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Loving Day is June 12th: Celebrate the Legal Right to Interracial Marriage

A Day to Pause, Reflect, and Celebrate Our Rights

By Bartleby, published Apr 26, 2006
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If you hear the words “Loving Day” and think I’m referencing a pop culture holiday on February 14th, then read on – ‘cause you’re mistaken. Loving Day, feted annually on June 12th, is not just a Hallmark holiday orchestrated to push the sale of greeting cards and chocolate hearts like its February cousin. Rather, it’s a serious celebration of a landmark Supreme Court decision about personal freedom. Why is it called Loving Day, you ask?

Well, never had a Supreme Court case been so aptly named as Loving v. Virginia, the 1967 decision that nullified a state law banning interracial marriage. The case secured the legal right of citizens in all states to marry they people they love without regard to race, a move with which only the most bigoted of Americans would now disagree. Loving Day, observed on June 12th to coincide with the anniversary of the decision, exists to celebrate the legal right to interracial marriage. This hard-won battle helped to shape the ongoing civil rights movement, and Loving Day honors the couple who waged this fight and all the couples who came before and after.

Mildred Jeter, a black woman, and Richard Loving, her white boyfriend, were residents of Virginia who wanted to get married in the late 1950s. Because the state of Virginia had a law (boldly titled the “Racial Integrity Act of 1924”) which denied marriage rights to people of different races, the couple got married in the District of Columbia and then returned to Virginia, where they were actually arrested for a felony! Although Jeter and Loving were sentenced to a year in jail for breaking the law, a Virginia judge agreed to suspend the sentence if the couple left the state. And that’s exactly what they did. But Loving and his wife didn’t leave quietly: they moved to DC and began fighting the unfair law in 1963.

Loving Day is June 12th: Celebrate the Legal Right to Interracial Marriage

After June 12, 1967, residents of all US states could marry the people they love without regard to race.

Credit: Ulrika Bengtsson

Copyright: www.sxc.hu

Takeaways
  • Loving Day is named in honor of a couple who fought interracial marriage bans.
  • It is a day to reflect on and celebrate our legal marriage rights.
  • Loving v. Virginia still has implications today in the same-sex marriage context.
Did You Know?
Pennsylvania was the first state to allow interracial marriage - in 1780!
Comments
Comments 1 - 4 of 4
 
 
The post time is showing incorrect.

Posted on 05/02/2008 at 8:05:00 PM

 
Wanted to let you all know that the Mother of interracial marriage died tonight, May 02, 2008 at about 9:15 PM. at home. God bless you all for the great things you all have said about her over the years. Inez Jeter

Posted on 05/02/2008 at 8:05:45 PM

 
I would like to introduce to you one of the first Mixed-race Personal Listings Service you may find on the Internet! It is created to balck relationships between Black Women and White Men. This will also serve as a forum for all AM and BW to meet, share, and grow together. As stated in simple terms, this group will serve to provide support, interact, online resource, and up coming events. http://www.interracialfriends.com/

Posted on 09/16/2007 at 2:09:00 AM

 
wow Brian I never heard of loving day and the story behind it. thanks for sharing

Posted on 06/08/2006 at 7:06:00 AM

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