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The well-understood gap between "mainstream" environmental organizations and Americans from minority populations is rooted in two phenomena. First, in the mid-1990s, hostility expressed toward immigrants and immigration by the Sierra Club (among other groups) drove a wedge between environmentalism and Latinos, as 87% of all Latinos are within two generations of the immigration experience. Second, whereas larger environmental groups focused on pollution and other forms of environmental degradation as well as conservation of natural and wild spaces, minority Americans showed less engagement in these issues and were affected more directly by air and water pollution and its consequences—phenomena that more directly affect communities of color. "Environmental justice" movements and organizations emerged to fill the gap left by the somewhat diminished focus of large "mainstream" groups on minority populations.

Who Are We? The Challenges to America's National
Identity. By Samuel P. Huntington. New York: Simon and Schuster,
2004. 448p. $27.00.Samuel Huntington suggests in this book that American national
identity is threatened by a tidal wave of Latino—primarily
Mexican—immigrants who are refusing to assimilate to American
"Anglo-Protestant" values, and who are facilitated in this
resistance by the erosion of elite support for those very same values.
That erosion is a consequence of the "cults of multiculturalism and
diversity" (p. 144) that have collectively "denounced the idea
of Americanization," "downgraded the centrality of
English," and "advocated legal recognition of group rights and
racial preferences" (p. 142), strong charges indeed.

The morning of November 3, 2004, was an extremely difficult time for gay and lesbian Americans. The reelection of President George W. Bush, and the simultaneous passage of anti-gay marriage amendments in 11 states, was as resounding a defeat as any social group is likely to experience in American politics. Worse, the emergence of the analytically vague phrase "moral values" from the exit polls and some arm-chair analysis by the pundits had already raised to the level of conventional wisdom the assertion that Senator John Kerry had lost because of the issue of same-sex marriage. Even Democrats, trying to extract some meaning and direction from the disappointing outcomes, appeared to conclude that the marriage issue had played an important and costly role. To gay and lesbian Americans, the headlines that morning might as well have read, "We lost. And it'syourfault!"

The authors contrast the 2002 Senate and 2003 gubernatorial runoffs in Louisiana, noting that the margin and the breadth of victory were greater for a gubernatorial candidate who enjoyed less political resources than her copartisan. The authors argue that the GOP's southern strategy has constrained its ability to diversify its coalition and contributed to the defeat of its nonwhite candidate for governor. Using aggregate parish level data and individual survey responses, the authors demonstrate that the customary polarization of whites in favor of Republican nominees was undermined in the 2003 election. The authors offer some thoughts on the implications of the findings.