Newly Minted

Newly Minted
Right after I was hooded

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Marriage Equaltiy is about all of us

On this morning of momentous possibility we each must take a moment to appreciate that the marriage equality act is directly related to the history of mixed race people in the United States. Africans in America were not allowed to legally marry (and those who did had to have permission from their masters) during slavery. African Americans were not allowed to marry white people during Jim Crow. Even after the 1967 Supreme Court ruling that the anti-miscegenation laws were unconstitutional; many states still had the anti-miscegenation laws on their books through the late 1990s. As recent as 2010 interracial couples were being denied marriage licenses. How do we, as people who have been historically denied the right to marry who we love, dare restrict that right for any other human being? The criminalization of love and intimate relationships is not only unconstitutional it is inhumane. Every time I hear an argument against same sex marriage I immediately remember that when my husband and I married in 1999 it was still "illegal" in two states in our country. If marriage equality doesn't pass, how long will it be before my marriage becomes illegal again? Marriage equality is about all of us. This IS our fight. ...more soon

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