Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind,
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
~William Shakespeare
http://youtu.be/Z009ZpDJtpk Love Is Color Blind~Sarah Connor & TQ
http://youtu.be/HSGU2Yekadg The Loving Kind~Nanci Griffith
Who would give a law to lovers? Love is unto itself a higher law. ~Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy, A.D. 524
In 1969, the state of Virginia adopted a motto, “Virginia is for Lovers.” Once there was a time, however, when that sentiment didn’t appear to ring true. The year was 1958. That was the year when Mildred Jeter, a woman of African-American and Rappahannock Native American nationality married Richard Loving, a man of European descent. In other words: she was black, and he was white. They traveled outside of the state of Virginia into Washington, D.C. to marry, so as not to violate The Racial Integrity Act of 1924, which was a state law banning marriage between white and non-white individuals.
After their marriage, the Lovings returned home to their small town of Central Pointe, Virginia. Within five weeks of their marriage, and based upon an anonymous tip, it’s been reported that Mr. and Mrs. Loving’s home was raided at 2:00 a.m. by the local police who found them in bed asleep. Upon learning that they were married, the couple was arrested and charged under Virginia's anti-miscegenation law with “cohabiting as man and wife, against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth.”
Can you imagine that? I have tried to put myself in that place that they were in and imagine it, and I can’t. I cannot fathom being asleep in bed with my husband, and having police descend upon my home at two o’clock in the morning, wake us from our peaceful sleep, then arrest us for nothing more than the simple fact that we were married to one another and our skin colors were different.
That was the reality in 1958-Virginia, and other places in the south as well.
Specifically, the Lovings were charged under Section 20-58 of the Virginia Code, which prohibited interracial couples from being married out of state then returning to Virginia, and Section 20-59, which classified miscegenation [the mixing of different racial groups through marriage, cohabitation, sexual relations, or procreation] as a felony, punishable by a prison sentence of between one and five years. The trial judge in their case was Leon M. Bazile who echoed the German Physiologist, Johann Friedrich Blumenbach’s 18th-century interpretation of race, to define the specific infraction of the law for which the Lovings were being charged. He said:
“...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 marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.”
Hm. I had to pause when I read that. I felt such vitriol dripping from those words as I read them. I wish that someone had asked Judge Bazile if he’d ever listened to the words of the gospel song, Jesus Loves the Little Children? It would certainly see his statement and give it a holy-roller raise!
“Jesus loves the little children – ALL the children of the world. Red, and yellow, black and white, ALL are precious in his sight. Jesus loves the little children of the world!”
Take a listen for yourself: http://youtu.be/0a45z_HG3WU Ray Stevens-Everything is Beautiful
Unfortunately, in the late 50's, the judge found nothing, it would appear, beautiful about the Lovings. After they pled guilty to their charges on January 6, 1959, they were sentenced to one year in prison, with the sentence suspended for 25 years on the condition that the couple leave the state of Virginia and not return to it together for 25 years. As painful as it was, they accepted the condition and moved to the District of Columbia.
Even in D.C., the Lovings faced housing discrimination. But, it was Mildred Loving’s frustration over their inability to travel together to visit their families in Virginia coupled with the social isolation they felt and the financial difficulties they faced in Washington as well as her flat out feeling of unfairness over the decision to begin with, that caused her to write a letter of protest to Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy in 1964. Upon receipt of her objection over her and her husband’s situation, Kennedy referred her letter to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
It would be the case that would change the course of the legality of interracial marriage and shake the foundation of the deep-seeded discrimination associated with statutes that would be shown to have ultimately violated the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.
The ACLU, on behalf of the Lovings, filed motions to vacate the state’s trial court judgement and set aside the original sentence that had been handed down in 1959, because of a Section 1 violation of the 14th Amendment. By October of 1964, when their motion still had not been decided, the Lovings filed a class action suit in the United States District Court.
By January 22nd, of the following year [1965], the district court allowed the Lovings to present their constitutional claims to the Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals. It was Virginia Supreme Court Justice Harry L. Carrico who wrote the court’s opinion upholding the constitutionality of the anti-miscegenation statutes and affirmed the criminal convictions as originally handed down in ‘59.
Undeterred, the Lovings took their case, on appeal, all the way to the United States Supreme Court. It was known as Loving v. Virginia.
What the U.S. Supreme Court decided in response to Loving v. Virginia, in the simplest terms is that love is color blind, and that the state did not have the right to tell people that it was illegal for them to marry because the color of their skin was akin to two different crayons one found in a child’s box of Crayola’s. It was not right. It was unfair. More importantly, it was unconstitutional.
Who would have EVER thought that a black woman from a small town in Virginia could change the course of marital law for every state in our union simply by virtue of writing a letter out of frustration over HER circumstance. Yet, that’s exactly what Mildred Loving did.
It was a unanimous decision by the court. UNANIMOUS. Think about that for a moment. In 1967, when the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its decision, every, single justice voted on the side of the Lovings – they were in full agreement that the state of Virginia had violated both the Due Process Clause as well as the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and overturned the previous conviction. The Commonwealth’s arguments were dismissed because they were discriminatory.
Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote in the unanimous decision for the court, finding:
“Marriage is one of the ‘basic civil rights of man,’ fundamental to our very existence and survival.... To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State's citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discrimination. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State.”
Further, the court held that the anti-miscegenation laws were racist and had been established as a means to perpetuate white supremacy, stating:
“There is patently no legitimate overriding purpose independent of invidious racial discrimination which justifies this classification. The fact that Virginia prohibits only interracial marriages involving white persons demonstrates that the racial classifications must stand on their own justification, as measures designed to maintain White Supremacy.”
Richard Loving’s reaction to the court’s decision: “For the first time, I can put my arm around Mildred and publicly call her my wife.”
The Lovings attorney, Bernard Cohen, responded by saying, “They just were in love with one another and wanted the right to live together as husband and wife in Virginia, without any interference from officialdom.”
It is no surprise that the Lovings thereafter moved back to Virginia.
On June 12, 2007, the 40th Anniversary of the high court’s decision, Mildred Loving had this to say, “My generation was bitterly divided over something that should have been so clear and right. The majority believed that what the judge said, that it was God’s plan to keep people apart, and that government should discriminate against people in love. But I have lived long enough now to see big changes. The older generation’s fears and prejudices have given way, and today’s young people realize that if someone loves someone, they have a right to marry.
Surrounded as I am now by wonderful children and grandchildren, not a day goes by that I don’t think of Richard and our love, our right to marry, and how much it meant to me to have that freedom to marry the person precious to me, even if others thought he was the ‘wrong kind of person’ for me to marry. I believe all Americans, no matter their race, no matter their sex, no matter their sexual orientation, should have that same freedom to marry. Government has no business imposing some people’s religious beliefs over others. Especially if it denies people’s civil rights.
I am still not a political person, but I am proud that Richard’s and my name is on a court case that can help reinforce the love, the commitment, the fairness, and the family that so many people, black or white, young or old, gay or straight, seek in life. I support the freedom to marry for all. That’s what Loving, and loving, are all about.”
I get choked up when I read the last two lines of her statement. I agree with them wholeheartedly: I support the freedom to marry for all. That’s what Loving and loving are all about.
Yes. Indeed. Love and ONLY love...
Today, 47 years later, more and more people who have been denied the right to marry are seeing that ban lifted on them as well, in part, thanks to the Loving v Virginia case. It’s a good thing.
For those of you who may be wondering, Richard Loving died in 1975 at the age of 41, in a car accident, after a drunken driver struck the car that he and Mildred were riding in. She lost her right eye in that same accident.
On Friday, May 2, 2008, Mildred Loving died of pneumonia. She was 68 years old. I remember hearing it on the evening news that night. Living in central Virginia, there was an overview of the case. It was a nice tribute. I remember taking a glass of iced tea outside on the front porch and sitting in the rocking chair, looking at my rock garden in the front yard thinking about that case and the Lovings. I heard the song, Everything Is Beautiful in my mind as I reflected on what Richard and Mildred Loving had achieved with that landmark Supreme Court case. Then, I heard Bruce Springsteen’s, If I Should Fall Behind, in my mind and I smiled. Richard and Mildred were together again. That was a lovely thought on a Friday evening as is this: the legacy of the Lovings is that the ban on interracial marriage has been stripped from the books on every state in our union. It it no longer illegal to marry someone of a different race than your own. Love does not recognize color. Other groups are using the Loving case to argue that love does not recognize gender either. I hear Ray Stevens in my head singing, “under God’s heaven, the world’s gonna find a way...”
In case you’ve ever seen June 12th marked on a calender as “Loving Day” and wondered what that was all about, now you know...
http://youtu.be/N1wg9jyvfN0 If I Should Fall Behind~Bruce Spring steen & The E Street Band
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