Contemporary Controversies and the American Racial Divide is a detailed study of some of the most racially divisive issues America has encountered in the past decade. Smith and Seltzer employ more than forty surveys to explore race-based public opinion differences on high-profile controversies including the Rodney King and O.J. Simpson cases, the arrest, trial, jailing, and subsequent reelection of Washington, D.C. Mayor Marion Barry, the Million Man March and Louis Farrakhan, and the Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill controversy. The authors also look at race-based opinion differences on the inner-city crack cocaine epidemic and the spread of AIDS among the American populace.