Candidates of all kinds of backgrounds may carry the day in the next century America, but the notion that all minorities, or even most members of any one minority, will line up behind them based on their pigmentation, is far from a reliable assumption for a national dialogue about our interracial future. While African-Americans are the least mainstreaming group, there is a growing black middle class, many members of which have adopted rather similar life styles and aspirations to other middle class Americans. Even if one takes all African-Americans as a group, one could be swayed too far by the recent data on the great differences in the ways whites and blacks perceived the O.J. Simpson trial and other matters directly concerning racial issues. When it comes to basic tenets of the American creed, the overwhelming majority of blacks are surprisingly accepting of them. Roughly the same percentages of blacks and whites strongly advocate balancing the budget, cutting personal income taxes, reforming the welfare system, and reforming Medicare.
Percentages are also nearly even in responses to questions on abortion and marijuana.
While there were some disagreements on specific issues and policies, this study found more similarities than discrepancies. Even when asked about such divisive issues as the direction of changes in race and ethnic relations, the similarities across lines were considerable. No anti anything majority here, or most likely, in our future. And the number of children of interracial marriages has quadrupled since 1970 to reach the 2 million mark. That is, while there may well be more Americans of non-European origin, a growing number of the American white majority will have a Hispanic daughter or son in law, an Asian stepfather or mother, and a whole rainbow of cousins.