Reexamines Gunnar Myrdal's "An American Dilemma" (1944), which argued race relations in America would improve because the American Creed of democratic liberalism created a dilemma between existing racial prejudice and the national ideology. Describes how Myrdal's deterministic perspective robbed civil rights historiography of its drama and shows how a rhetorical approach to documents restores the vividness of historical moments. (NKA)