Mildred Loving

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Mildred and Richard Loving

Mildred Loving (June 22, 1939–May 2, 2008), with her husband Richard Perry Loving (October 29, 1933–June 29, 1975), filed and won a landmark U.S. court appeal in defense of their interracial marriage that became the legal standard used to eradicate laws against mixed marriage across the country.

Loving was born Mildred Delores Jeter, of African and Rappahannock Native American descent, and married a white man named Richard Loving in June 1958. The Lovings traveled to the District of Columbia to be married, but on their return to their home in Central Point, Virginia, they were charged with “cohabiting as man and wife, against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth” according to Virginia’s anti-miscegenation law.

The Lovings pled guilty and were forced to leave Virginia to avoid going to jail, having been ordered not to return together for 25 years. A few years later, frustrated by their inability to travel together to visit their families in Virginia, Mildred Loving wrote to Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, who referred the case to the American Civil Liberties Union. The legal challenge, Loving v. Virginia, went all the way to the United States Supreme Court, which ruled on June 12, 1967, that any ban on interracial marriage was unconstitutional.

June 12 has become known as Loving Day in the United States, a day of celebration of mixed-race marriages.

1 Biography
2 Death
3 Works based on the Loving case
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Biography

Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving first met when she was 11 and he was 17. He was a family friend and over the years they started courting.^[1] They lived just north of Richmond in the Commonwealth of Virginia, where interracial marriage was banned by a 1924 statute. When Mildred was 18 she became pregnant, and the couple decided to marry, traveling out of Virginia to do so. Mildred later stated that she did not know it was illegal when they got married in 1958, but she believed her husband did.^[2] They returned to Virginia and were arrested in the middle of the night by the county sheriff, who had received an anonymous tip.^[3] They moved to Washington DC after pleading guilty to being married and being banned from living together in their home state, but returned to Virginia after the Supreme Court decision.

Mildred considered her marriage and the court decision to be God’s work, and she supported everyone’s right to marry whomever they wished.^[4] She told the Washington Evening Star in 1965, when the case was pending, “We loved each other and got married. We are not marrying the state. The law should allow a person to marry anyone he wants.”^[2]

On June 12, 2007, Mildred Loving issued a public statement for the 40th anniversary of the Loving v. Virginia Supreme Court decision, commenting on same-sex marriage.^[5] Her statement concluded:

Surrounded as I am now by wonderful children and grandchildren, not a day goes by that I don’t think of Richard and our love, our right to marry, and how much it meant to me to have that freedom to marry the person precious to me, even if others thought he was the “wrong kind of person” for me to marry. I believe all Americans, no matter their race, no matter their sex, no matter their sexual orientation, should have that same freedom to marry. Government has no business imposing some people’s religious beliefs over others. Especially if it denies people’s civil rights.

I am still not a political person, but I am proud that Richard’s and my name is on a court case that can help reinforce the love, the commitment, the fairness, and the family that so many people, black or white, young or old, gay or straight, seek in life. I support the freedom to marry for all. That’s what Loving, and loving, are all about.

Mildred and Richard Loving had three children, Donald (died 2000), Peggy and Sidney. The happy union of Mildred with Richard Loving ended when a drunken driver struck their car in 1975, killing him and costing Mildred Loving her right eye.

[edit] Death

Mildred Loving died of pneumonia on May 2, 2008, in Milford, Virginia, at the age of 68. Her daughter, Peggy Fortune, said “I want [people] to remember her as being strong and brave yet humble—and believ[ing] in love.”^[2]

The final sentence in Mildred Loving’s obituary in the New York Times makes note of the above-noted June 2007 statement to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Loving v. Virginia^[3]: “A modest homemaker, Loving never thought she had done anything extraordinary. ‘It wasn’t my doing,’ Loving told the Associated Press in a rare interview a year ago. ‘It was God’s work’.”^[6]

[edit] Works based on the Loving case

Mr. & Mrs. Loving (1996), film starring Lela Rochon, Timothy Hutton and Ruby Dee, written and directed by Richard Friedenberg.[1] According to Loving, “Not much of it was very true. The only part of it right was I had three children.” Source: Dionne Walker. "Pioneer of interracial marriage looks back", USAToday.com, 2007-06-10. Retrieved on 2008-05-08.
Phyl Newbeck (2004). Virginia Hasn’t Always Been for Lovers. ISBN ISBN 0-8093-2528-4.