subject to metal detector searches.

The forum, hosted by the student government, focused on Proposition 209, the so-called California Civil Rights Initiative. This November ballot measure, if ratified, would outlaw all state related employment, contracting, and education affirmative action programs.

Such programs, said Duke, a former Louisiana Ku Klux Klan leader, "are not about equality. They are about discrimination on the basis of race against better qualified whites." Duke hopes "209 wins, and wins big, but it is only a first step. It doesn't go far enough, because it leaves affirmative action in place in the private sector."

Hicks, a former president of the Los Angeles Southern Christian Leadership Conference, told the predominantly Black, Latino, and Asian student audience that there had been "historic preferential treatment the American majority enjoyed for hundreds of years."

"Race is a real factor in current discrimination," Hicks said, requiring special efforts to "ensure inclusion. Affirmative action is not quotas, because quotas are illegal.... Affirmative action just gets us into the pool, and gives a square shot."

Despite student ushers attempting to restrain applause, the audience erupted in sustained cheers for Hicks, and jeers for Duke, during the two-hour exchange. Only written questions from the floor were allowed.

Duke said he was defending the "rights of white working people. There are a lot of these people out there hurting, really hurting. They are victims of reverse discrimination."

"Reverse discrimination is the cry of every unqualified white guy who ever got aced out of a job by a more qualified Black, Latino, or women," Hicks retorted. "But I'm sure that line plays well where you [Duke] come from, with Joe `Something' when he goes home with his six-pack and talks with his buddies."

"We lost points on that," one Black student, shaking his head later, noted in reference to the "Joe Something" remark.

Duke made clear his aim in the debate. "I want to appeal to the white people in the audience, to the white people watching. You are in a battle for your civilization. If affirmative action continues, you'll be outnumbered, you'll be outvoted, and the discrimination you see today will be nothing compared to the that of the future," he said, as groups of students began hissing.

"You have the right to have your children live in a nation that reflects the values of their forefathers," Duke continued, "not wake up in Mexico, or Haiti, or Zimbabwe." The tense silence was cracked by boos, catcalls, and groans from the crowd.

"I was waiting for the sheet to come down," a Black student said, "and it did."

"I like the idea of having a debate. I don't like the idea of paying David Duke. I'm totally against 209," said Shean O'Hayyer.

"What's important is that we have a debate," Randy Anisco, a Filipino student said. "My view of affirmative action has two prongs. Everyone should have equality, but I don't think qualified students should be kept out of admissions because of it."

Duke's pitch won applause from a small section of the crowd in both venues. "He represents what I feel," a white student said afterwards, "but I don't like Duke."

There was a lot of controversy over whether the debate would occur at all. Student government sponsors resisted pressure from California Republican Governor Peter Wilson, a key backer of Proposition 209, and "Yes to 209" leader Ward Connerly to cancel the event. Both were embarrassed by Duke's racist profile, but had twice rejected invitations from the students to speak on a panel or debate the ultrarightist.

On the day of the debate, the CSUN Daily Sundial reported that the College Republicans had gathered 2,500 signatures to recall student body president Vladimir Cerna, a defender of affirmative action and equal rights for immigrants. Cerna, who is Salvadoran, led efforts to organize the debate.

An effort to stop the debate in court was thrown out by a judge on September 23.

Members of the Berkeley-based Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action by Any Means Necessary (BAMN) launched a campaign to thwart the proceeding. The sect vowed to stop the debate, as a protest against Duke. On the day of the event, BAMN, members of the Progressive Labor Party (PLP)-an ultraleftist outfit with a history of provocative behavior-and Refuse and Resist showed up on the campus will bullhorns, determined to get to Duke.

In a designated free speech area, the ultraleftists were debated by CSUN students, most of them Black and Latino, as Hicks and Duke argued inside. When members of PLP spotted a well-known member of the rightist Jewish Defense League, they attacked him. Anticipating such an opportunity, Los Angeles cops waded in, assaulting the crowd with shots of several "flash bang" grenades, and four rounds of rubber bullets. Reinforced by 20 mounted cops, and seven helicopters swirling above, the police blocked the exit of hundreds who had nothing to do with the ultraleftists. Six activists were arrested.

On September 27, conservative columnist David Horowitz wrote in the Los Angeles Times that Republican presidential candidate Robert Dole could overtake President William Clinton in the polls and win in California if he campaigned aggressively for Proposition 209.

The same day, Republican vice presidential candidate Jack Kemp rejected such advice during a campaign stop here. "We are not going to campaign on a wedge issue. We have endorsed [Proposition 209], but as a transition to a new era. We are not going to let this issue tear up California."

He pledged a Republican administration would double the number of Black-owned businesses and cut Black unemployment by 50 percent by the year 2000.

As young Latinos and Chicanos hoisted anti-209 placards at a campaign event in Fillmore, the Republican candidate stated that a Dole-Kemp regime would say to California, "mi casa es su casa [my house is your house]."

Craig Honts is a member of the United Transportation Union.  
 
 
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