Release Date:- 2021-09-21
Availability:- In Stock
Kind:- ebook
A landmark history told with supreme narrative skill, Freedom to Discriminate uncovers realtorsā definitive role in segregating America and shaping modern conservative thought. Gene Slater follows this story from inside the realtor profession, drawing on many industry documents that have remained unexamined until now. His book traces the increasingly aggressive ways realtors justified their practices, how they successfully weaponized the word āfreedomā for their cause, and how conservative politicians have drawn directly from realtorsā rhetoric for the past several decades. Much of this story takes place in California, and Slater demonstrates why one of the very first all-white neighborhoods was in Berkeley, and why the state was the perfect place for Ronald Reaganās political ascension.
The hinge point in this history is Proposition 14, a largely forgotten but monumentally important 1964 ballot initiative. Created and promoted by California realtors, the proposition sought to uphold housing discrimination permanently in the stateās constitution, and a vast majority of Californians voted for it. This vote had explosive consequencesāones that still inform our deepest political divisions todayāand a true reckoning with the history of American racism requires a closer look at the events leading up to it. Freedom to Discriminate shatters preconceptions about American segregation, and it connects many seemingly disparate aspects of the nationās history in a novel and galvanizing way.