Sunday, October 31, 2010

We've Seen This Before: White Voter Angst


Howard Jarvis led a movement in 1978 to reduce property taxes in California, called Proposition 13, that became a national movement. A hero to many, from my perspective, he was just another jolly (jowly?) white guy who didn't want to pay taxes.
I was going to a California state college in 1978. I had exchanged the bitter cold winters and sweltering summers of Minnesota for the perpetual sunshine of southern California. (It never rains in California, but boy don't they warn you)
In 1978, the census forecast for 1980 was that California would become the first state in the nation where whites would no longer be a majority. California in 1978 had significant Asian, African and Mexican minorities.
California had one of the best public university systems in the nation. The UC universities were designed to be primarily research institutions. UC-Los Angeles and UC-Berkeley being the most well known.
The Cal State universities were designed to be primarily teaching institutions, with the goal of providing low cost education to all Californians that desired it. I was attending Cal State Fullerton. After satisfying the state residency requirement, my tuition was under a thousand dollars a year.
The UC and Cal State systems were primarily funded by property taxes. My heretical theory is that when white voters realized that most of the young people going to college on their dime (their words) would not be white, they complained.
I would point out that most of these white voters did not complain previously, but rather had extolled the benefits of college education being available to everyone. I guess they meant every one who was white.
It may be a coincidence, and I understand there are people who explain the existence of patterns this way, but with census projections declaring that whites will no longer be a majority in the nation, it isn't surprising to see white people complaining again about property taxes (i.e. school funding)
Again, it needs to be pointed out that these angry white voters did not complain with the same vehemence before. It needs to be pointed out that most (what is it 90 percent?) of Tea Party activists are white.
The constitution was crafted by well-to-do white men to protect the interests of, yes, you got it, well-to-do white men. Brown men, black men, yellow men and ALL women were excluded from these protections. Any time any of these exclusive entitlements of these affluent white people are in danger of being reduced (I believe it's called sharing) there is a backlash.
This backlash has gone by different names in different times. The Tea Party is just the latest incarnation.
Let's face it, white folks aren't good at sharing. The White Anglo Saxon Protestant deity they worship has blessed their entitlements and they aren't giving them away to any Mexicans, Africans or Asians. No way, no how. Not without a fight!
Howard Jarvis and his cause are still being invoked in California elections this year. He is still a hero to many white people. I still think of him as a selfish white man who didn't want to share. But then, I'm a heretic. I don't mind sharing.


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