U.S. Race Relations at the Crossroads in California

Abstract

If you believe, as I do, in racial equality as a matter of moral principle and in the incompatibility of political democracy with racial hierarchy, then you will no doubt agree that we live in very difficult times, and that the end of the millennium gives more grounds for sorrow than celebration. Optimism is more than difficult when so many visions have gone unrealized and so much ground has been lost. Because race is such a deep and enduring wound in the body politic, the struggle for racial equality (even in its few optimistic moments) requires us to always keep a sharp lookout for that "hellhound on my trail," to quote blues man Robert Johnson.

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