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Revision as of 14:33, 19 March 2004 by Infrogmation (talk | contribs)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)Miscegenation is a term invented in 1863 to describe people of different human races (usually one European and one African) producing offspring; the use of this term is invariably restricted to those who believe that the category race is meaningful when applied to human beings and who believe that such "race mixing" is inherently bad.
The word "Miscegenation" was coined in an anonymous pamphlet printed in New York City in late 1863, entitled "Miscegenation: The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro". As the pamphlet noted, the term was coined from two words of the Latin language, miscere (to mix) and genus (race). The pamphlet argued in favor of "interbreeding" of "White" and African Americans until the races were indistiguishably mixed, and claimed that this was the goal of the United States Republican Party. The real authors were David Goodman Croly, managing editor of the New York World, a Democratic Party paper, and George Wakeman, a World reporter. The pamphlet was soon exposed as an attempt to discredit the Republicans, the Abraham Lincoln administration, and the abolitionist movement. Nonetheless, this pamphlet and variations on it were reprinted widely in communities on both sides of the American Civil War by opponents of the Republicans.
The word miscegenation entered the language in the Southern USA. For a century, it was common for white southern advocates of the social status-quo to accuse advocates of the elimination of slavery, and later the advocates of civil rights for African Americans, of actually having the goal of miscegenation and the "destruction of the white race". After World War II, many white southerners accused the US civil rights movement of Martin Luther King of being a Communist plot funded by the U.S.S.R. in order to destroy the United States through miscegenation.
In most of the southern states, various laws were passed making it illegal for members of different races to marry; these were known as miscegenation laws, like the South African Immorality Act. Interracial marriage was prohibited and upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in "Pace v. Alabama" (1883). That decision was not overturned until the United States Supreme Court ruled in "Loving v. Virginia" (1967). At that time, 16 states still had laws prohibiting interracial marriage.
Typically a felony, miscegenation laws prohibited the solemnization of weddings between races and prohibit the officiating of such ceremonies. Sometimes the individuals attempting to marry would not be held guilty of miscegenation themselves, but felony charges of adultery or fornication would more usually be leveled against them.
An urban myth claims that there are still such laws, which have not been repealed in the United States, and are still on the books, though they have not been enforced. It would be unlikely to find such a law in the U.S. today.
See also: Jim Crow law, Racial segregation, Racism, racial purity, Passing