Poll Finds Waning Support for Affirmative Action Programs Among College Graduates

A new poll conducted by researchers at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut, finds that a clear majority of Americans believe affirmative action in hiring, promotions, and college admissions should be abolished. Only 27 percent of whites supported the continuation of affirmative action programs whereas 78 percent of blacks want such programs to continue. Hispanics were about evenly split on whether affirmative action programs should be continued.

Slightly more than half of all respondents with a college degree call for an end to affirmative action programs whereas those with a lower level of education voiced even less support for continuing preferences.

When the question was made more specific, asking if respondents support affirmative action programs that give preferences to blacks in hirings, promotions, and college admissions, support for affirmative action dropped even further. More than 60 percent of all respondents said they did not support affirmative action programs for blacks. By a margin of 57-37 percent, respondents with a college degree opposed affirmative action programs for African Americans.

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