Thank God for the Lovings

     I always assumed I would marry a white man and if you would have told me 5 years ago that I would end up being married to a black man, I probably would have laughed. Interracial marriage was the furthest thing from my mind and for the most part, still is. I don't look at my husband and see a black man, I just see him and I don't think of us having a interracial marriage, just a regular one. Even though most of the nations attention is focused on same sex marriage issues right now, there are still a lot of people out there who disagree with interracial marriage. While we have been largely supported by our friends and family, I have recently been thinking about an incident when Michael and I first started dating and we were on the receiving end of a nasty look that clearly read "you guys shouldn't be together" and it got me thinking.
     Being a white female in the U.S., I never felt like anyone made great strides for my race, we never really had to over come anything (remember, I'm talking about race here, not women's rights or our separation from Britain) African Americans, on the other hand, had tons to overcome. I always knew desegregation wasn't that long ago but Michaels parents really put it into perspective for me when they shared their stories of going through it. Thank God for people like Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr., Fredrick Duglass, Sojourner Truth, and Thurgood Marshall. All who made huge differences in African American history, and changed the future. But I want to write about Mildred and Richard Loving, who changed my future.
     The Lovings were an interracial couple who married in DC, evading the Racial Integrity Act (a state law banning the marriage of any white person to any non white person) After returning home to Caroline County, Virginia, they were charged with violation of the ban. Police invaded their home at night hoping to find them having sex (which was another crime) but instead just found them sleeping in the same bed. Mildred, trying to defend their marriage, pointed out their marriage certificate hanging on the wall, but in the end the certificate proved that they were married in another state and returned to Virginia (also a crime). The Lovings were charged under Section 20-58 of the Virginia Code, which prohibited interracial couples from being married out of state and with the intent of returning to Virginia, and Section 20-59, which classified miscegenation (interracial marriage or interracial sex) as a felony, punishable by a prison sentence of between one and five years. In January of 1959 the Lovings pled guilty and were sentenced to one year in prison or being banished from Virginia for 25 years. They decided to move to DC and fight. On June 12, 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned their convictions in a unanimous decision. The court ruled that Virginia's anti-miscegenation statute violated both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
     So, here we are 44 years later, I am sitting in my living room drinking coffee and writing this blog in the early morning while my husband sleeps comfy in our bed. Thank God I don't have to worry about breaking the law or the police breaking into our home. I often wonder what life would be like if we were placed back in the 50's and 60's. Would have I even taken a chance with him? Would I fight for our rights or would I go to prison? Would I put up with the discrimination? I am so grateful that people before me fought.

Mildred & Richard Loving