Mixed Race Studies

Governor Northen says that miscegenation by law will never, take place in the south. But miscegenation in the south has already taken place. It has been on the road over 200 years. Not miscegenation by law, but by brute force, which is the very worst form of law. Who started it? Not the negroes, I am sure, nor was it the poor white trash. It was the blue vein aristocracy of the south that broke over the fence, defied all law, and the result is we have black negroes and white negroes, some of them as white as Governor Northen.

Joseph W. Henderson, “An Answer to Northen: The Son of a Slave Mother on Southern Miscegenation,” The Daily Star (via: Valley of the Shadow: Civil War Era Newspapers, University of Virginia Library), June 19, 1899, page 1 (column 1). http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=H9AwAAAAIBAJ&sjid=WooDAAAAIBAJ&pg=5707%2C959988

Black GIs, English women, and ‘brown babies’ (1944-1950)

Mix-d: Museum: Timeline
Mix-d:
2012-07-10

During the period 1942-45 around one million US servicemen were based in England as part of the preparations for the invasion of Europe in June 1944 and around 130,000 (13%) of these were Black (African American) GIs. This caused endless worry for British officials who were reluctant to support American segregation practices formally, but were nevertheless highly concerned about the possible growth of interracial relationships and ‘half-caste babies’ in Britain. British authorities tried to discourage relationships between white British women and black – and other minority ethnic – troops in a number of ways: social segregation at dance halls, pubs and cinemas, restrictions put on female military staff, police surveillance and ‘whispering campaigns’.  These actions did little, however, to stop these interracial relationships. The black troops tended to be popular with Britons, who tended to oppose the American idea of segregation, and they were particularly popular with white British women, much to the angry bewilderment of white American GIs…

Read the entire timeline section and view the video clip here.

Speaking of morals, you asked me what effect the female population of mixed blood was going to have on society here [in Charleston, South Carolina]. I have looked somewhat into the matter since my return, from what I can learn, I believe there is hardly a young man here of Southern birth, who can afford the expense, who does not protect one of these girls, and few married men who have not two families. Miscegenation is practiced here. I know of nearly a dozen cases where the parties are married. These girls are many of them beautiful, many almost pure white, with blue eyes and light hair, of fine figures and lady-like appearance. Many of them are much whiter than the majority of pure whites, who seem to belong to the order of women known as scraggy, and are the color of a liver colored pointer, having tan colored paws and faces. But few children are born where these girls are protected by single men, while some of the old men have larger colored families. Nothing can be done to rectify this evil, as these girls will not on any account marry a man with a drop of “nigger blood” in his veins.

“Life in the South,” Franklin Repository (via: Valley of the Shadow: Civil War Era Newspapers, University of Virginia Library), January 23, 1867, 2 (column 3). http://valley.lib.virginia.edu/news/fr1867/pa.fr.fr.1867.01.23.xml#02

British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act (1914)

Mix-d: Museum: Timeline
Mix-d:
2012-07-10

With the increase of the minority ethnic population in Britain from the turn of the century, popular concerns about interracial relationships grew. The 1914 British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act meant that not only did ‘aliens’ – that is, foreign-born residents, have to carry an alien registration card, but British women across the Empire who married such men automatically lost their British nationality. Such was the case for Emily Ah Foo, a Liverpudlian woman who married Stanley, a Chinese seaman. There were no such restrictions for British men; in fact, any foreign woman marrying a British subject automatically became British…

Read the entire timeline section and view the video clip here.

Commentary: Morgan Freeman’s Misguided “Mixed-Race President” Quote

Black Entertainment Television
2012-07-09

Cord Jefferson

The legendary Black actor made a silly mistake when he said Obama isn’t a truly Black president, because fewer and fewer truly Black Americans exist.

Morgan Freeman is one of the most sought after actors in Hollywood, and for good reason: He’s handsome in the way we expect wizened and wise old men to be, he’s got an eminently soothing voice, and, above it all, he’s a hyper-talented thespian. Kudos to Freeman for rising to the top of his craft. Where Freeman tends to falter, however, is when it comes to talking about race and politics…

…In a new interview with NPR, Freeman said that he takes issue with people calling Barack Obama our “first Black president.”

“First thing that always pops into my head regarding our president is that all of the people who are setting up this barrier for him … they just conveniently forget that Barack had a mama, and she was white — very white American, Kansas, middle of America. There was no argument about who he is or what he is. America’s first black president hasn’t arisen yet. He’s not America’s first black president — he’s America’s first mixed-race president.”

Freeman’s hesitance to call Obama the first Black president is fine if that’s his choice on the matter. But as long as we’re splitting hairs, it should be noted that it’s going to be mighty hard to ever elect a Black president who isn’t, as Freeman calls it, “mixed race.”..

Read the entire opinion piece here.