During the last half of 2004, petitioners for the so-called "Michigan Civil Rights Initiative" canvassed the state collecting signatures to get their anti-affirmative action measure on the ballot for November 2006. During the course of this campaign, petitioners specifically targeted black voting districts, telling black and other minority voters that the petition was to protect affirmative action. On this basis, approximately 120,000 black and other minority voters signed for MCRI to get the referendum on the ballot. Upon further investigation, the fact that MCRI also lied to tens of thousands of white voters also comes to light.

If any other petition campaign had so systemically lied to and defrauded the Michigan electorate, for example by circulating a petition in support of a tax hike while insisting to potential signers that the petition's intention was to freeze taxes at their current rates, the entire political establishment would be in an uproar and would employ every available measure to prevent such an initiative from proceeding. Because MCRI is attacking the rights of black and other minority students, however, its deceit is unworthy of attention in the eyes of the state's political leadership. This is unacceptable. BAMN has worked tirelessly to expose MCRI's racially targeted voter fraud to the entire state.

Without knowing the facts behind BAMN's success in defending affirmative action both in Michigan and across the country for over a decade, a recent Daily editorial (Affirm affirmative action, 01/06/06) might lead one to believe that our method of organizing is "outlandish and unproductive." Such a statement comes as no surprise, because every successful civil rights leader has been attacked and slandered in his own time by those who feared the struggle necessary for progressive change.

In refuting this foolishness, it is necessary only to make passing references to our leading role in the fight to defend affirmative action so far: We presented the most comprehensive legal defense of affirmative action ever put before an American court in the trial of Grutter v. Bollinger, the Law School affirmative action case; we organized the 50,000-person national march on Washington on April 1, 2003 when the U.S. Supreme Court heard the University's two affirmative action cases; we successfully prevented MCRI from getting on the ballot in 2004. This is just a small sample of what we have achieved. In spite of our ongoing success, the Daily finds it necessary to attack us and attempt to undermine our work.

The editorial refers to "some groups" who have brought forward a "startling" amount of evidence of fraud in MCRI's campaign. "Some groups" in this context actually refers only to BAMN, since we are the organization that has actively exposed the fraud and deceit that characterized MCRI's petition drive. While educating the public about the importance of affirmative action programs is important, the key to defeating MCRI - and thereby preserve affirmative action in Michigan - is to consistently and ruthlessly expose its proponents lies and deception to the entire state. Anyone who is interested in helping to investigate and expose MCRI's fraud should contact us at bamn@umich.edu.

The writers are members of BAMN.

Stenvig and Royal are Rackham students, and Smith is an LSA senior.