Large-scale national surveys have produced a vast amount of data on racism, prejudice, and discrimination in the United States. This dissertation contributes to racial attitudes research by using data from a new, nationally representative telephone survey conducted in 2003 to examine key claims about identity, privilege, and politics from whiteness studies. I find that racial identity is less salient and significant for whites than other racial groups, and the importance of white identities vary based on education and region. There is also a duality of white racial identity wherein strong identities are held for both progressive and defensive reasons. I also examine understandings of white privilege by using a split ballot experiment to compare explanations for white privilege and African American disadvantage. Explanations for racial advantage and disadvantage are different; they are not simply mirror images of each other. More Americans than expected believe structural factors play a role in generating white privilege. Finally, I explore the utility of adding whiteness measures to models of political attitudes and beliefs. I find that Americans who see structural factors as important in explaining white advantage are more likely than others to support assistance to African Americans. The inclusion of whiteness in our analyses of racial politics provides additional insight as well as new directions for future research and discussions on the complex phenomenon of race and politics in the United States. In sum, this dissertation provides baseline measures of key dimensions of whiteness theory and shows that racial attitudes research can be strengthened by incorporating ideas from whiteness studies.