Loving Day

Today, June 12, is Loving Day, the anniversary of the 1967 Supreme Court decision that struck down antimiscegenation laws that sixteen Southern states still proudly carried on their lawbooks.  While the blacks they were preventing from marrying whites were those they perceived as having roots in Africa, others with dark skin were looked at in the same way.

I have a friend whose father was from India and whose mother was French.  She told me about a trip they took through the American South in the 1950's.  Her siblings favored their mother's complexion, while she more resembled her father.  When they went to restaurants, she and her father were required to sit in the back, while her mother and siblings were permitted to eat in front, with the other "white" folks.  It's probably a good thing that her parents weren't also arrested for miscegenation at the same time.