The Illinois Negro Code
Most people believe the history of race relations in the United States is neatly divided by geography. Those states north of the Mason-Dixon Line were paragons of equality and liberty, where race was not an issue and diversity flourished in all its glory. In the benighted states to their south, however, the entire social structure was based on slavery and racist oppression. Consequently, the War Between the States was fought purely over the issue of slavery, and, as is usual in trial by combat, the arms of the virtuous side were strengthened by the Hand of the Almighty, which led to their victory over those rebellious slaveholding cretins. For some unknown reason, the books written by court historians do not start with the words “once upon a time.”
In reality, things were much different, as the history of Illinois demonstrates.
Article VIII, Section 12, of the first Illinois state constitution (1818) states that “every person in the state has a right to justice, and to a remedy to wrongs committed against his person, property, or reputation.” However, limits were soon placed on this enumerated right. In fact, Article V of this same constitution prohibited “negroes, mulattoes, and Indians” from serving in the state militia. This meant that these people were not allowed to keep or bear arms. In “An Act Concerning Practice,” which was put in force on February 2, 1827, the first of the legal restrictions on citizenship rights for blacks was established. Section 3 states: “A negro, mulatto, or Indian shall not be a witness in any court, or in any case, against a white person. A person having one fourth part negro blood shall be adjudged a mulatto.” This section effectively prevents any of the aforementioned from having recourse in a court of law against the depredations of any white person. (This is reminiscent of the status of Dhimmis under Islamic law.) The second clause of this section did state, however, that negroes and mulattoes are persons.
The constitution of 1818 has a curious attitude toward slavery. Since slavery was not allowed in the Northwest Territories, Illinois should never have had any slaves within its borders. Article VI generally forbids slavery, except as punishment for crimes. Yet Section 2 specifically allows slaves from other states to work in the Shawneetown salt works, though only for a term of one year, after which they were to be freed.
Strife over slavery surfaced early in Illinois. In fact, there was a movement for another constitutional convention as early as 1822, with the idea of making Illinois a slave state. After some chicanery, the General Assembly passed a resolution calling for a convention. A spirited campaign ensued, and the proposal failed at the polls in 1824. Still, harsh laws concerning blacks continued to be put on the books.
In another law, passed on February 7, 1827, and put into effect on June 1, 1827, blacks and women were denied the right to sit on juries. The English common-law tradition holds that it is important that a person be judged by a jury of his peers if justice is to be served. Under Illinois law, during this time period, a woman could testify in court in most cases, yet she was denied the right to have other women serve on her jury. For blacks, the situation was worse. They could not testify even in their own defense if a white person was involved, and their jury would consist of white men.
By the early 1830’s, Illinois law books already had a section entitled the “Negro Code.” On March 30, 1819, the General Assembly passed “AN ACT respecting Free Negroes, Mulattoes, Servants, and Slaves”—a comprehensive law that governed the conditions under which free blacks, as well as slaves and servants, could come into the state. Illinois was a very poor state in those days, and the government did not want anyone coming into the state who might be a burden on the state’s rudimentary welfare system. Section 3 specifically forbids the bringing of slaves into the state for the purpose of freeing them and having them become public charges. People bringing slaves into the state were required to post a $1,000 bond for each to ensure that they were not to be freed and placed on the public dole.
Under this law, no black or mulatto was allowed to reside in Illinois unless he could produce a court certificate from some jurisdiction in the United States attesting to his free status. This certificate was to be recorded in the county of his residence. Should the free black man have a family, his certificate needed to be endorsed after the birth of each new child by a court clerk. While the burden of keeping these records seems extreme today, it may actually have provided some protection against individuals being seized as fugitive slaves and hauled off to another state. How much protection this certificate would provide is unclear, however, since Section 4 says: “Provided, nevertheless, That nothing in this act contained, shall be construed to bar the lawful claim of any person or persons to any such negro or mulatto.” In other words, there would be little legal recourse for any free black if someone claimed him as a slave and produced some bogus documentation.
Any free black was required to show a certificate of freedom in order to gain employment in Illinois. Those employers who disregarded this requirement were to be fined $1.50 per person, per day.
In fairness to the state of Illinois, this law also prescribed fair treatment of servants. When their terms of indenture were up, they were to be provided with clothes and other necessities. A servant would have to consent before his contract could be transferred to another master. There were provisions for what to do when servants misbehaved and also for masters who failed in their duties. Servants who acquired property during their terms of indenture were allowed to keep it.
On the other hand, there were harsh penalties if slaves or servants were found more than ten miles away from their master’s residence without a pass. Such an infraction could be punished with up to 35 lashes. Servants could be lashed for infractions for which free people were merely fined. The going rate was 20 lashes for each eight dollars of fine. Nobody was supposed to get more than 40 lashes at any one time. And, in Section 23,
be it further enacted, That riots, routs, unlawful assemblies, trespasses, and seditious speeches, by any slave or slaves, servant or servants, shall be punished with stripes, at the discretion of a justice of the peace, not exceeding thirty-nine . . .
This statute authorized any person to apprehend such lawbreakers and to haul them off to the justice of the peace. It was even illegal for three or more slaves or servants to assemble for the purpose of dancing or revelry, whether at night or in the daytime, even on private property. If a master was found to have allowed this law to be violated, he could be fined. And there were incentives for others to turn him in.
The fact that the law makes such references to slavery indicates that, contrary to the constitution of 1818, the “peculiar institution” was alive and well in Illinois. Slaves and servants were obviously not considered full citizens. Even free blacks had severe restrictions on their rights.
In 1829, the “ACT respecting free Negroes and Mulattoes, Servants, and Slaves” was revised. No longer was it sufficient for a free black to provide local authorities a certificate attesting his freedom. Now, he had to post a $1,000 bond as well. The bonding requirement was not imposed on any blacks already resident in Illinois. This bond was forfeited if the individual ever failed to “demean himself, or herself, in strict conformity with the laws of this state” or became a charge to any Illinois county. Any black without a certificate would now be considered a runaway slave. His status would be posted and published, and the sheriff was to take him into custody. While waiting for a master to show up, the sheriff was authorized “to hire them out for the best price he can get.” If no master showed up in a year, the sheriff was to execute a certificate effectively declaring the person to be free. There were provisions for what fees had to be paid to the sheriff should the lawful owner show up. It became a crime for any escaped slave to come to Illinois for the purpose of saving up enough money to buy his freedom. No negro, mulatto, or Indian was allowed to purchase a servant unless that person was the same “complexion” as the master. Finally, it was declared illegal for any negro or mulatto to marry any white person. Section 3 also declares any such marriages null and void, and anyone seeking to be married in violation of this law was to be given 39 lashes and imprisoned for up to one year. Any official who presided at the marriage of different races faced a fine of not less than $200 and would be ineligible for any future office in the state.
By 1845, it was illegal for people of differing races to cohabit. Those who did so were believed to be living in an “open state of adultery and fornication.” Anyone convicted of violating this law was subject to a fine of up to $500 and imprisonment for not more than a year. If this was not a sufficient deterrent, “for the second offense the punishment shall be double, for the third treble, and in the same ratio for each succeeding offense.”
By the 1840’s, the 1818 constitution was becoming an albatross around the neck of the state. Whig internal improvements had put the state government into a severe fiscal crisis. Some social problems were also coming to the fore. The northern part of the state was being heavily settled by immigrants from Northern states. The southern half of Illinois, however, was populated mostly by people from the South. A constitutional convention was called in 1847 to address the changing situation of the state. Mr. Bond, the delegate from Clinton County, and the son of the first governor of the state, offered a resolution on June 24, 1847, that would order the General Assembly to ban the immigration of free blacks into the state. He also wanted to ensure that people could not bring slaves into Illinois only to set them free. While claiming that he did not want to offend any of the other delegates and that nobody cared more about doing justice to “that class of unfortunate individuals, called free negroes” than he did, he was concerned about the property rights of slaveholders. In his part of Illinois, small communities of free blacks were springing up, and these were aiding and abetting the escape of slaves from other states.
This convention clearly showed the cleavage between the northern and southern halves of the state. Generally, the representatives from the northern counties wanted more political rights for blacks than did those of the South. Still, most of the former took care to state that they were not abolitionists. From the records of the debates of the convention, it is obvious that even those who supported blacks having some civil and political rights did not care for them very much. Concerns were aired regarding possible insurrection of blacks, interracial marriage, blacks wooing white daughters, crime, and the like. It was flatly stated by a number of delegates that blacks were not citizens regardless of what such states as Vermont and Massachusetts might think. The delegates did not think that the races could ever live together in a state of equality. Some voices pointed out that the principles of Christian charity required treating blacks fairly, but these same voices also said that they were not in favor of the Underground Railroad and that the best option for free blacks was foreign colonization. (Colonization was also the preference of both Henry Clay and Abraham Lincoln.) Even the more moderate delegates agreed that there was no question of political equality between blacks and whites, since the people were adamantly against it. Probably the best summary of the political realities of race was given by a Mr. Kinney, the delegate from St. Clair County. He cited what happened when the executors of the estate of statesman John Randolph of Roanoke sought to settle his former slaves in the strongly abolitionist state of Ohio: The locals rose up and drove them off. (In his biography of John Randolph, Russell Kirk corroborates Mr. Kinney on this point.) Mr. Kinney supported the actions of the Ohio abolitionists:
They did not want them, they knew what sort of a population they were, and how worthless and degraded they become, and how troublesome they always were. If we would allow the negroes any kind of equality we must admit them to the social hearth. It was then that equality commenced. We must live with them and permit them to mingle with us in all our social affairs, and, also, if they desired it, must not object to proposals to marry our daughters.
Finally, a compromise was worked out, under which an article in the new constitution would order the General Assembly, at the earliest possible time, to pass a law forbidding the immigration of free blacks into the state and preventing slave owners from bringing their blacks into Illinois for the purpose of freeing them and dumping them. This provision became Article XIV. To allow for the differing views on blacks in the opposite ends of the state, this article was placed as a separate question on the ballot. The voting followed sectional lines, with only a few southern delegates voting against it. After the convention adjourned for the last time, the questions were put to the voters. On March 6, 1848, 60,585 voted in favor of the new constitution, while only 15,903 opposed it. Article XIV passed by a vote of 50,261 to 21,297. That vote also followed sectional lines, being more popular in the southern portion of the state than in the north, but the general opinion seems to have been that blacks were not wanted.
Until after the War Between the States, blacks in Illinois could not vote and did not pay the poll tax; could not marry whites; could not keep or bear arms, serve on juries, or testify in court in a case involving a white. Eventually, they were forbidden even to settle in the state. This denial of rights is an aspect of the history of citizenship in Illinois that has been given short shrift for many years. It is difficult even to find copies of the 1818 and 1848 state constitutions in most libraries. The earliest version of the state constitution that is easily found is that of 1870. Access to the older editions of the Revised Statutes is limited largely by the age and fragility of the remaining copies. Consequently, many people have never heard of the Jim Crow laws that existed in Illinois and many other northern states until their repeal after 1865.
This is unfortunate, because it means that few people have an accurate picture of antebellum racial politics in the North, much less the South. Court historians have been able to keep the truth swept under the rug for nearly a century, but it is finally seeing the light of day.
Steve Berg writes from DeKalb, Illinois.
This article first appeared in the April 2004 issue of Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture.
Entries(RSS)
An interesting aspect of the change in Illinois attitude toward blacks was pointed out to my years ago by Dr. Fleming. After the Great Unpleasantness, the wife of General John Logan wrote a fawning biography of her husband the war hero. He served in the Mexican war, and also was involved in burning Southern cities later on in the 1860s. Totally missing in this book is any mention that he served in the Illinois General Assembly and promoted many of the later anti-black laws. Some, I believe were actually referred to as "the Logan Acts." There is a big hole in the book, time-wise.
I will endeavor to find out when the miscegenation laws were repealed when the law library re-opens.
Dr. Berg, the laws must not have been enforced when boxer Jack Johnson married a white woman, I believe in Chicago, in the early 1910s. Note: Jack Johnson's marriages do not seem to have been a particularly good models for interracial relationships, I admit.
Caper, Chicago has long been a special case in Illinois laws. It will take me a while to find my notes and then track down the repeal dates.
Interracial relationships are not all that one sided. even in a strongly Progressive university town, it is rare to see an interracial couple where the female is black. It is almost always the "snowflake" scenario with a black man and a white woman. One of my friends dated a black woman back in the 1970s. I asked him about her family's reaction, and he replied that her mother liked him, her sisters tolerated him, her brothers hated him, and her father refused to acknowledge his existence. I can well imagine the table talk when he was not there, "Swede-Finns are people too, but you wouldn't want your daughter to date one!"
None of this surprises me. History is never really as neat as it's presented in state propaganda mills..........uh, I mean public schools.
Slavery was legal in New Jersey until 1846. At one point, 2/3 of all slaves residing in the North lived in New Jersey. On the eve of the Civil War, New Jersey citizens owned 18 "apprentices for life" -- these "apprentices" were not emancipated until 1863.
There was very strong pro-South sentiment in New Jersey. So much so that Lincoln had to make two trips to Trenton to cajole the State Legislature into keeping New Jersey part of the Union.
After the Civil War, New Jersey was a hotbed of Klan activity. In the 1930's New Jersey was home to a very large Nazi organization known as the German American Bund. The Bund owned a large meeting ground called Camp Nordland located in Andover. The Bund had it's headquarters in Newark. The building is still standing, and it still displays a swastika over the the main entrance. The building's current owner, a black man, refuses to remove the swastika.
Like I said, real history is messy.
Mr. Cundiff,
"Antisemitism," really?.
Certainly contemporary American cultural discourse has grown beyond simplistic name-calling, particularly when using meaningless appellatives like "Antisemite" or Lord forbid, "Judeophobe." (As an aside what in the world is a "faux Catholic." You don't mean to imply that you are the sole arbiter of what constitutes a "real" Catholic - do you?)
Since I'm in favor of returning the the Palestinian people's land to them, and considering the fact that they are a Semitic people, wouldn't that make me "Pro-semitic." Especially in light of the fact that most Jews (the Ashkenazim at any rate, who comprise 90% of world Jewry) have little to no Semitic markers in their DNA. (Granted this is merely my own hypothesis, but it should be easy enough to test for.)
Sorry to burst your bubble but I'm no "Antisemite" nor even a "Judeophobe." However, I freely cop to being an anti-Zionist. Interesting you mentioned The Protocols. Have you ever read them. Everything that they say the Zionists will do, they (the Zionists) have done. Is this merely a coincidence? They've aggressively moved to control the world's financial apparatus, all important Western media, the education system, and all influential Non-governmental Organizations. They use their control of these institutions to control our Governments. Not only have they done these things - which The Protocols say they will do - but they gained control of these entities and use them in exactly the way that The Protocols say they will.
If I'm "unbalanced" as Capers says, then three-quarters of the world, that believes as I do, must be unbalanced. The bulk of Muslims believe that Zionists control the world. Most blacks I've read (or talked to) believe it. You can go to the Judaica section of any library or book store and it is full of books written by Jews boasting about how Jews control the world. The United Nations even drafted a resolution declaring Zionism to be Racism. (Indicating that the UN believes they are too powerful, because we all know that they [the UN] believes that only those with "power" can be "racist.") But the tremendously powerful Zionists were able to force them to rescind the resolution. Hell, even Henry Ford believed it. I guess he was "unbalanced" as well. Or is it just that as an un-reconstructed man he didn't have the benefit of a lifetime of Jewish propaganda to explain to him how he should think. I guess that's his excuse for not knowing any better.
By the way, have you ever read the personal letters of Charles Lindbergh's wife to her friends. After he started the America First movement to keep America out of WWII she began writing a series of letters to friends lamenting the fact that her family would be destroyed (particularly, she feared that she would no longer be welcome to shop at Neiman Marcus) if her husband continued to defy the Jews. All of her friends sympathized with her plight because there was no doubt in their mind that her family would be destroyed. Even though they were all extremely wealthy and privileged they understood that they could not stand against Zionist power in this country. Eventually, his child was kidnapped (by a man with a very Jewish name) and his reputation was destroyed. And that was 70 years ago. Both Henry Ford and Walt Disney got a taste of this as well (for they both tried to stand against Zionist imperial hegemony). Today both of their companies are completely controlled by Zionists and are used to further destroy American Heritage, Traditions, and Culture. Now maybe you understand why rich wealthy Whites today (e.g. the Rockerfellers, the Bushes, the Kennedys, the Clintons et. al.) refuse to stand against them.
Explain to me Sid (a suspiciously Jewish-sounding name. Oh wait . . . don't tell me . . . you're Danish, right) why so many Whites throughout history disliked Jews. Why so many pogroms, in every part of Europe? Why the Holocaust? Why Antisemitism at all? (Since you used the word, I'll use it in responding to you). If the Jews were/are such wonderful people and don't cause any harm to others, why is it that so many others despise them? Oh I know, all non-Jews are just insane, genocidal Goyim. Especially those Whites. No wonder they can so easily justify destroying our cultures and our societies.
Finally, what in the hell is a "writebacker" anyway?
I must admit I always find the commentary on this website most interesting, and much of the responses to the commentary even more so. In terms of interracial marriage, I leave you with this: the state should not make laws that prohibit or require people to marry outside their race. Freedom of association is the key here. Let those who want to stay in their own racial group do so, yet allow people who want to marry across racial lines to do so as well. Interracial marriage is typically a sign of cultural assimilation to some degree, and requires some type of assimilation on the part of one or both of the people involved in order to function in an ordered society.
The Church is made up of people from all over the world, and while this is something to be said for the right of a people to preserve their culture, unless you believe that one particular race will go to heaven while another will not, then you must come to the obvious conclusion that we who are saved will spend eternity with many people of differing racial backgrounds than our own. It is also important to understand that people who are of different races can still have similar ethnic and cultural ties, as is the case with most whites and blacks in the American South (Southern Partisan had a really good article on this topic a few months ago). Therefore, just because an interracial marriage occurs, that does not mean it cannot operate within the context of a common culture in one way or another; furthermore, if Christians will spend eternity with people of different racial backgrounds, then why shouldn't they fellowship with those people in this life, and even intermarry with them if they so choose? Just the same, if people only want to marry within their own racial group, why shouldn't they be allowed to do so without being branded racists or bigots?
People deserve equal treatment under the law, just as they deserve to have freedom of association. So long as the marriage is heterosexual in nature, can produce children, and may ultimately benefit the state by helping to replenish the populace and increase the available workforce, there should be no law against it. I certainly support efforts to preserve the white Christian culture of America, but as most Southerners already know, this culture is capable of supporting some racial diversity (as it has in the South for centuries) while still retaining its core identity, assuming the people coming into this culture are required to properly assimilate (unlike many of the Mexican who are here now). There are many people who enjoy the benefits of white society, and who benefit white society, who are not white.
I do not believe that just because a certain practice is not specifically condemned in the Bible, that this means, therefore, that it must be allowed in society. In cursorily perusing the bible, I have found much to back up a belief that male homosexuality should be condemned as a sin, but I have yet to find anything of real strength that indicates that female homosexuality should be considered a sin. Does that mean it should be allowed? Not necessarily (others with better knowledge of the bible may be aware of passages that indicate it is a sin, but that is not the point).
In the old testament, did not God forbid Jews from intermarrying with surrounding peoples? If so, then it cannot be wrong in and of itself to forbid interracial marriage, because God would not have forbidden it if it had been inherently wrong to forbid it in the first place.
If one is to say that we must allow interracial marriage in order to be decent christians, the one begins to fall down the slippery slope that abolitionists once did when they claimed slavery to be unchristian and demanded that slaveowners set their slaves free. It was not, they were proven wrong, and some of them reacted by burning bibles. Slave owners were usually better christians than many, or likely, most abolitionists, and I'll bet most good christians in the north weren't all that concerned about slavery because they had their own lives to live. Likewise, we are free to outlaw interracial marriage if we want, and that doesn't make us hateful, unchristian, or lacking in good will.
It is unchristian to demand that a people or ethnic group be stripped of all means of genetic self-preservation, because that is waging war upon that ethnic group by demanding it's eventual genetic disentigration. Such a thing must be unholy. In essence, Caper makes just such an argument by saying we must ignore our own ethnic self-interest in order to be 'christian'. He sounds more like a Muslim when he makes this argument.
If a people are threatened with genetic disentigration, thay have the right as a people to forbid intermarriage and punish violators. That has been a Jewish practice for centuries. I for one, am grateful they did, because I have known some beautiful Jewish girls who wouldn't have existed if their ancestors hadn't kept to their own.
We do not have to allow racial intermarriage at all in order to be good christians, any more than we have to allow mestizos or musselmen to pour in and take our country over in order to be good 'Americans'.
Caper's arguments about the Judeophobe and Antisemite "Russ" are so persuasive that I need argue no further. Just note how "Russ"'s latest is a classical example of the Bandwagon Fallacy.
@57: I must agree that I see nothing unchristian about preferring to marry within one's own race or even encouraging others (especially children) to do likewise. I couldn't even see myself marrying a southern or eastern European woman, and as an Anglophone living in France, even as one who loves the French language and culture, marrying into a French family would be pushing it somewhat (although I would be willing to do so). On an individual level, of course, that is the more potent issue: whether one can handle the immediate or extended family that will result from the union. And I think such considerations are why interracial marriages in North America are still comparatively rare.
That said, if our culture is strongly tied to our racial makeup--and for better or for worse it arguably is--I'm not sure that such laws are either necessary or effective. For one thing, I have observed that the more religious of the old European ethnic stocks in America--at least Catholics--tend also to be the least interbred: for instance, more likely to be one hundred percent Irish, Italian, Polish or French-Canadian or at least fifty percent. What's the correlation? Because both are derived from the instinct of keeping one's culture. If our sense of self-preservation is so weak that we will not do what is necessary to maintain our culture, what is there left for the law to protect?
There's something else. Caper is well-equipped to defend himself, but I have to say I'm a bit mystified by your chastisement of his line of thought as more Mohammedan than Christian. In the first place, the Decalogue does indeed command me to honor my father and mother, and Christ did indeed come to fulfill and not to break the law, but obedience to God always supersedes obedience to one's parents. Christ also warned us that anyone who wishes to follow Him must leave his father and mother and take up the Cross. Granted that I can think of few few if any examples of moments when one would need to enter into an interracial marriage in order to follow God's will, the bottom line is that while honoring one's ancestors is virtuous and fully Christian, honoring God takes precedence. (And maybe there is a practical example [and admittedly this is speaking in a HUGE abstract]: if my only choices for marriage was between a heathen Anglo-American and a pious Cameroonian, the correct choice ought to be obvious.)
Second, Caper would probably contend--and I would agree--that whatever the virtues or drawbacks to the union, in no circumstances could disparity of racial ancestry be considered an impediment to sacramental matrimony. In other words, no matter what people thought of the union or what the drawbacks, it would still be a valid and binding marriage provided it met the appropriate conditions. This argument may not hold force with Protestant Christians, since most of them do not consider matrimony a sacrament as such. But I tend to agree with him, based upon my very limited knowledge of canon law and ecclesiastical dogmas. As St. Augustine says, "an unjust law is no law at all"; in other words, if the law of the State of Illinois or any other state says that the marriage cannot happen, but the law of the Church says it can, then it must be possible. Whether it is desirable or advisable is another question. There have been many cases of imprudent but licit marriages that had nothing to do with race.
Finally, while it is true that the ancient Israelites were forbidden from intermarrying as a rule, the reality must be looked at in a broader picture and understood in the fact that "Hebrew" relates to a religious identity as much as an ethnic one. I would be highly surprised to learn that most or all Jews living today were the pure and unmixed descendants of the twelve tribes who left Egypt. Christ is descended from a convert who was a former prostitute. The Lord commanded the Israelites to do many things that would be completely inadmissible under the New Testament and it apparently served His plan, but I'm not sure that it is correct to attempt to make generalizations about His will using the Old Testament as a standalone.
"If our sense of self-preservation is so weak that we will not do what is necessary to maintain our culture, what is there left for the law to protect?"
One thing I ought to mention. Someone will doubtless compare this example to immigration law and ask me whether I do not therefore support immigration restrictions because they are "unnecessary and ineffective" for a people with such a strong preservationist instinct. I think there is a difference. Immigration restrictions are an external expression of self-defense on the part of the nation. Legal restrictions on interracial marriage would be an internal regulation: they go beyond guarding a culture; they attempt to impose it. Yes, politics does inform culture more than we might wish, and perhaps I simply lack the education or erudition to expand this point further. But I think the rest of my post holds.
Re: 58
But Sid, you didn't need to provoke yet another response from Russ in order to see that he would have written just what he wrote. His reply to Mr. Berg was sufficient.
Re: 57
"I do not believe that just because a certain practice is not specifically condemned in the Bible, that this means, therefore, that it must be allowed in society."
I concur. I am a Catholic, and so I rely on the Church to clarify these things, as they have been revealed in Scripture and tradition. The Church has clarified it: interracial marriage is not immoral and should be legal. If you hold to "sola Scriptura" (and maybe you don't), please pause and realize that what you just said is an admission that the Bible alone is insufficient to determine everything that is proper and improper to do in life.
"In cursorily perusing the bible, I have found much to back up a belief that male homosexuality should be condemned as a sin, but I have yet to find anything of real strength that indicates that female homosexuality should be considered a sin."
St. Paul to the Romans, ch. 1, v. 26: For their women have changed the natural use into that use which is against nature.
"In the old testament, did not God forbid Jews from intermarrying with surrounding peoples? If so, then it cannot be wrong in and of itself to forbid interracial marriage, because God would not have forbidden it if it had been inherently wrong to forbid it in the first place."
As Mr. Moses has noted, the Old Testament permits many things that God since has denied to us in the New Testament. The ancient Hebrews were permitted, nay ordered, to wipe out Canaanite men, women, and children. Yet most of us argue that genocide is contrary to natural morality. Our Lord said that divorce was permitted in the Law of Moses as a concession to the people's vices. Furthermore, as Mr. Moses has noted, the law against interracial marriage either 1) was not absolute, or else 2) it really referred to *interreligious* marriage between pagans and followers of the Law. *Moses himself* caught some flak for marrying outside the tribe. Mr. Moses has noted that the Canaanite prostitute Rahab appears in the genealogy of Our Lord (St. Matthew ch. 1). So does Ruth, who was a Moabite. Do we know if the wife of Uriah the Hittite was Hebrew. If she was, she shouldn't have married a Hittite. If she wasn't, King David shouldn't have . . . well, in that particular case he "shouldn't have" for other reasons, too. So there were in fact exceptions to the rule.
So I argue: 1) the Old Testament is not a particularly reliable guide for what we should do now, 2) the rule against interracial marriage was not absolute even in the Old Testament. (An aside: I do not know if Mr. Wilson is a Protestant, but it seems that Protestants go back to the Old Testament to find the particular rulings on particular matters that the New Testament books of the Bible supply so few of. I recommend looking to the Magisterium of the Catholic Church, which supplies for the authoritative communal decisions so often lacking in New Testament books.)
"If one is to say that we must allow interracial marriage in order to be decent christians, the one begins to fall down the slippery slope that abolitionists once did when they claimed slavery to be unchristian and demanded that slaveowners set their slaves free. It was not, they were proven wrong, and some of them reacted by burning bibles. Slave owners were usually better christians than many, or likely, most abolitionists, and I’ll bet most good christians in the north weren’t all that concerned about slavery because they had their own lives to live. Likewise, we are free to outlaw interracial marriage if we want, and that doesn’t make us hateful, unchristian, or lacking in good will."
I deny that there is such a slippery slope -- or, if there is, the "slope" seems to go downhill both ways, as it were. Your claim seems to amount to: "The abolitionists claimed that we had to abolish slavery to be good Christians. They were wrong. You claim that we have to allow interracial marriage to be good Christians, which reminds me of the first argument. Therefore you're wrong." Is that accurate? Yet surely we need to do *some things* in order to be good Christians, right? If I am false in claiming some correlation between Christian behavior and permission or prohibition of interracial marriage, then prove it, as you prove that the Bible does not ban slavery. Yet you seem to be faulting me for the form of my argument. If I am wrong for framing the argument this way, would this argument be false, "We should not lynch alleged black criminals, but rather let them stand trial. It is the Christian thing to do." Now, I don't want to start another debate about the frequency of lynchings, responsibility for them, lynchings in the North, the numbers of whites who have been lynched, etc., etc. All I mean is, one may appeal to the Gospel to argue for a particular policy vis-a-vis race without starting a slide down the slippery slope. Each individual argument stands or falls on its own merits.
Additionally, as for slavery and the Bible, you as good as admitted earlier that the Bible is insufficient on its own to resolve some of these matters. That slavery in the Greco-Roman world was just doesn't mean that slavery in the South was -- that simple observation is true, regardless of whether one says that Southern (and yes, Northern)-style slavery was just. Remember, as soon as the slave of a Roman slave was emancipated, he automatically became a Roman citizen. That is not quite the way it worked in the South . . .
"It is unchristian to demand that a people or ethnic group be stripped of all means of genetic self-preservation, because that is waging war upon that ethnic group by demanding it’s eventual genetic disentigration. Such a thing must be unholy. In essence, Caper makes just such an argument by saying we must ignore our own ethnic self-interest in order to be ‘christian’. He sounds more like a Muslim when he makes this argument."
Here Mr. Moses has ably pre-empted me. I never said that a people or ethnic group should be stripped of *all* means of genetic self-preservation. I said that they should not use the *power of the state* in order to enforce it. If the given culture or ethnos *demands* state intervention to criminalize, prosecute, and punish those who marry outside their group, that culture or ethnos is already pretty weak and probably doomed. I never said anything about prohibiting parents from instilling in their children a strong preference for members of their own kind. I specifically said that propaganda generated in order to normalize or idealize interracial marriage is separate issue from *bare legal permission* for those marriages to occur as often as they occur. So I never said that ethnic self-interest was wrong. I said that ethnic self-interest must not trump the interest of consenting adult Christians to arrange the marriages that will work best for them and their families. If the best marriage for that person will be with a member of the "out-group," then why should the law intervene, in total disregard for the will of the spouses and/or their families?
"If a people are threatened with genetic disentigration, thay have the right as a people to forbid intermarriage and punish violators. That has been a Jewish practice for centuries. I for one, am grateful they did, because I have known some beautiful Jewish girls who wouldn’t have existed if their ancestors hadn’t kept to their own. "
First off, genetic identity is not an absolute moral imperative. Peoples come and go, and for many of these instances it is not such a big loss. There are no more Franks, only Frenchmen and the Germans of Franconia. The English are a mixture of Celtic Britons, Romans, Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Danes, Normans, and the anonymous pre-Celtic peoples who provide Britain with most of its genetic material. The Goths have been assimilated into the Swedes, Italians, Spaniards, etc. Do you claim that in *every* instance this assimilation was wrong? So when it is in the interests of a group to assimilate, assimilation is okay, right? Or would you prefer honest-to-goodness Jutes to the partially-Jutish Englishmen of today? My point is not that racial assimilation is always good, for I am not saying it is. I am saying that personal considerations may make it right in particular situations. *State legislation* is not the answer. If ethnic consciousness were high enough, state legislation would be superfluous.
I admire the beauty of Jewish women, too. Yet in that particular instance the preservation of their bloodline was linked with a refusal to convert to Christianity (!). For the Christians of the time certainly promoted assimilation of Jews. Since Jews always could convert to Christianity and marry Gentiles, there effectively was no *state legislation* banning interracial marriage. The Jews survived as a group without *state* anti-miscegenation laws. So they don't prove your case. If you want to inculcate "staying with one's own" and not mixing, you can do so without relying on the government to enforce your penalties.
The family is more important than the ethnic group, too, I might add, and when it comes to the Sacrament of Matrimony, the Church in the person of the ministers of that Sacrament, the spouses, trumps the ethnic group. By the way, the arguments in favor of "an imperiled genetic identity," are eerily similar to the ones used by the eugenics movement to sterilize "genetic defectives." My Church stood up against such unjust laws that violated the dignity of the human person and the human race. Ditto on anti-miscegenation laws.
"We do not have to allow racial intermarriage at all in order to be good christians, any more than we have to allow mestizos or musselmen to pour in and take our country over in order to be good ‘Americans’."
You do not to allow it *legally* to those others who choose to enter into such marriages, provided everyone is a Christian. As Mr. Moses noted, immigration is a distinct issue. I am talking about marriage with people who already are *here.*
Without indulging in Freudian pschoanalysis here, may I suggest that the traumas of the South are coloring (hah!) this debate? Most of the people who are arguing against me present the legal *permission* for interracial marriage as a matter of "forcing" interracial marriage on people. First, anti-misceganation laws force others who want to marry not to. Secondly, no one is being "forced to intermarry." The state is not holding a gun to anyone's head to say "marry someone outside your race or else!" Perhaps Southerners are framing this as a matter of federal or Yankee intervention in their state affairs? Historically, the Supreme Court struck down state anti-miscegenation laws. I think this was right, as such laws were unjust and unconstitutional. But beyond that, I argue that those states should have overturned those laws themselves. The matter of the morality of these laws should be argued apart from the regional and constitutional debates concerning their demise. My argument is not that the "North" or the "fed" should "force" Southerners to do anything. I am arguing that those who prefer to stick with their own should not send men with badges out to forstall Christians who have found a suitable spouse outside of their own national or ethnic kind.
Anti-miscegenation laws are actually part of that statist system of moralism that says, "There should be a law . . ."
"You do not to allow it *legally* to those others who choose to enter into such marriages, provided everyone is a Christian. As Mr. Moses noted, immigration is a distinct issue. I am talking about marriage with people who already are *here.* "
I meant, "You should allow it *legally*. . ."
Here is an instance when interracial marriage might be God's will. Let us say that a man has engaged in fornication with someone from another race and the woman is pregnant. Is it moral to deny him even so much as the *option* of "doing the noble thing" and making his concubine an honest woman? Has not God brought forth many good marriages and families from such evil circumstances as I have described?
"*State legislation* is not the answer. If ethnic consciousness were high enough, state legislation would be superfluous."
There are some instances in which legislation might be warranted. I have already mentioned immigration. Laws often reflect popular conscience or at least popular idealism, and they can serve to protect the naïve from threats they might not otherwise detect--hence laws against heretical preaching in the Middle Ages and laws against selling pornography to children (although in a more civilized place it really would be illegal to sell to anyone). Laws can also serve to suppress cultural corruption--hence the outlawing of prostitution (even though Drs. Roberts and Fleming are correct in arguing that the present methods of enforcement are neither just nor effective).
Of course, that's a trivial point. We are in agreement that interracial marriage does not warrant such legislation, and is not necessarily a threat intrinsically. Race and ethnic identity are real (in spite of what academics claim) and potent, but they are pliable concepts, as you show.
"Remember, as soon as the slave of a Roman slave was emancipated, he automatically became a Roman citizen."
Sigh. I meant, "as soon as the slave a Roman CITIZEN was emancipated."
In his "People's History of the United States" [1980 ed., Ch. 9] Howard Zinn provides very interesting numbers: in 1790, there were 500,000 slaves in the U.S., while in 1860 their number was no less than - four million!
That much apropos the common myth that slavery in the U.S. was mostly a pre-XIX century phenomenon.
As a Catholic Christian, I agree with Caper, but whether a given marriage or group of marriages is approved or not is up to each individual. If someone wants to shun and have as little as possible to do with inter-racial couples, it's likely to be his own problem. If a tight knit family, clan or other group chooses to shun or expel someone who marries outside the group, the person will know that in advance and factor it into his or her marriage decisions.
Since the beginning of the human race, you have had close consanguinous marriages and since human beings became numerous enough to spread out some, you have also had miscegenation. Among my own acquaintances, I have observed marriages which were miscegenous, closely consanguinous, and everything in between. In the world, you have countries like Iraq, where nearly half of marriages are with close relatives, Brazil, where miscegenation is the norm - and everything in between. This is the variety of human experience.
To me the most important thing about a marriage is that, as St. Paul said, it should reflect the relationship of Christ and the Church in fruitfulness, lifetime fidelity, and sanctifying its members.
"Your desire to preserve your folkways and the state’s right to prevent marriages are quite different practical matters."
That depends. If we are talking in terms of your presentation of Catholic social and moral teaching, then you are correct. For the state to prevent any marriage that the Roman Catholic Church has blessed, allowing husband and wife to bestow that sacrament on each other, would be immoral.
I am not talking in those terms. Nor am I talking about "today"—some national referendum or the like. Not only do we not live under a Roman Catholic government, but we do not live in a Constitutional Republic. The scale alone of our federal "representation" in Washington excludes that option. As does the reigning Incorporation Doctrine. My "state" is not a state. My community is not free to maintain any sort of standard to preserve some sort of heritage—of blood, of religion, of anything real or imagined. I see nothing inherently immoral about a law establishing the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod here in Winnebago County. Furthermore, I think that female suffrage is immoral, based on the natural law. But to entertain either fantasy in today's context would be ridiculous.
Dr. Berg's article pertained to Illinois law in the 19th century. I was addressing anti-miscegenation law in that context. Do I think that an anti-miscegenation law in that time was "inherently immoral"? No. Given the fact that Illinois citizens were free to associate or dissociate with blacks or those of mixed backgrounds, given the extreme hatred for blacks that pervaded the hearts both of those in Illinois who opposed slavery and those who accepted it, given the whole social order of Illinois at the time, I think anti-miscegenation laws were even prudent.
St. Augustine refused to marry the mother of Adeodatus (whose name he fails to mention once), in part, because of the Roman social order of the time. Was this immoral? I don't think so. On the other hand, in the early centuries, the Church was known for marrying individuals of different social classes.
What is especially dangerous is the idea that we should read the modern notion of "free association" back into the pages of our history. In other words, insisting that it was immoral to have anti-miscegenation laws in states because this violated the "principle" of "free association."
"Everybody says there is this RACE problem. Everybody says this RACE problem will be solved when the third world pours into EVERY white country and ONLY ino white countries."
"The Netherlands and Belgium are more crowded than Japan or Taiwan, but nobody says that Japan or Taiwan will solve this RACE problem by bringing in millions of third worlders and quote assimilatin with them."
"Everybody says the final solution to the RACE problem is for EVERY white country and ONLY white countries to "assimilate."i.e.,intermarry, with all those non-whites."
"What if I said there was this RACE problem and this RACE problem would be solved only if hundreds of millions of non-blacks were brought into EVERY black country and ONLY into black countries?"
"How long would it take anyone to realize that I"m not talking about a RACE problem. I'm talking about the final solution to the BLACK problem?"
"And how long would it take any sane black man to notice this and what kind of psycho black man would'nt object to this?"
"But if I tell that obvious truth about the ongoing program of genocide against my race, the white race, Liberals and respectable conservatives agree that I am a naziwhowanttokillsixmillionjews."
"They say they are anti-racist. What they are is anti-white."
"Anti-racist is a code word for anti-white." Bob's Mantra
Apparantly many good Catholics support a program of genocide as well.
I understand that, Dr. Wolf, that it would not make any sense to attempt to pass such a law today. That is why I asked if, per possibile, would you like to return the nation, or your state, or your county, to a situation in which you not only could but would enact anti-miscegenation laws. If you had the ability to effect what you desire, if you had your druthers, would you restore anti-miscegenation laws, right now?
I understand that Dr. Berg's article is about the situation in 19th century Illinois. Why did I start this conversation about morality? I did it because I find in the paleoconservative movement a certain phenomenon which might be intellectual laziness, or it might be disingenuousness. I would like to prove myself wrong in these speculations. Whenever someone objects to Southern racism, the retort often is, "The North was just as guilty." Yet proving your opponent is a hypocrite, the "Tu quoque" argument, does not exonerate oneself. Dr. Berg proved that Illinois' Black Code was as exacting as that of Southern states. Fine. But should our response be to look on all these laws with equanimity or with abhorrence both for Northern and Southern racial injustice? The "Tu quoque" argument exposes the hypocrites. Now, were the people who set up the various Black Codes, North and South, right or wrong? If they were wrong, we must "agree" with the hypocrites in rejecting our ancestors' bad examples.
The only law I decided to object to was the anti-miscegenation law, which is immoral. Now, to be fair, Mr. Wilson and Dr. Berg have gone to the morality of the matter and have said, "Not immoral," at least not obviously so. Thank you, gentlemen, for responding to me and for addressing the more important matter. But I must conclude, if Protestant theology is insufficient to prove anti-miscegenation laws wrong, that is yet another reason to reject that theology. As Orestes Brownson said, this nation needs the Catholic Faith. (By the way, quoting a Unionist on these pages is every bit as "politically incorrect" as quoting a secessionist on the rest of the internet. Oh, how ever I do hope I didn't offend anyone by quoting that Yankee so-and-so . . .) The attempt to make America Catholic is no more quixotic than the one to attempt to stay above the moral quagmire we're in, and it is certainly less fanciful than trying to preserve "Christian" values without first agreeing on what Christianity is (which amounts to, Who Christ is).
Yet I am still left asking, would paleocons *ideally* like to revive anti-miscegenation laws? If they won't talk about where they actually want the nation (or their state, county, etc.) to go, it could be because they honestly don't know or care. I find that rather lazy for people with principles and folkways worth defending. Or perhaps they realize that it is dangerous to admit openly that not only do they defend past race laws but they seek to revive them, later if not sooner. That seems disingenuous. I applaud Dr. Trifkovic for admitting that he wants to deprive Moslems of American citizenship and deport them. I only wish that people who favor re-segregating America (via segregation laws) would admit that this is their ultimate goal, if they had their druthers. Merely saying things such as "America was better under Jim Crow than it is today," while provocative, says nothing about how to solve today's problems. Even if it is not disingenuous, it gives that impression. Conservatives and others of good will might say, "Who knows what those paleocons might do if they ever gained influence or power." Hence the movement stays small -- not that other reasons are lacking, of course, but is it not reasonable to think that such doubts about the ultimate goals or aspirations or ideals of the paleoconservatives have their effect.
Please correct me if I have erred, profoundly or slightly.
On the matter of St. Augustine's concubine, I have heard it said that he might well have suppressed her name in order not to defame her. Why needlessly expose a woman he had once loved, and now truly loved as a real or potential sister in Christ, to the public shame of having been a concubine? Perhaps she had become a wife, or nun, or had found some other decent life. St. Augustine was confessing to his own sins, not hers. If you mentioned St. Augustine's choice in order to respond to my hypthetical situation (the one in which a white man impregnates a non-white woman), I was not arguing that the man *had* to marry the woman, only that he should have the legal ability. So St. Augustine's particular choice doesn't bear on my hypothetical situation.
"Given the fact that Illinois citizens were free to associate or dissociate with blacks or those of mixed backgrounds, given the extreme hatred for blacks that pervaded the hearts both of those in Illinois who opposed slavery and those who accepted it, given the whole social order of Illinois at the time, I think anti-miscegenation laws were even prudent."
What is your understanding of free association? How is it free association when the people, at the ballot, and not individuals themselves decide with whom to associate and dissociate? I am not asking a leading question; I genuinely desire an explanation of "freedom of association" as practiced by the state as a whole and not by the private citizens.
Of course, given my premises, it will not change my views on anti-miscegenation laws.
Hmm, were the laws "prudent" given the racial hatred of the time? If the laws were designed to prevent the commission of violence by bigots by depriving those bigots of an occasion of sin, then there might be some mitigation of the injustice or immorality of these laws. Yet one could then justify the prohibition of Christianity in Moslem lands on the ground that Moslems hate and persecute Christians and, ergo, we must not permit any provocation of Moslem extremists.
It is true that the Church urges Catholics to follow the civil laws on marriage as far as possible, even when interracial marriage is illegal. But when I recall the martrydom of Fr. James Coyle by a racist Methodist minister for conducting an (allegedly) interracial wedding in Alabama, and the murderer's acquittal by a Klan jury, I must say that the guilt lies with the murderer and his abettors, not the married couple or the priest. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Coyle .
If the argument is that barbarian, un-Christian laws are suitable for barbarian, un-Christian people (Dr. Wolf said that the context of the laws was "extreme hatred"), that may be so, but that only underlines the necessity of evangelizing and civilizing those same people to the point where they can live by just laws. That is much more the duty of the Church than of the state, and unfortunately in the United States the federal government has increasingly seen the cause of progress as its own monopoly. As a result, more often than not false "progress" is made, and true gains like the legalization of interracial marriage is offset by the bane of governmental promotion of sodomy and abortion.
Fr. James Coyle, martyr for the Sacrament of Matrimony, pray for us! Pray for racial harmony and the protection of the natural law!
Last post for the time being: Dr. Wolf, you do not think that anti-miscegenation laws are inherently immoral. Thank you again for that answer. Now, just because these laws may be justified in some circumstances does not mean that the practice of interracial marriage is in and of itself immoral, agreed? I ask again, do you regard marriage between a white spouse and a spouse of a different race as inherently immoral?
I'm reluctant to step in here, because I think that this conversation has long gone too far off topic, but two comments made by Caper way up the page have been troubling me. First:
I think that, all too often, we find modern attitudes that superficially coincide with Church teaching (or rather, in this case, with a lack of Church teaching, since the Church has never definitively pronounced that racial differences are not an impediment to marriage but has simply never considered them so) and therefore jump to the conclusion that the Church's teaching and the modern attitude stem from the same source.
In this case, I'd say that's manifestly not true. Which brings me to the second comment by Caper:
Caper, I know, prefers the extraordinary form of the Mass (as do I), and he is quite well versed in the many changes that have occurred in the Latin Rite over the last half-century. Therefore, he likely knows that, in 1959, Pope John XXIII changed the Rite of Baptism, which used to include an admonition to be delivered at the baptism of a Jew who converted to Christianity: "Horresce Iudaicam perfidiam, respue Hebraicam superstitionem." As Fr. Zuhlsdorf translates it at his blog, What Does the Prayer Really Say?, "Dread Jewish unbelief, spurn Hebrew superstition!" (Father Z. goes on to note that "Horresco has to do with your hair standing on end at something terrible. Respuo is literally 'to spew out'.")
I don't note this to try to claim that Caper is wrong in what he writes about racial differences not being an impediment to marriage, in the eyes of the Church, but simply to make the point that the Church's reasons are not the same as the reasons embodied in the postmodern view of racial equality. As Catholics, we need to be careful about reading the latter back into the former.
Mr. Caper at 62
You words:
"Historically, the Supreme Court struck down state anti-miscegenation laws. I think this was right, as such laws were unjust and unconstitutional. But beyond that, I argue that those states should have overturned those laws themselves."
The Church should never become the state, and the Church should never genuflect to the state. The Church has an obligation from the Christ, of whom She is the Bride and the Body, to inform, in the most denotive meaning of that word, a given society in which She finds Herself with the values of the Christ by means of the Gospel as the Church fulfills her function as salt and light.
As I have previously stated, the state, in this case one of the fifty states, should not be in the business of licensing marriage. That is from my Biblical and Church-history understanding of marriage a matter for family and the Church.
However, since we live, at least in theory, in a constitutional federate republic, we do live in a society which has reserved for itself the right to legislate certain things, including the licensing of marriage, which I, again, would argue is contrary to natural rights - freedom of association flowing out of that, and common law which always strives for the greatest liberty, which would include marrying whom one would want, at least unhindered by polity. My position, however, notwithstanding, the people of a given state have the right through their legislative bodies to enact statutes contray to my notions of morality and right and wrong.
My problem with your words supra is that you would have the Supreme Court of the general government, a government that is the creature of the states and of the people thereof, strike down a law of the states.
I would argue that the creature does not have such authority over the creator, particularly that arm of the creature which is unelected and which sits for life, baring impeachment. The Constitution does not give the Supreme Court the authoirty of judical review. The court has indeed assumed that power, and we bow to it because of the nature of power, but it does not have that authority. Also, the Court has assumed a jurisdiction over state law which is nowhere to be found in the Constitution. Again, a power to which we bow because of the nature of power, but again no authority.
Now, I do, as a Christian, obviously subscribe to the notion of a higher law, higher than the Constitution. But the authority to apply that higher law does not rest with the general government or any arm of the general government. Nor does it rest with a given state government or arm thereof. Nor does it rest with the people as some numerical majority within a polity. It rests solely with the people when they formally go into convention to amend, nullify or reform their polity. There, the people can say, "According to the higher law, we must amend, nullify or reform. It is here where the Church will have failed or succeeded in informing a given society with the values of the Christ whom She represents.
This is precisely where the radical abolitionists were wrong. They deigned to believe that they were the vengeful arm of God. They could, in pursuit of the higher law, sweep the Constitution from the table, sweep state law from the table and sweep common law from the table, being arrogantly impatient with the long-suffering way that it worked toward liberty. Even our Creator will wait to separate the wheat from the tares, lest He destroy the good with the evil.
The Church must avoid the temptation of letting the state do its Gospel work for it, whether it be decisions by the Supreme Court or the folly of believing that one can make a society moral by supporting a faction like the Republicans.
"Now, to be fair, Mr. Wilson and Dr. Berg have gone to the morality of the matter and have said, “Not immoral,” at least not obviously so."
Whoops, I meant to say "Dr. Wolf." My apologies.
According to scripture Our Lord has created separate peoples and "appointed to each the bounds of its habitation." Does it not seem that miscegination flourishes most in times of social breakdown, degeneracy, and loss of faith like the present?
I confess that I have not read every word of every post and in some cases not a single word. How easily people are distracted! Let us see if we can gain a little clarity and perhaps some degree of consensus on inter-racial marriage.
First off, the US Constitution did not establish a Christian much less a Catholic state. In that sense, religious arguments are irrelevant to the historical situation, then and now. Illinois could regulate marriage--whether wisely or not, well or not--as its lawmakers and citizens saw fit.
Now, it is certainly true the Catholic tradition that marriage is an affair primarily between the man and woman and their families as well as a sacrament of the Church. It is also true that the Reformers unwisely turned to the state for moral and social regulation--read the very good book, When Fathers Ruled, on this development.
But while parents and their children are free, on Christian (as well as ancient-pagan) principle, to contract marriages (this is deliberately vague since consent of the two parties is usually though not always stipulated), they are not necessarily free to bring new citizens or subjects into the world in violation of law. At Rome, a slave was not free to marry a citizen, nor were his children legitimate and citizens. More seriously, a free citizen was not free to marry the citizen of a foreign state that did not enjoy the right of connubium with Rome. The offspring of such a union were definitely not regarded as citizens. One could multiply instances from ancient Greek and Jewish laws.
On the trivial level, this means that it was probably wise for Illinois legislators not to allow marriage between white citizens and blacks who were generally not treated as citizens in any state, that is, they lacked the right to vote, hold office, or sit on juries. Illinois was only the most extreme example of the tendency that justified the majority in Dred Scott in arguing that African Americans were not regarded as citizens under the Constitution.
On a deeper level, we ought to be able to make some distinctions. First, off we have to be clear when we argue from Christian principle that we are speaking of a non-Christian country, the USA, and therefore only talking in the abstract. Secondly, we should be able to distinguish between the sacramental aspect of marriage (if we believe it is a sacrament), the familial aspect, and the social/political aspect. In ancient law and in most periods of the Church, marriages contracted without the consent of parents was either invalid or discouraged. (This again is a long story, since the Church tried to prevent young men from seducing young women into marriage knowing that their fathers would then give them a way out.) Thus, a "bigot" parent, even if Catholic, has the moral right to forbid his minor son or daughter to marry someone he doesn't like, for whatever reason. On the socio-political side, legislators have the right and duty to protect citizenship, and from this perspective they should have some say as to which marriages can produce legitimate citizens.
Finally, there is the moral question of interracial marriage. The fact is that some of these marriages work, and once contracted it is our duty as Christian parents, friends, neighbors, fellow-citizens to do nothing to impair the marriage or damage the family. On the other hand, we should also be clear that many such pairings have proved unsuccessful, on a statistical basis. Nicole Simpson's parents had a duty to warn their daughter of what she was facing. Black husbands have a bad reputation for abusing white wives. I personally know a fair number of black/white marriages of both types, but I do not personally know of one that has worked out. This should be a legitimate concern, especially since divorce imposes a great cost on the whole of society.
Finally, there is the unspoken assumption of some of my co-religionists that it is wrong to prefer one's race and ethnicity in making friends or finding mates. That is not at all, as Clyde Wilson and Aaron Wolf have pointed out, dictated or implied by Christian teaching. It is entirely the product of liberal Enlightenment thought that is the enemy of all things Christian. Such thinking has destroyed our civilization and undermined our churches. Centuries of such lies should be enough.
Finally, in parting, I should like to say the personal tone of some of these remarks unacceptable. I am issuing a blanket amnesty for past offenses, but future violators of the rules of polite discourse and those who rush to ad hominem arguments will find themselves unable to post writebacks. I hope I am not sounding too much like a Yankee schoolmarm in saying that it ought to be possible, as Steve Berg, Clyde Wilson, Robert Peters, and the good Yankee John Wilson have shown, to carry on a discussion informed by fact and reason and inspired by a desire for truth.
Here is my take, as a person who is happily married in an inter-racial marriage, with well-adjusted children, albeit outside the USA:
I don't see any biblical basis for either promoting or preventing interracial marriage. I think it is legitimate to consider questions of race in marriage but only as a secondary issue.
Racial boundaries are frequently cultural, religious and linguistic boundaries, and those boundaries pose a challenge to the ultimate success of the marriage. A marriage that has the full support of both families and the surrounding communities is, all other things being equal, likely to have better prospects for success than one that lacks such support. So even if we say that there is no clear prohibition of interracial marriage, people contemplating such a marriage need to be aware of the challenges they face before they enter into it. No marriage is to be entered into lightly, especially interracial marriage for the reasons given above.
In my family's case we have been able to overcome the challenges through our common faith in Jesus Christ. We are very much aware of the fact that our citizenship is in heaven.
The Bible tells us to seek God's will to be done on earth as it is in heaven, and it also presents us a picture, in the book of Revelation, of all the nations of the earth worshipping God together, forever. That shows us what we should be working for here on earth. That does NOT imply that we should be actively working to merge all the races so as to eliminate racial differences. God is glorified by the diversity of the various races of mankind. I don't think the essential integrity of the various races is seriously threatened by interracial marriage. A much more serious issue is that some peoples seem bent on self-extinction through their low birth rates. But that is directly related to the affected society's loss of faith in Jesus Christ, accompanied by a pessimistic view of the future. It does not have much to do with "miscegenation."
Steve Berg, you write "My Danish and Viking ancestors... way back in time... were also slave traders, and were known to have sacked the occasionally monastery and committed more than a few rapes and pillages. But, we Nordics have not done much of those sorts of things of late."
On a point of information, a harsh form of slavery was practised in the Danish Virgin Islands, with bloody and savagely repressed uprisings in the 19th century. And the Danes were very active in the slave trade itself, buying slaves in Africa for shipment from fortified posts like Cape Castle in Ghana until they were bought out by the British as part of the anti-slave trade campaigns. Indeed, even when I was a teenager in Nigeria in the '60s, shoddy guns were still called Dane Guns after the guns they traded all along that coast.
I am glad that the issue of interracial marriage has finally gotten some attention here at Chronicles. Many of the great issues facing the sovereignty and security of our great country are race-related, so invariably the mixing of different races is something that must also be examined when evaluating the current state of American culture. I enjoy Chronicles because it takes a paleoconservative perspective on the world, unlike the liberal bias present in most media and neoconservative propaganda. However, it is most unfortunate that so many leading paleoconservatives are happily oblivious to the detrimental effect that anti-miscegenation rhetoric is having on the overall success of true conservatism at large. Many people in America, especially the youth, are being taught the truth about racial equality. The problem is that they are also being inundated with multicultist philosophy as well, to the point that things like a person's sexual orientation are to be treated with the same level of tolerance as race. Many people need to be taught the truth about the detrimental effects of multiculturalism, but in order to reach them, the issue of race will have to be virtually non-existent. It is easier to raise concerns over what a person can change (sexual orientation), than what they cannot (race). if paleoconservatism, and those who preach it, can be racially tolerant, then there is hope for the movement at large; if true conservatism is to survive, and I even dare say true Christian conservatism at that, then it must not be impeded by racial bias.
It is fine, well, and dandy to want to marry someone of your own race; whether she is blonde, brunette, or red-headed, that is your own "preference." So to some people have a racial preference, or just happen to fall madly in love with someone of another color who just happens to be compatible with them. I hope that most paleoconservatives understand this, but I fear they do not, whereas neoconservatives do, or at least do not seem to have the same number of issues with it. There will always be groups of whites in America who will band together into their little enclaves amidst the onrush of globalism and the third world. Will there be enough whites who will be willing to admit into their ranks those who have the same value systems as they, but do not have the same color of skin? Can those same whites understand how two people of different racial backgrounds who have a similar upbringing may choose to intermarry because of their common bonds? Only time will tell. Racial bias is a greater threat to the existence of the white race than interracial relationships or marriages will ever be. Even primitive peoples understand that increasing their numbers with other people who choose to share in the same common culture only serves to strengthen their numbers and give them numerical advantages over a common foe. Now, consider if you will for a minute how that argument relates to the survival of America against the onslaught of Mexico, and perhaps you can see the viability of many races sharing a common cause.
Re: P.M.Lawrence's posting. I was not aware of this, but sadly, I am not surprised. Many of the European maritime countries were involved in the slave trade. Denmark certainly has a long seafaring tradition, not limited to the Vikings raising hell from Scandinavia all the way into at least the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Avarice and the desire to use the absolute lowest cost labor are nearly universal human traits, causing much misery.
The slave trade has not come up in any of our genealogy research so far. My family was apparently not involved in maritime endeavors, except for one distant relative whose job it was to claim salvage washing ashore in northern Jutland for the king. His wife was wise in herb lore and helped nurse the survivors back to some semblance of health. Mostly we were artisans, gentlemen farmers, and some military officers mainly fighting the Prussians and the Swedes.
The Black Codes of popular discussion are mainly thought to be those of the post war South. Whereas, the significant "Black Codes" to be examined are those of not only Illinois, but Ohio and Indiana as well. My historical take on these fall into the category of the Haiti slave revolt and Nat Turner's terror campaign. That is, one of the major impediments to manumission movements was the fear of freed blacks. Where would they go in a democratic republic.....and vote? A who's your future gendarme kind of question.
It seems ironic that, after the Compromise of 1850, which theoretically tightened Fugitive Slave enforcement, the Northern States with a river barrier to entry felt the need to tell blacks by dint of black codes: "not in my neighborhood." But then, it was Illinois in which the "freed" Dred Scott lived, during the dispute.
One need not mention the Wilmot Proviso to show white fear of freed blacks voting in future northern plebiscites. This fear was rife in the North and perhaps understandably in the South as well. If freeing the slaves would have just been a hardship to the "dandies" of the plantations, then perhaps Northerners and Southerners would have been able to forge a coalition for manumission. But the purchase of slaves, freeing the bondsmen, was the easy part. What to do with them after freeing them, that was the problem. (Lincoln had a solution, but we can't mention it, because it involved a fleet of ships and ethnic cleansing.)
And, if history is a guide at all, it is a problem. Why even Bill Clinton, "our first black President", seems to be acknowledging such recently.
68 Leon Holler asks,
"Do many others on this site agree [that] Christians . . . must accept [interracial marriages] - as long as the marriages in question are properly conducted by a/the Church?"
I'm not sure just what you mean by "accept" . . . there are many marriages that should never have been entered into, but which are nevertheless binding legally, and (following the Bible) binding in God's eyes as well. If a child rebelliously entered into a foolish marriage and was raising up foolish grandchildren, or was leading an immoral life together with his or her spouse, then it might be entirely appropriate for the extended family to reject fellowship with that family: you don't subsidize evil.
There are also cases where you forgive your repentant children of their wickedness, in which case fellowship can be restored even though what was done cannot be undone.
Whether interracial marriages fall into this category of behavior for which you would disown a family member "depends." I don't think that it's automatic by any means, but I think it needs to be recognized that many of the most foolish marriages are interracial. There are plenty of equally foolish marriages that don't cross racial boundaries.
I have had people try to argue from the Bible that if I love God, I am duty bound as a Christian to divorce my wife of another race and to send her away together with our half-breed children. The argument was based on the assumption that what Ezra and Nehemiah had prohibited, and required divorce for, were marriages across racial boundaries. My understanding is that the core issue was one of religious faith -- that the marriages were interfaith marriages -- and that any racial differences were coincidental. (In the past, race, language, culture, and religion would have split much more "cleanly" than today so that in the Hebrew scriptures one could prohibit marriages with "foreigners" when the primary issue was the *idolatry* of foreigners rather than their skin color.) It was pointed out to me that if Ezra and Nehemiah had intended to prohibit interfaith marriages, the wives could have been offered the opportunity to convert rather than being sent away. That strikes me as an awful lot of theology and law to hang on an inference. Besides pointing that out, I also pointed out that in discussing the relations between Jews and Gentiles in the New Testament, and in discussing the conditions where it was legitimate for people to get divorced in the NT, there is no mention of miscegenation. The silence of the NT strikes me as curious in view of the fact that in the NT era the gospel is expanding very aggressively, at Christ's express command, throughout the world. The reply seems to be that people everywhere -- regardless of their religious belief -- just naturally take it for granted that miscegenation is wrong and therefore it was not necessary to "spell it out clearly" in the NT. (People who say that are assuming the continiuity of the OT's moral precepts in any case, so for them they would expect the "clear prohibition of the OT" [which is not clear in my view, but anyway] to be still valid in the NT unless a contrary command was given abrogating the earlier law.)
I have concluded that a convincing case cannot be made that the Bible considers "miscegenation" per se to be immoral. When we consider that the ultimate aim of each Christian marriage is to advance the kingdom of God, each marriage needs to be examined in its unique context. There are many interracial marriages that were entered into for all the wrong reasons. Some of them may be God's grace be redeemed and turn out great in the long run. Others may be a living hell for their members. However, the same can be said for many marriages within one's racial group. The interracial aspect does tend to add another element of complexity, so to be sure. But there are also cases -- and I think mine is one -- where the interracial aspect of the marriage is a positive blessing to society. For some people, it is actually *better* that they be in an interracial marriage.
However, I think that it is not really all that big an issue. Race relations is a huge issue and very important . . . but interracial marriage is a relatively minor (although very visible) sub-issue within the larger issue. I cannot believe that racial diversity is going to be destroyed over time by interracial marriage turning everyone into homogenous "cafe latte."
Mr. Holler?
Oh, and by the way, as a Christian I want to take a good close look at anything that is "universally" believed by unregenerate people. Is that a defense mechanism that God has hard-wired into the fabric of our being for our own good? Or is it a tendency that fallen man tends to have *because* of the fall? Jesus and Paul both describe various features of the psychology of unregenerate men that Christians are supposed to strive to *overcome.* So the "universality" of aversion to "miscegenation" is by itself not something that should convince a Christian that it is what God intended for His people.
Excellent analysis by Mr. Witmer. On another note, I am struck by the fact that the opponents of miscegenation treat it as if it were an entirely new phenomenon, whereas in fact it has been going on for thousands of years. If it was going to homogenize the human race, it would have done so long ago.
St. Francis Xavier, the greatest Christian missionary other than St. Paul, was confronted during his time in what is now Malaysia with Portuguese governors and other high officials and merchants collecting harems of native women for their lustful enjoyment. Francis approached this problem by urging these men to award their concubines to loyal retainers for a Christian marriage. Once the official was down to his last and favorite concubine, the saint would persuade him to "make an honest woman of her" through marriage in the Church. Thus did a great saint use widespread miscegenation as a cure for fornication.
On interracial marriage or on interracial anything:
Catholics and Protestants I refer to the Book of Ruth.
Catholics I refer to Populorum Progresso ##47, 62, 63, 72.
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/paul_vi/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-vi_enc_26031967_populorum_en.html
Thanks for the references from PP, Mr. Cundiff.
The Book of Ruth is entirely irrelevant. Jews and Moabites were hardly distinguishable except in religion. Paul VI's Populorum Progressio is a typical product of that unfortunate pontiff. There is much good in it that repeats the wisdom of wiser Catholic teachers, some that is highly debatable--the value of industrialization to Third World countries is not at all self-evident, quite the contrary-- and much high-sounding and dangerous twaddle interlarded with socialist-influenced attitudes that sound better in the Communist Manifesto. The notion that it is the United Nations' responsibility to build the brotherhood of man is a truly terrible idea, typical of secularist post-Christian thinkers and quite alien to the Christ who told Pilate that His kingdom is not of this world. (It is Marxian nonsense of this sort that has driven so many good men out of the Church.) Drawing attention to Paul VI only reminds former Catholics of why they felt they had to leave.
All this bother about race, on both sides, is one more piece of modernity that Christians should chuck.
It was worth extending the diversion Russ sought, if only to draw this out of him: "Especially in light of the fact that most Jews (the Ashkenazim at any rate, who comprise 90% of world Jewry) have little to no Semitic markers in their DNA. (Granted this is merely my own hypothesis, but it should be easy enough to test for.)"
Gotta love that little parenthetical. Also, his timeline concerning Lindbergh's America First activities relative to the kidnapping of his child is helpful to those trying to understand the Russ phenomenon.
At the risk of feeding the troll, I think it is good -- both in itself, and to enable the fight against false inferences concerning the general beliefs of this forum -- to point out that Russ is either crazy, abysmally ignorant, or both.
Nostra aestate #5?
http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decl_19651028_nostra-aetate_en.html
Mit brennender Sorge, ## 8, 10, 11, 17, & 23?
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/pius_xi/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xi_enc_14031937_mit-brennender-sorge_en.html
Nostra aetate that should read
I'll try without the links
Nostra Aetate #5
Mit brennender Sorge ##8, 10, 11, 17, 23.
@ 50 Caper. "But if other people use the words “Negro” and “miscegenation,” then I don’t see cause to criticize them."
Then why did you bring it up? Doing so has the same effect as PC criticism. "African American" is less offensive than "black." If offending modern people is your standard, then don't write or say "black." "Negro" and "black" have the same literal meaning. Mrl Wolf's usage is just more archaic. Ditto "miscegenation."
@73 Caper. "Whenever someone objects to Southern racism, the retort often is, “The North was just as guilty.” Yet proving your opponent is a hypocrite, the “Tu quoque” argument, does not exonerate oneself. Dr. Berg proved that Illinois’ Black Code was as exacting as that of Southern states. Fine."
Significant aspects of American history have been grossly skewed (and distorted) in one direction. I don't think it's inappropriate to make corrections at a site devoted to American-culture-from-the-traditional-conservative-perspective. I don't think the author or editors were trying to exonerate anyone.
@ 92 TJF. "All this bother about race, on both sides, is one more piece of modernity that Christians should chuck."
Yessir, but I think that modern, ever-expanding economies (which seem to have the effect of reducing us all to consumer-producer units) force us to have to think about such unpleasant things. I wish it weren't so and maybe things could have worked out differently if more prudent men had been in charge, but they didn't. I think that it's awfully hard to decouple race and ethnicity and, therefore, race and culture. The most realistic prospect to do this seems to involve reduction to consumer-pop culture that appeals to everyone's baser instincts. No wonder serious Muslims hate us so much.
People like the Amish and Mennonites have "chucked" it because they live an insular lifestyle that no one else wants a part of. They exist as a "race" without ever having to dwell on it (even in places like Mestizo Guatelmala.
I have to say I agree with Aaron Wolf's view of miscegenation. I avoid thinking of it as immoral or a sin but, at a minimum, I consider it (as a mass practice anyway) subversive to God's will and inconsistent with His created order. I don't have hard-hearted feelings towards those who participate in such unions which I guess is how I know I'm being "Christian" about it.
The Roman Catholic Spanish seem to have had a more negative reaction to Black-Spaniard miscegenation than to Indian-Spaniard miscegenation. The term for the latter, mestizo, is derived from a word meaning "mixed" and the term for the former, mulatto, is derived from a word meaning "little mule" as in "the offspring will be sterile."
They seem to have believed that race matters.
As usual, my statements have been misconstrued. What is there about the Internet that dulls the wits? In advising people to chuck their racial obsessions, I was not suggesting that they abandon prudence or shut their eyes to the reality of racial differences. Race and ethnicity matter, but so do a great many other things. When we focus our unhappiness or hghminded moral outrage exclusively on racial concerns, we distort our understanding and our moral sense. Most scientific racists and most moralizing anti-racists are very unpleasant people to be around. They are not only boring in their insistence upon riding their hobby horse on every occasion, but they trivialize every conversation. For an anti-Semite, Mendelsohn andn Mahler must have written bad music, and for the professonal anti-racist all Southerners who did not march with Dr. King are bigots. I wish the members of both cheerleading squads would find a more useful hobby, like building Grandfather clocks out of popsickle sticks, and leave political discussions to grownups.
Beg your pardon. Here's what dulled my wits.
You didn't seem to distinguish between the generally secular/atheist race-is-the-whole-ball-of-wax crowd and Christians. The first group (which infests isolated-right-wing-internet world) is an embarassment to us, particularly when they "ride their hobby horse" on every (and so, inappropriate) occasions. But the second (Christians) doesn't share this obsession at all and HAS abandonded prudence (almost none would agree with what Mr. Wolf wrote above in public or private) so I don't think they need to "chuck" the aspect of modernity you describe as much as avoid it.
Personally, my own view of racial intermarriage is sometimes coloured more by cultural or religious concerns, other times by racial concerns. I myself would rather marry a Christian Philipina or a Polynesian than, say, a blonde traitor-to-her-entire-civilisation-and-to-God muslim convert. Egyptian Copts, on the other hand, generally are not white enough for me (though some are, since they are not entirely racially homogenous). I just find oriental women more attractive than non-white caucasians.
Jews I consider white, even though they are semitic, and I wouldn't mind marrying one if she didn't insist that we raise our kids as Jews, and that's all despite the fact that I consider the argument that they are a religion, not a race, to be ludicrous or even dishonest. Yes, they are a race or at least an ethnicity.
If none of this makes much sense to anyone else, I dont care, since this is simply personal taste and therefore dosen't have to make sense. In reality, however, I want white kids so I'll marry my own kind, and I prefer that everyone else does so as well, especially Jews, so that they dont die off through miscegenation.
To Caper or any other Catholic: since the Catholics here are using Catholic social teaching quite a bit, can someone point me to the parts of it which they are using to address the issue of interracial marriage?
Likewise, what parts would be useful re: lesbianism. This second issue could be considered off-topic and therefore I wont discuss it here at any length, but I have reason to ask about it. You wouldn't believe how many younger females I've been around in the last year who have tried it or had someone else try to get them to. I'm not trying to save their souls or even persuade them not to do it, but I think developing a coherent argument to use if need be would be prudent. Romans 1:26 is a start, and I think there is a passage connected to the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, but I cant find it now to save my life. A coherent argument would need more than this in any case.
Addendum to rambling above that strays even further from original post:
I am sensitive to the problems presented by people to obsess about these types of (important I think) issues. I suppose an equivalent type would be the enviro-wackos and their obsession.
Case in point. I was reading a nice article about children's literature at a Christian website and some writebacker just blurts out about immigration and Mexicans. Totally off base and it makes those with serious concerns about the issue seem like nutcases. People need to be disciplined (when and how to make them) in their arguments, particuarly on these issues.
Similary, race and IQ is interesting and relevant to some big issues facing us. But it's all some people talk about. They "ride that hobby horse" constantly.