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Loving v Virginia
Jun. 12th, 2005 07:21 amOn June 12th, 1967 the Supreme Court of the USA unanimously overturned the conviction of the Lovings. They had been convicted to a year in prison or to 25 years in exile from the state. Their crime? He was white, she was black and they got married.
The judge from the first trial
--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.--
Supreme Court's Decision
--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 discriminations. 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.--
I guess it's just me, but it sounds familiar. I'm sure there are those who will get ticked and who would think that mentioning the struggles of the 60s and then using the same breath to say gay rights should be punished. I don't.
( The joy of different points of view )
The judge from the first trial
--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.--
Supreme Court's Decision
--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 discriminations. 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.--
I guess it's just me, but it sounds familiar. I'm sure there are those who will get ticked and who would think that mentioning the struggles of the 60s and then using the same breath to say gay rights should be punished. I don't.
( The joy of different points of view )
