Respect for Marriage Act
Protecting the right to marriage against racism and xenophobia
When President Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act on December 13, 2022, the right to marriage was finally written into law for interracial and LGBT marriages. With racism and xenophobia on the rise, this is a huge step to solidify the right to marriage in congressional legislation, not just court precedent.
Loving v Virginia
Nowadays it would be hard to imagine losing the right to marry across racial lines, but in 2009 a Louisiana judge refused to marry an interracial couple, citing concern for the welfare of any future children. Thankfully the judge is a minority opinion, since today 94% of Americans support interracial marriages versus 4% in 1958.
With racism and xenophobia on the rise [the Respect for Marriage Act] is a huge step to solidify the right to marriage in congressional legislation, not just court precedent.
This change in public perception is largely due to Richard and Mildred Loving. The couple were legally married in Washington D.C., but in 1958 after moving to Virginia, they were arrested for violating the Racial Integrity Act of 1924. At their court sentencing in Virginia, the judge declared:
“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.”
The Lovings were ordered to either serve one year in jail for their marriage or abandon their home in Virginia. The couple fled their home state and hired an attorney. The ACLU took the Lovings’ case to the Supreme Court and in 1967 the Court unanimously ruled it was discriminatory to not grant interracial couples the same right to marry as same race couples.
In 2007, 40 years after her historic Supreme Court ruling, Mildred Loving spoke in support of the LGBT marriage equality movement, exclaiming:
“The older generation’s fears and prejudices have given way, and today’s young people realize that if someone loves someone, they have a right to marry.”
Respect for Marriage Act
After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade and Justice Thomas, who himself is in an interracial marriage, called into question the legality of other rights rooted in Supreme Court rulings, Congress raced to secure the right to marriage for LGBT and interracial couples. With bipartisan support, the Respect for Marriage Act passed the Senate, House, and then was signed into law by President Biden.
10 years ago, I could marry my husband because of the 1967 Supreme Court case Loving v Virginia, which ruled it was discriminatory to not grant interracial couples the same right to marry as same race couples. But from today on, couples have their right to marriage enshrined in legislation, not a court ruling, through the Respect for Marriage Act.
While there was no big concern that the marriage rights of interracial couples would be dissolved, researchers have found that the act of writing something into law can change public opinion over time. With racism and xenophobia on the rise, the Respect for Marriage Act solidifies into U.S. law the human right to marriage for interracial couples — and sets the U.S. one more step ahead towards stronger human rights protections.
