According to the authors of "Higher Education for American Democracy," the role of education in a democratic society "is not merely to meet the demands of the present" but to "serve as an instrument of social transition" (p. 6). A democratic university should be a living model of democracy that could embody the civic ambitions of a nation. The focus in this article is on one such model: the University of California, Riverside (UCR), in the last decades of the 20th century. The author's year-long (2016-2017) ethnographic study of UCR examined the workings of all campus units, from finance to facilities, academic advising to cultural centers. What was discovered offers a keyhole glimpse into the larger racial and financial politics shaping higher education throughout the United States at present. Considering UCR in detail helps to identify what a more democratic higher education could look like, how we might get there, and what might stand in the way.