"Martin Luther King gave his famous 'I Have a Dream Speech' at a civil rights march in Washington in 1963. In your view, do you think the U.S. has fulfilled the vision King outlined in that speech, or don't you think so?"If that looks like a surprisingly small racial gap, that's because it is. Shockingly so. I've scarcely ever seen a poll on a racial issue with that small a split. Admittedly the "non-white" group isn't just the "black" group, and I'd like to see the split among African-Americans per se, but I'd be surprised if it looks too radically different. (For instance, if you assume that non-white non-blacks responded the same as whites, and that blacks are 50% of non-whites, that would double the tiny gap from 6% to roughly 12%, still not too impressive.)
All adults Whites Non-Whites
Has fulfilled: 50% 51% 49%
Don't think so: 47% 46% 50%
This isn't the really interesting thing, though. The poll also asked those who thought we have not achieved the Dream yet whether they think we can eventually do so, or not. Overall, 27% said we could get there eventually and 22% said we couldn't, along with the original 50% who said we're there yet. Among white "no" voters, however, the breakdown was 25%-23%. Among non-white "no" voters, the figures were 31%-19%. So whites had a 51%/25%/23% line overall, while non-whites were at 49%/31%/19%. That's slightly less "yes," noticeably less "not ever," and substantially more "not yet, but eventually" response among non-whites. It's an interesting combination: more long-term optimism, but also more present-tense skepticism. I suppose that makes a lot of sense, for a group that has suffered so long and has come so far, and still has so far to go to reach full equality.
No comments:
Post a Comment