Loving

Interracial Intimacy in America and the Threat to White Supremacy

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The landmark story of how interracial love and marriage changed American historyand continues to alter the landscape of American politics

When Mildred and Richard Loving wed in 1958, they were ripped from their shared bed and taken to court. Their crime: miscegenation, punished by exile from their home state of Virginia. The resulting landmark decision of Loving v. Virginia ended bans on interracial marriage and remains a signature case—the first to use the words “white supremacy” to describe such racism.

Drawing from the earliest chapters in US history, legal scholar Sheryll Cashin reveals the enduring legacy of America’s original sin, tracing how we transformed from a country without an entrenched construction of race to a nation where one drop of nonwhite blood merited exclusion from full citizenship. In vivid detail, she illustrates how the idea of whiteness was created by the planter class of yesterday and is reinforced by today’s power-hungry dog-whistlers to divide struggling whites and people of color, ensuring plutocracy and undermining the common good.

Not just a hopeful treatise on the future of race relations in America, Loving challenges the notion that trickle-down progressive politics is our only hope for a more inclusive society. Accessible and sharp, Cashin reanimates the possibility of a future where interracial understanding serves as a catalyst of a social revolution ending not in artificial color blindness but in a culture where acceptance and difference are celebrated.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
INTRODUCTION

PART ONE BEFORE LOVING, 1607–1939

CHAPTER ONE
Going Native: Virginia’s First Lovers and Haters

CHAPTER TWO
Sex, Love, and Rebellion in Early Colonial Virginia

CHAPTER THREE
Slavery Begets Antimiscegenation and White Supremacy

CHAPTER FOUR
Miscegenation, Dog-Whistling, and the Spread of Supremacy

PART TWO LOVING

CHAPTER FIVE
Loving v. Virginia (1967)

PART THREE AFTER LOVING

CHAPTER SIX
2017: Interracial Intimacy and the Threat to and Persistence of White Supremacy

CHAPTER SEVEN
More Loving: Families and Friendship

CHAPTER EIGHT
The Future: The Rise of the Culturally Dexterous

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
NOTES
INDEX
Sheryll Cashin, professor of law at Georgetown University, is author of The Agitator’s Daughter, The Failures of Integration, and Place, Not Race. She is a frequent commentator on law and race relations, appearing on NPR, CNN, ABC News, and MSNBC. Cashin was a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and served in the Clinton White House as an advisor on urban and economic policy.

About

The landmark story of how interracial love and marriage changed American historyand continues to alter the landscape of American politics

When Mildred and Richard Loving wed in 1958, they were ripped from their shared bed and taken to court. Their crime: miscegenation, punished by exile from their home state of Virginia. The resulting landmark decision of Loving v. Virginia ended bans on interracial marriage and remains a signature case—the first to use the words “white supremacy” to describe such racism.

Drawing from the earliest chapters in US history, legal scholar Sheryll Cashin reveals the enduring legacy of America’s original sin, tracing how we transformed from a country without an entrenched construction of race to a nation where one drop of nonwhite blood merited exclusion from full citizenship. In vivid detail, she illustrates how the idea of whiteness was created by the planter class of yesterday and is reinforced by today’s power-hungry dog-whistlers to divide struggling whites and people of color, ensuring plutocracy and undermining the common good.

Not just a hopeful treatise on the future of race relations in America, Loving challenges the notion that trickle-down progressive politics is our only hope for a more inclusive society. Accessible and sharp, Cashin reanimates the possibility of a future where interracial understanding serves as a catalyst of a social revolution ending not in artificial color blindness but in a culture where acceptance and difference are celebrated.

Table of Contents

AUTHOR’S NOTE
INTRODUCTION

PART ONE BEFORE LOVING, 1607–1939

CHAPTER ONE
Going Native: Virginia’s First Lovers and Haters

CHAPTER TWO
Sex, Love, and Rebellion in Early Colonial Virginia

CHAPTER THREE
Slavery Begets Antimiscegenation and White Supremacy

CHAPTER FOUR
Miscegenation, Dog-Whistling, and the Spread of Supremacy

PART TWO LOVING

CHAPTER FIVE
Loving v. Virginia (1967)

PART THREE AFTER LOVING

CHAPTER SIX
2017: Interracial Intimacy and the Threat to and Persistence of White Supremacy

CHAPTER SEVEN
More Loving: Families and Friendship

CHAPTER EIGHT
The Future: The Rise of the Culturally Dexterous

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
NOTES
INDEX

Author

Sheryll Cashin, professor of law at Georgetown University, is author of The Agitator’s Daughter, The Failures of Integration, and Place, Not Race. She is a frequent commentator on law and race relations, appearing on NPR, CNN, ABC News, and MSNBC. Cashin was a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and served in the Clinton White House as an advisor on urban and economic policy.