How are we doing with loving?: Race, law, and intermarriage

Boston University Law Review

Volumn 77, Issue 4, 1997, Pages 815-822

  Kennedy, Randall ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0031312641     PISSN: 00068047     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Review

References (32)

1. 388 U.S. 1 (1967).
2. 3 Laws of Va. 86-87 (Hening 1823). See generally Walter Wadlington, The Loving Case: Virginia's Anti-Miscegenation Statute in Historical Perspective, 52 VA. L. REV. 1189 (1966) (providing an historical account of Virginia's miscegenation laws and concluding that a constitutional attack in the federal courts was the only avenue remaining open for striking the law from the statute books).
3. See Loving, 388 U.S. at 6.
4. 1924 Va. Acts ch. 371.
5. See Loving, 388 U.S. at 6.
6. See id. at 4 (citing VA. CODE ANN. § 20-58 (Michie 1960)).
7. See id. (citing VA. CODE ANN. § 20-57).
8. See id. at 2-3.
9. Id. at 3.
10. Id. at 10-11. The Court also held that Virginia's ban on interracial marriage violated the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. See id. at 12.
11. See id. at 1.
12. See Eric Harrison, Dating Changes, Discord Rock a Tiny Alabama Town South: A Principal is Removed. A School Is Burned. But at Heart of the Tension is Growing Issue of Race-Mixing, L.A. TIMES, Aug. 12, 1994, at A1. It should be noted, however, that Hulond Humphries, the principal who was dismissed for voicing his disapproval of interracial dating and marriage, subsequently became the leading contender for the post of superintendent of schools. In other words, after his demotion, the former principal requested and received a promotion from voters. See Rheta Grimsley Johnson, Wedowee Thumbs Nose at the World, THE ATLANTA CONST., July 17, 1996, at C1.
13. See Eric Harrison, Dating Changes, Discord Rock a Tiny Alabama Town South: A Principal is Removed. A School Is Burned. But at Heart of the Tension is Growing Issue of Race-Mixing, L.A. TIMES, Aug. 12, 1994, at A1. It should be noted, however, that Hulond Humphries, the principal who was dismissed for voicing his disapproval of interracial dating and marriage, subsequently became the leading contender for the post of superintendent of schools. In other words, after his demotion, the former principal requested and received a promotion from voters. See Rheta Grimsley Johnson, Wedowee Thumbs Nose at the World, THE ATLANTA CONST., July 17, 1996, at C1.
14. See Mr. and Mrs. Thomas: A Love Story, NEWSDAY, Oct. 1, 1991, at 8.
15. See generally RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, FORBIDDEN GROUNDS: THE CASE AGAINST EMPLOYMENT DISCRIMINATION LAWS (1992) (arguing that employment markets are largely competitive and therefore regulation cannot be justified); MILTON FRIEDMAN, CAPITALISM AND FREEDOM 108-15 (1962) (arguing in favor of free market approach for solving such problems).
16. See generally RICHARD A. EPSTEIN, FORBIDDEN GROUNDS: THE CASE AGAINST EMPLOYMENT DISCRIMINATION LAWS (1992) (arguing that employment markets are largely competitive and therefore regulation cannot be justified); MILTON FRIEDMAN, CAPITALISM AND FREEDOM 108-15 (1962) (arguing in favor of free market approach for solving such problems).
17. See Douglas J. Besharov & Timothy S. Sullivan, One Flesh, THE NEW DEMOCRAT, July/Aug. 1996, at 19.
18. See id. at 21.
19. In 1980, black women married white men in only 0.7% of all marriages involving a black bride; by 1993, black women were marrying white men in 3.9% of the marriages involving a black bride. See id.
20. Id. at 20.
21. Id. at 21.
22. Nathan Glazer, Black and White After Thirty Years, THE PUBLIC INTEREST, Fall 1995, at 67.
23. See John N. Tinker, Intermarriage and Assimilation in a Plural Society: Japanese-Americans in the United States, 5 MARRIAGE & FAM. REV. 61, 63 (1982) (documenting rates of intermarriage among Japanese Americans from the 1940s through the 1970s); see also PAUL R. SPICKARD, MIXED BLOOD: INTERMARRIAGE AND ETHNIC IDENTITY IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY AMERICA 47-61 (1989) (contrasting intermarriage rates among first generation and second generation Japanese Americans).
24. See John N. Tinker, Intermarriage and Assimilation in a Plural Society: Japanese-Americans in the United States, 5 MARRIAGE & FAM. REV. 61, 63 (1982) (documenting rates of intermarriage among Japanese Americans from the 1940s through the 1970s); see also PAUL R. SPICKARD, MIXED BLOOD: INTERMARRIAGE AND ETHNIC IDENTITY IN TWENTIETH-CENTURY AMERICA 47-61 (1989) (contrasting intermarriage rates among first generation and second generation Japanese Americans).
25. For a poignant example of this phenomenon, see MAUREEN T. REDDY, CROSSING THE COLOR LINE: RACE, PARENTING, AND CULTURE (1994).
26. See Isabel Wilkerson, Black-White Marriages Rise, but Couples Still Face Scorn, N.Y. TIMES, Dec. 2, 1991, at A1.
27. SPICKARD, supra note 21, at 348.
28. For the most extensive argument against race matching, see Elizabeth Bartholet, Where Do Black Children Belong? The Politics of Race Matching in Adoption, 139 U. PA. L. REV. 1163 (1991). See also Randall Kennedy, Orphans of Separatism: The Painful Politics of Transracial Adoption, 17 AM. PROSPECT, Spring 1994, at 38.
29. For the most extensive argument against race matching, see Elizabeth Bartholet, Where Do Black Children Belong? The Politics of Race Matching in Adoption, 139 U. PA. L. REV. 1163 (1991). See also Randall Kennedy, Orphans of Separatism: The Painful Politics of Transracial Adoption, 17 AM. PROSPECT, Spring 1994, at 38.
30. See Act of Aug. 20, 1996, Pub. L. No. 104-188, § 1808, 110 Stat. 1775.
31. See generally Note, Racial Steering in the Romantic Marketplace, 107 HARV. L. REV. 877 (1994) (arguing in favor of mobilizing public opinion against racially discriminatory personal ads in magazines and newspapers).
32. It should be noted, however, that the Supreme Court invalidated state prohibition against interracial marriage only near the end of the Civil Rights Era, some thirteen years after Brown v. Board of Educ., 347 U.S. 483 (1954). Nineteen years before Loving, the Supreme Court of California held that California's antimiscegenation law violated the federal constitution. See Perez v. Lippold, 198 P.2d 17, 29 (1948).