American suburbs in the 1970s are usually understood as sites of racial reaction, defined by color-blind conservative and opposition to housing and school integration. This paper complicates that consensus by examining Montgomery County, Maryland, a well-off suburb bordering Washington, D.C. Though motivated by similar racial and economic fears as other communities, the highly-educated population of the county turned to diversity the protector, rather than executioner, of their suburban dreams. Through housing and school policy, officials and ordinary residents alike argued that racial pluralism represented a positive good, and more importantly, an antidote to neighborhood transition amid rapid demographic changes. The origins of modern conservatism may lie in suburban America, but the origins of modern, multicultural liberalism just might dwell there too.
B Miller (Wed,) studied this question.