Lov(ing) is Love
Fifty years ago today the Supreme Court struck down Virginia’s ban on interracial marriage…
Mildred Jeter, a black woman (though she also had Native American heritage and may have preferred to think of herself as Indian), married Richard Loving, a white man, in the District of Columbia in 1958. When they returned to their home in Caroline County, Virginia, they were arrested under Virginia’s anti-miscegenation statute, which dated to colonial times and had been reaffirmed in the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. The Lovings were indicted and pled guilty. They were sentenced to a year in jail; the state’s law didn’t just ban interracial marriage, it made such marriage a criminal offense. However, the trial judge suspended the sentence on the condition that they leave Virginia and not return together for 25 years. In his opinion, the judge 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 marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.
Five years later they filed suit to have their conviction overturned. The case eventually reached the Supreme Court, which struck down Virginia’s law unanimously.
The Loving case was a milestone in the progress toward a country that truly guarantees every citizen life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness and equal protection of the laws. And, of course, it played a key role in the legal recognition of same-sex marriage four decades later.
From a libertarian perspective, it would be best to get the government out of marriage entirely—let marriage be a private contract and a religious ceremony, but not a government institution. But, whenever government imposes obligations or dispenses benefits, it may not “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” That provision is explicit in the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, applicable to the states, and implicit in the Fifth Amendment, applicable to the federal government.
Both Loving and Obergefell are landmark decisions that extended liberty and justice—and the freedom to marry—to all. But, had it not been for Loving, we may not ever have had Obergefell. Today we celebrate the late Richard and Mildred Loving — and their lawyers — and the victory that they won for all Americans.
