WASHINGTON, D.C. - Speculation runs rampant here in Washington about President Clinton's commencement speech this weekend at the University of California at San Diego. He is expected to unveil his "initiative on race," but the White House is trying to keep the lid on specifics. If his minions' actions are any indication, Californians can expect a slap in the face.

At the University of California's Hastings College of Law graduation a few weeks ago, Attorney General Janet Reno took the opportunity to surreptitiously attack the state whose school had honored her as its keynote speaker. "We cannot deny that we are a multicultural society. . . I'm concerned, in the wake of Prop. 209 (the California Civil Rights Initiative that abolished racial preferences), that future classes won't be able to benefit from such rich (cultural and racial diversity)."

Though she did not specifically mention it, it was the University of California's governing board whose decision to remove race as a "plus factor" in admissions, whose June 1995 decision to ban the use of race- and gender-based preferences in admissions actually produced the lack of "diversity" Ms. Reno fears. She's referring, in fact, to the recently released admissions data from UC which shows a 75 percent drop in the number of admitted blacks at UC-Berkeley's Boalt Hall law school. Reno's comments are representative of the general hysteria prevalent among opponents of special admissions programs; according to Ms. Reno, without special help, minorities will be hopelessly left behind, and we will all suffer. Two points need to be made in response.

First, let us remember exactly how this drop in admissions came about. No one was excluded on the basis of race or sex; both were simply taken out of the admissions equation. In other words, applications were judged on scores, grades and recommendations -- but not gender or skin color. This is not an "anti-immigrant" policy, as Reno claimed at Hastings, but in fact is the only possible way to ensure equal treatment for all Americans, recently arrived or otherwise.

This leads to the second point--the sacred invocation of diversity (defined by race) as a necessary element in the educational process. As Ward Connerly, former chairman of CCRI and the founder of the American Civil Rights Institute, told guests at a PRI dinner last week, "Diversity does not equal excellence." This is not to say that diversity is a bad thing, but it is not a substitute for greatness. As Connerly asked the audience, when you were in school, do you ever remember sitting in classes and discussing your neighbor's childhood? Short of osmosis, one wonders exactly how diversity on campus manifests itself as a learning process.

While its merits are mythic on campuses today, it's time to take a common sense look at diversity. We need to take the focus off difference and instead emphasize achievement and opportunity. Despite Ms. Reno's protests, the Regents decision specifically (and CCRI more broadly) are the first steps towards compelling the state of California to expose the fallacy of diversity and return to the pursuit of individual achievement.

Unfortunately, the Attorney General's comments offer a preview of her boss's scheduled remarks on race at Saturday's University of California at San Diego graduation ceremony. The President comes to California to launch his new initiative on race -- and to chide the millions of voters who supported CCRI last November. Clinton is expected to revamp his "mend it, don't end it" policy, putting a new face on failed forms of affirmative action and making the case for continued use of preferences.

Don't expect clarity. As he's done from the beginning, the President will preen and pander, doing his best to blur the line between outreach and set-asides, between opportunity and outcomes. Rhetoric aside, count on Clinton to call for an expansion of programs that discriminate against one person in favor of another. Let's hope that Californians and the nation at large will continue to stand their ground in support of the constitutional premise of equal treatment under the law.

-Katherine Post, Public Policy Fellow