The Enlightened Ones

As the home of the University of California's main campus and of nine Nobel prizewinners, Berkeley likes to think of itself as more enlightened and sophisticated than all of those tract-house havens across the bay from San Francisco. Last January, in keeping with the community's idea of itself, the Berkeley City Council passed an exceedingly tough ordinance against discrimination in housing.

Shortly before, a citizens' committee had concluded that "discrimination within the city is widespread and general, both in the rental and sale of housing." In the last ten years, Berkeley's Negro population had increased 65%. to about 20% of the total (111,000). Most of the Negroes are confined to the west and southwest sections of the city, where two public schools are nearly all-Negro.

To break up that pattern, the ordinance banned "discrimination because of race, color, religion, national origin or ancestry" in all housing transactions, including mortgage loans. It provided for a board to investigate complaints and, if private persuasion fails, to order corrective action. Anybody found guilty by a court of violating a board order could be jailed for six months, fined $500.

Before the ordinance could be put into effect, a group of citizens obtained 10,500 signatures on a petition to force a referendum. Last week, after a bitter campaign. 82% of Berkeley's voters turned out and. perhaps deciding that the ordinance was too tough and too subject to vagaries of judgment, killed it by a vote of 22,720 to 20,325.

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