Research

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A poll commissioned in early 2006 by the Equal Justice Society, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and the ACLU of Northern California to gauge California voters’ perceptions on race, discrimination and federal judicial nominations revealed widespread agreement that race discrimination is a serious problem in the state and the government must take steps to address it.The poll was conducted by the nationally renowned Lake Research Partners, with support provided by the Open Society Institute. The statewide survey of registered voters in California, included over-samples of African-Americans, Latinos, and Asian-Americans, in order to more fully understand the opinions of particular communities. The survey, conducted in February, focused on attitudes toward racial discrimination; important insight on how Californians view the judicial nominations process was also revealed.

“California voters strongly believe that civil rights and affirmative action are important issues and want to know judicial nominees’ positions on them,” concluded David Mermin, a pollster with Lake Research Partners.

Most importantly, voters strongly believe that government has a responsibility to take action to address racial and ethnic discrimination and that California needs to lead the country in formulating innovative solutions to racial disparities and discrimination.

When asked to judge the importance of issues the Supreme Court may rule on in coming years, civil rights and voting rights are overwhelmingly important to California voters (91% and 89% rate them “important” respectively). Ranking just below these are presidential power (88%), privacy and government surveillance (85%), and abortion (80%). Compared to these issues, affirmative action is further down the list (74%).

Voters believe it is important to know a judicial nominee’s position on issues such as affirmative action (54% say it is “very important”; 78% “important”).

Equal Justice Society Law and Policy Director Kimberly Thomas Rapp said, “The poll validates our understanding that people are dedicated to fair and independent judges and that it is appropriate to know the judicial temperament of upcoming nominees. We need a United States judiciary that allows for fairness and balance.”

“The key challenge identified by this research will be to reframe the policy actions needed to achieve equal opportunity, drawing on and enhancing the core values shared across racial groups, rather than allowing opponents to splinter and divide voters,” noted Mermin.