This volume represents the first publication in book form of the report of President Bill Clinton's Commission on Race Initiative. Although the document was originally released in 1998, its important contents were overshadowed by crises that diverted the president's and the media's attention. The commission's report contains the first comprehensive assessment of racial progress (or the lack thereof) in America since the heyday of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, along with many recommendations for improvement. It also extends the discussion of race relations beyond issues of black and white to encompass the new diversity of the nation's population in the twenty-first century. The book features Steven F. Lawson's introduction; a foreword by commission chair John Hope Franklin; President Clinton's speech that launched the commission; and, other useful materials that provide fresh information on American race relations today.