Ward Connerly, activist against racial preferences, will share his thoughts on the issues and problems created by affirmative action Tuesday.

The lecture, which is titled “The Failure of Racial Preferences,” will be held at 8 p.m. in the Sun Room of the Memorial Union. It is free and open to the public.

“We are proud to stand up for color-blindness by bringing in Mr. Connerly to speak,” said event organizer Ben Studenski. “Ward Connerly has done more to help build a color-blind society than any other person in recent years. He is a nationally renowned speaker with a cutting edge topic.”

Connerly became well known through his actions as the chairman of the California Civil Rights Initiative (CCRI), the organization that successfully campaigned to end affirmative action in California.

According to a press release, the initiative, called Proposition 209, obtained more than one million signatures and qualified to be on the November 1996 ballot.

Californians passed Proposition 209 by a 54 percent to 46 percent margin, ending affirmative action in the public sector in the state.

Connerly is currently president and chief executive officer of Connerly and Associates, Inc., a housing and association management consulting firm established in 1973.

Jason Darrah, member of the College Republicans and sophomore in political science, said Connerly was vital in the passing of Proposition 209.

“He was the key advocate and was very instrumental in its success,” Darrah said. “Often times, you do not see that from an African-American about issues like this.”

The basis of Proposition 209 was Connerly’s work as a member of the Board of Regents at the University of California, which focused on the race-based system present at the university. After much debate, a majority of regents voted to end the university’s use of race as a means for admission.

“Ward worked very hard at the University of California where he worked to end racial preference at the school,” Darrah said. “It would be good to go to this lecture because it gives a different view about this topic. He will speak about how the whole premise of [affirmative action] is wrong.”

Darrah also said Connerly will “offer another side to the story.”

“Often you see a liberal slant at most of the lectures at Iowa State, and this is another side that many people do not know,” he said.