It's hard to believe that after 54 years of the Supreme Court's Decision in Loving v Virginia that interracial marriage may be an issue before the Supreme Court yet again. I guess in the last five years we have seen more hatred of different segments of our society expressed, including the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement as well as LGBTQ rights. Many may not remember, but it used to be illegal to transport a woman across state lines for purposes of a personal relationship or to interracially marry.
It seems the antipathy towards interracial marriage is now arising once again. There is not a case to overturn interracial marriage, but this article is written by the Civil Rights Attorney who co-represented the interracial couple in the landmark case of Loving v Virginia. He speaks about a case that is currently before the Supreme Court in which a severely mentally ill black man suffering from schizophrenia and psychosis is on trial for murdering his estranged wife and children. His wife was white, and their children are products of their interracial marriage. The Jurors who decided that case were asked their views on interracial marriage and people of different races having children. According to the Supreme Court Petition, three Jurors expressed opposition to one or both of these issues. One Juror said I don’t believe God intended for this and another said we should stay with our blood line. The third stated that interracial marriage was harmful for children as they did not have a specific race to belong to.
I, as many others thought, that this country had evolved beyond these archaic views. 54 years ago, the Trial Court that imposed the criminal penalty on the Lovings’ actually stated Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And, but for the interference with his arrangement, there would be no cause for such marriage. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix. I find this quotation and statement absolutely astounding now as well as then., but the law that created criminality for interracial marriages was based on purported justifications of “racial integrity” and preventing the “corruption of blood” themes that still echo through the Jurors' statements in the case now being sent to the Supreme Court.
Selected excerpt(s) and linked article courtesy of Philip Hirschkop, Civil Rights Attorney, Bloomberglaw(dot)com
Royalty-free photo courtesy of UnSplash
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