This issue is particularly sensitive at a time of corporate down sizing and major reductions in federal employment. Those fighting to defeat affirmative action are winning the war of perception in the media, newspapers, and with ordinary citizens. We have been slow in defining affirmative action and have failed to get the public response generated by the opposition. Affirmative action merely casts a wider net to include a larger number of qualified applicants to compete and participate. Affirmative action allows women and people of color and other minorities access to higher education, jobs, and business opportunities which have been historically out of their reach.
Affirmative action is a system of goals and programs that strengthens our national economy.
It provides Corporate America with the diversity necessary to compete in the global market. It helps to ensure that the public sector is reflective of the populations it serves. Quotas and preferential treatment have never been a part of any affirmative action program. Bob Dole says that equal opportunity without affirmative action should be the nation's goal. However, as much as we would like, we don't live in a color blind society.