MMINNEAPOLIS DEAN HOLT smiled and laughed with a waiter he knows fromseveral trips to Buca Little Italy, his favorite restaurant.

"Best Italian food in the Twin Cities," he said.

Holt sat next to his wife, Kim Holt. She smiled, too. What's not to smileabout? Life for the Holts is good.

They own a nice split-level home. They have a bright, healthy 6-year-oldson. Dean Holt, 35, has hit his stride as a product sales manager for Pillsbury.Even though his wife, 28, left her job as a customer service representativefor Carlson Cos., the Holts easily rank in the upper reaches of the middleclass.

And yet, because they are black, there is a certain tension to the Holts'achievements. For whites, middle-class life is typical. For blacks, it isnot. Half of white households make more than $35,000 a year, which is aboutthe median national income. Barely a quarter of black households make thatmuch.

For the Holts and other members of the black middle class, success presentsa new set of challenges, especially when elections approach.

Do their politics and values align with those of their neighbors, most ofwhom are white? Or do they align with black tradition, a tradition thatsays you don't forget where you came from and you don't forget who you'veleft behind?

Often, the answer is mixed.

The Holts seem, at first, like typical conservative suburbanites. Like theirneighbors, they are appalled at what they see as an over-reliance on welfareamong the poor. And there's a certain frustration, embarrassment tingedwith anger, for other blacks who can't - or won't - wean themselves offthe welfare system.

"No one makes us have babies," Dean Holt said. "No one makesus drop out of school. It's about personal responsibility. I've seen generationsof welfare moms who have never worked a day in their life. I don't thinkwelfare was designed to be like that."

But although those values might match those of their fellow suburbanites,the Holts insist that they can never forget that they are different.

Kim Holt still remembers the chill that greeted them when they moved tosuburban Plymouth. "There were some who didn't speak for a year,"she said.

Dean Holt tried approaching one of his neighbors only to be brushed aside."I went up to him one day and said hi," he said. "He said,`I don't have time right now to talk.' "

It's common for black Americans who have "made it" to complainthat they feel "invisible." They don't conform, after all, tocommon media portrayals. And as Election Day draws closer, it's an openquestion if any of the political messages being sent out are directed tothem.

The candidates certainly haven't caught fire with the Holts. Nor have theywith two other black families interviewed for this story.

Collectively, they offer Republicans a frustrating paradox.

None said they would vote for Bob Dole. Yet the Holts support term limits,private school vouchers, stiff penalties for criminals and welfare reformwith time limits, all Republican positions.

Fair or unfair, the perception lingers that the Republican Party is notinclusive and does not understand racial issues. For many middle-class blacks,that perception acts as a barrier between supporting Republican positionsand supporting Republican politicians. In 1992, only 6 percent of blackssupported George Bush, down from 8 percent in 1988.

What do middle-class blacks want? What does it feel like to live in theirskin?

Judging from the Holts' experience - and those of others like them - ititches and it burns sometimes. Such as when you're watched and followedin a clothing store. Such as when "your own" look at your houseand your car and your job and call you "booshie," slang for bourgeoisie,a pampered class that's forsaken its roots to hold hands with The Man.

They are black, proud to be black, but never black enough - either to fitwhite stereotypes or to fit the expectations of other blacks. Charles Banner-Haley,a sociologist and author of "The Fruits of Integration," saysmiddle-class blacks are not white wannabes. They are simply torn betweenidentity and empathy with poorer blacks and their drive for success.

"Lower-class blacks are extremely angry," Banner-Haley said. "Theylook at blacks who have made it, and they feel left out."

Banner-Haley said that the early black middle-class response to the angerof their poorer brethren was "sad."

"They've tried to `get down' with them, to rationalize certain behavior,"Banner-Haley said.

Now, however, middle-class blacks have come to new conclusions. "Now,the black middle class is saying we've got to change," Banner-Haleysaid. "There's been a loss of moral authority."

That loss of moral authority, Banner-Haley said, partly explains black middle-classsupport for an overhaul of the welfare system and stiff penalties for criminals.

But still the old pinch remains.

"The black middle class is under the gun," Banner-Haley said."It asks itself: How do we help (poorer blacks) without antagonizingthe white majority?"

Bart Landry, author of "The New Black Middle Class," said thatpinch is a unique part of reality for middle-class blacks. "It's anextra burden that middle-class whites don't have," Landry said. "Butit's kind of an inescapable burden."

How many more Holt families are out there these days - blacks with collegedegrees pursuing the American dream?

The answer is a lot more than there used to be - but not as many as it sometimesseems.

In 1970, there were 1.4 million black households earning more than today'sequivalent of $35,000 a year, the approximate median income. By 1993, thatnumber had more than doubled to 3 million, meaning that over the past quartercentury, an additional 1.6 million households had achieved a foothold inthe middle class or beyond.

Indeed, the numbers of affluent black households, those earning more than$75,000 (or its equivalent) per year, increased by nearly sixfold between1970 and 1993.

But that's only half of the story. Among blacks as a whole, these gainswere offset by entrenched poverty at the lower end of the economic scale.

Considering black households as a whole, those in the middle made littleprogress. For example, as a percentage of all black households, those inthe middle - those making between $25,000 and $75,000 a year - actuallydeclined slightly between 1970 and 1993.

Even when the newly affluent are added in, black progress seems rather stagnant.The percentage of black households making more than the median income increasedonly to 26.5 percent of all black households in 1993 from 22 percent ofall black households in 1970.

What that means is that the Holts and other middle-class blacks are morevisible to the wider society, yet among blacks as a whole they are stillquite exceptional. Sylvia Neblett, a lawyer and wife of another lawyer,Adonis Neblett, has chosen to stay home in St. Paul with Tamra, 3, and Marcelo,1 1/2. Her oldest, 13-year-old Matthew, is at school.

Sylvia Neblett's job in the Minneapolis Civil Rights Department was "reorganized"in December 1994 after a new department head took over. She said she sometimesmisses work.

"There are days when I do miss it," she said. "I enjoyedgetting up, getting ready for work."

Neblett said the decision to remain home has benefits and drawbacks. Thebenefits come from spending more time with her children. The primary drawback,she said, is money. Her family lives in a modest apartment, and her incomeis missed.

Her husband said Dole's plans for a 15 percent tax cut sounds as if it wouldhelp his family's finances.

"But I'm skeptical of him being able to deliver," he said. "Ibelieve what he stands for isn't to help me or to help those similar tome."

Adonis Neblett, 39, who has an engineering degree from the MassachusettsInstitute of Technology, said he has more faith in President Bill Clinton.

"They always talk about families," he said. "I heard it from(the Democrats), and it sounded sincere. I heard them talk about inclusion,and it sounded sincere. It was warm and fuzzy, but it created a vision ofa country where I want to live."