By Cliff Peale
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Ensuring racially diverse college campuses is an issue that has done the improbable: Create a disagreement between President Bush and some of the nation's largest corporations.

Procter & Gamble Co. and Ashland Inc. are two of nearly 50 big companies that today will side with the University of Michigan against the Bush administration.

The White House says the university policy favoring students of color for admission to help diversify the student body is a quota system that discriminates against white students and should be outlawed.

OTHER SUPPORTERS

Besides Tristate-based Procter & Gamble and Ashland Inc., a number of other companies with operations in Greater Cincinnati filed a "friend of the court" brief with the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati to uphold the University of Michigan's admissions policy.   The companies, which are expected to file a similar brief with the U.S. Supreme Court today, include:   3M, Bank One, the accounting firm of Ernst & Young, General Mills, Johnson & Johnson, Kellogg and Sara Lee. Other companies that joined in the brief were Abbott Laboratories, Bank One, Boeing, Coca-Cola, Dow Chemical, DuPont, Eastman Kodak, Fannie Mae, General Dynamics, Intel, Lilly, Lucent Technologies, Microsoft, Mitsubishi Motor, Nationwide Mutual Insurance, Pfizer, PPG Industries, Steelcase, Texaco Inc., the Tribune Co., TRW and United Airlines.

At stake for P&G, Ashland and the other corporations is an interest more fundamental than the politics that have made racial preferences a hot-button political issue for three decades.

They say their prosperity depends on finding a diverse work force, particularly as they are trying to sell to more-diverse audiences.

"Many companies have learned, some of them kicking and screaming, that affirmative action works," said Arthur Shriberg, a professor of management at Xavier University who has studied diversity programs. "If government were a business, they'd be out of business. It's just a different world."

P&G historically has avoided political statements in its advertising and civic engagements, making its foray into one of the nation's most emotionally charged issues even more unusual.

Reluctant to offend the administration - Vice President Cheney was a P&G director before taking office - company officials declined to elaborate on their position this week before joining other corporations in the "friend of the court" brief with the U.S. Supreme Court.

The companies are not publicly defending the university's specific policy, which awards points to applicants if they are minorities, just as it would for a perfect SAT score.

Verna Williams, a law professor at the University of Cincinnati, said the corporate filing could be significant because it could influence the administration.

"I think it's wonderful corporations are speaking out, because they can make a compelling case of why affirmative action is important to the nation," she said.

Important case

Experts are calling the Michigan case the most significant case of its kind before the Supreme Court since 1978, when the court outlawed quotas but ruled that universities could consider race in admissions. It came through the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati in 2001 on its way to the nation's highest court.

The president has argued that other states, including California, Texas and Florida, are finding race-neutral ways to diversify their student populations. For example, some have guaranteed admission to public universities to the top students at all high schools in those states.

Mr. Bush has said Michigan's policy of assigning a numerical value for minority candidates goes too far.

"Quota systems that use race to include or exclude people from higher education and the opportunities it offers are divisive, unfair and impossible to square with the Constitution," the president said this year.

Bush's opposition to Michigan's policy showed the political risks evident in any discussion about race, because the Republican Party is eager to attract more minority voters.

Critics, meanwhile, contend the administration is using the issue to appeal to its conservative base.

Several leaders in the administration, including Secretary of State Colin Powell and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, have expressed some support for racial-preference programs, although Rice agreed with Bush that Michigan's methods were problematic.

But big business, which will benefit from many of the president's economic programs, has tried to steer clear of those political minefields, said Xavier's Shriberg.

"One might argue that government isn't held accountable the way business is," the XU professor said.

"Has government learned what corporate America has learned?"

Recruitment priorities

In a brief filed in May 2001, the corporations said finding a diverse work force helps sales and profits, making racial hiring criteria a necessity, not a luxury.

"Because P&G is a major employer in the Midwest ... it has historically relied upon nearby universities of superior academic training, such as the University of Michigan, as a key source of new employees," P&G said in its section of that brief.

In its fiscal year ending in June 2001, P&G hired about 3,275 people in the U.S., 36.5 percent of them minorities, it said in that brief. The University of Michigan has long been one of the top 20 schools where P&G recruits, and was in the top 5 for African-American new hires from 1997 to 2000.

About 300 Michigan alumni worked at P&G as of that year, and the company donates more than $200,000 annually to support UofM academic programs, it said.

"Procter & Gamble continues to invest heavily in the University of Michigan as a valued and ongoing source of new talent needed by the company to further grow its global business," it said in the filing.

Other companies included in the 2001 amicus brief were 3M Co., Indianapolis drug giant Eli Lilly & Co., and P&G rival Johnson & Johnson.

Ashland spokesman Stan Lampe said recruiting a diverse work force has been a priority at the company, now based in Covington, for decades, so the Supreme Court brief is consistent with its policy.

"In order to get a diverse work force, you have to have a diverse student population coming out of your post-secondary education," he said. "One begets the other."

E-mail cpeale@enquirer.com