The discrepancy between verbal attitude and overt behavior bears both on public opinion research and public policy, but there has been little attempt to study the problem with a natural population in a public opinion context. This paper reviews conceptual issues from the attitude-behavior literature and applies them to a public opinion, voting setting. I argue (a) that a large proportion of white Americans seldom or never experience a personal encounter with blacks, thus restricting their realistic behavior orientations and overt behavior toward blacks largely to the policy sphere, and (b) that many of the key issues discussed in voting studies can be subsumed under the more general concerns of the attitude-behavior literature. Using data from the SRC 1968 Presidential Election Survey, the paper examines the process by which affect and action orientation toward blacks are translated into affect, action orientation (voting intention), and overt behavior (voting decision) toward George Wallace, an independent presidential candidate with a strong anti-civil rights campaign platform.