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** California, Never a Slave State, Considers Reparations
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Dear John,

Poor people—including poor black people—have it hard in California. An honest assessment of the causes would require the Golden State’s political establishment to admit that its attempts to address enduring poverty have been catastrophic for low-income Californians.

Instead, Californians got a state reparations commission that time-traveled to the 19th century and discovered that slavery is the real reason for enduring black poverty. To settle accounts, the commission has determined that California taxpayers owe each of their black neighbors $223,000. The state Legislature, which created the task force, will take up that proposal in a few weeks.

Established in 2020, the Task Force to Study and Develop Reparations Proposals for African Americans has been busy. It has produced a sprawling report: a collection of actual outrages against black people, specious theories about racism, and purposeful confusions of state and U.S. history. Reading its 500 pages is like listening to Béla Bartók’s “Bluebeard’s Castle” played on a kazoo.

Detailing the report’s shortcomings would take another 500 pages. Begin with this: Slavery in what’s now California was banned under Mexican authority in 1837. California joined the union in 1850 as a free state. The panel briefly acknowledges this only to dismiss it, lingering instead on the 1852 passage of the California Fugitive Slave Act, under which 13 people were deported from the state. The commission briefly mentions that the reviled law lapsed three years after being passed but doesn’t mention the numerous cases of white California officials—sheriffs, judges, attorneys and others—who discovered and liberated enslaved people.

Nor does the commission explain that millions of black Americans voluntarily migrated to California.

Political scientist Ralph Bunche (1904-71) made a good case for California. A black man raised in South Central Los Angeles, Bunche held degrees from the University of California, Los Angeles, Harvard and the London School of Economics. In 1950, he became the first Nobel Peace Prize winner of African descent for his work as a United Nations mediator in the Middle East.

In a speech at UCLA in the late 1920s, Bunche told the story of a black Texan “who had been in a virtual state of slavery to his Southern boss. By careful saving he was able to take a short trip to Los Angeles and partake of the freedom and the grandeur of the Southland, and more particularly the pure liberty of our own Central Avenue.” That man would never be the same, Bunche said. He might return to the South, but he had seen the promised land.

The real challenge to black and other poor Californians is bad government. Take the state’s execrable public education system. California ranks ([link removed]) dead last in the nation in literacy. Black children are the most brutalized by these failures: Only 10% meet math standards and about 30% achieve English competency. Denied a real education, many of these children will qualify only for low-level jobs and government assistance.

The commission calls this a “school-to-prison pipeline” and blames slavery. Yet California’s public schools are run by the commission’s ideological allies, chiefly the teachers unions. They oppose as racist any program that might free children to pursue a good education—vouchers, home schooling, public charter schools, even transfers between districts.

Confronted with their failures, the establishment has now come to the bottom of the barrel of excuses: Blame slavery, punish those who didn’t engage in it and reward those who didn’t suffer from it directly.

In California, the answer to the failures of progressivism is always more progressivism.

Read the full op-ed ([link removed]) by CPC president Will Swaim featured in The Wall Street Journal.

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** Update: Judge puts AB 257 on hold
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There’s a joke circulating in California that goes like this: What’s the difference between the Titanic and the state of California? Answer: The Titanic went down with its lights on.

California's “FAST Recovery Act” (AB 257) was set to go into effect Jan. 1 but has been put on hold by a judge, for now. The law will create a state commission comprising 13 political appointees who will govern work and wages in California’s fast-food franchises.

Let’s summarize: AB 257 will likely kill the jobs of immigrant and poor men and women who want to work in the fast-food industry. It imposes what union organizers could not achieve through voluntary association. It will raise food prices and limit food options in already struggling neighborhoods. It is opposed by the very regulatory body that is supposed to supervise its implementation. Its passage relied in part on a corrupt “study” by a major state university working with the union that will benefit from the new law.

It’s now likely that AB 257 will be opposed at the ballot box. As soon as Newsom signed the bill, an association representing fast-food businesses began gathering signatures for a statewide ballot proposition to repeal it. On December 9, the California secretary of state’s office declared that the association had submitted more than the minimum number of signatures to qualify the measure for the November 2024 ballot.

Under California law, that should have postponed implementation of AB 257. Instead, the state’s Department of Industrial Relations announced it would dispense with a century of case law and impose the law on January 1. On December 29, the association announced it will sue the state to uphold its own laws. One day later, on December 30, a state judge cut the baby in half: The state can begin considering appointments to the commission, but it can’t change wages or work rules.

Welcome to the California Titanic. Stand atop its soaring prow. Lean out over the vast expanse of uncharted waters. Shout into the wind that you’re the king of the world. And be prepared to swim for your life.

Read the full article ([link removed]) by CPC president Will Swaim in National Review.
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** Register now for CPC's Parent Union Legislative Summit
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Have you RSVP'd yet for California Policy Center’s second annual Parent Union Legislative Summit —Parents, Not Partisans— February 8-9, 2023 in Sacramento?

Join parents, parent group leaders, education reform advocates, teachers, and school board members from around the state to build on the historic momentum of California’s nonpartisan parent movement to take back our schools.

Summit attendees will hear from education reform leaders and education experts on how to:
* Activate parents in your district to hold new school boards accountable
* Stand up to the teachers unions in defending California's K-12 schools
* Advance critical education issues such as literacy and math competencies
* Make an impact in the state legislature in 2023 and much more!

BONUS: Visit the State Capitol with fellow advocates on Day Two to meet with newly-elected legislators and let them know that California’s parent movement has only just begun!

Learn more and register for this free two-day event now using Promo Code: ParentUnion. ([link removed])

SUPPORT CPC ([link removed])
New Podcast ()
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** Radio Free California #258: The Incredible Shrinking California
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Mark Wahlberg left the Golden State for Nevada, just one of the hundreds of thousands of Californians who helped lead California to its third year of population decline. CPC president Will Swaim and CPC board member David Bahsen discuss the ongoing California Exodus and much more on this week's podcast. Listen now ([link removed]) . ([link removed])

More from CPC ()


** California Destroys Its Independent Truckers
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The destruction of independent truckers began when Gov. Newsom signed AB 5 into law, compelling independent drivers to surrender the companies they’ve built and seek employment in large firms. These entrepreneurs carry cargo from California ports and manufacturers to the rest of the U.S. No American will escape the ramifications. Read the National Review article by CPC's Will Swaim. ([link removed])


** DeSantis Battles The Teachers Union
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In California, and much of the U.S., union dues are deducted by the school district from teachers’ paychecks, just like federal and state withholding taxes. The district then turns the money over to the union, which doesn’t pay a penny for the transactions. In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis wants to stop this abuse. Read the latest by Larry Sand, ([link removed]) president of the California Teachers Empowerment Network.

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ABOUT THE CALIFORNIA POLICY CENTER

The California Policy Center promotes prosperity for all Californians through limited government and individual liberty.

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