Today’s guest blogger, Anna Mahler, is a regular contributor to Wednesday’s Woman and blogs at The Mommy Padawan. In case you are wondering, padawan means student. Anna considers herself a student of life, always open to learning through her experiences as a wife, mother, friend, and woman in her community. I am honored to welcome her back to Sperk* today with a story of courage that comes from history, her own and ours.
Wednesday's Woman: Mildred Loving
by Anna Mahler
Having the basic right to marry
the person you fall in love with is something most of us take for granted. When
I was single, my thoughts and emotions were far more wrapped up in wondering if
I would ever meet someone special to share my life with. Whether or not
marriage would be a legal option if I did finally meet “the one” never came in
to play.
But that is not how the world has always worked and for some, it is still not that way.
But that is not how the world has always worked and for some, it is still not that way.
Mildred, a woman who was part
black, part Cherokee, fell in love with her childhood sweetheart, a white
construction worker named Richard Loving. Richard felt the same and was ready
to settle down but there was a problem. Mildred and Richard were from Virginia,
a state where interracial marriage was against the law.
In June of 1958, the couple
traveled to Washington, D.C. to marry and returned home to Virginia.
Shortly
after their return, local police raided their home at night. They were
arrested, charged with unlawful cohabitation and jailed.
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| Screenshot The Loving Story |
Convicted on felony charges, the couple was offered a
suspension of their one-year prison sentences if they would leave the state and
not return. Mildred was pregnant with the couple’s first child at the time so
the Lovings decided to move to Washington DC.
Mildred never truly adjusted to life in the city and always
longed for her roots and a more rural life back in Virginia. Frustrated with the current system, in 1964,
she contacted the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) for help.
"I wasn't involved with the civil rights
movement," Mildred explains at one point. "We were trying to get back
to Virginia. That was our goal."
I can't imagine how scary, frustrating and humiliating this
situation must have been for Mildred Loving, for so many reasons. Interracial
relationships and marriages are not completely uncommon today and are of
course, completely legal but they are still not always accepted.
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| The Loving Story |
As their trial began, when their lawyer, Bernard Cohen,
asked Richard whether he had anything to say to the justices, he replied
simply: "Tell the court I love my wife, and it's just unfair that I can't
live with her in Virginia."
In 1967, Supreme Court ruled on
the case of Loving v. Virginia. In
what would become a landmark case, the Court ruled that state bans on
interracial marriage were unconstitutional.
While times have changed, mostly
for the better, there are still people today who are fighting for this same
basic right.
In 2007, 32 years after her husband died, Mrs. Loving - who
herself passed away the following year - released a statement in support of
same-sex marriage.
“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.” (source)
For her strength, her bravery and
her heart, today's Wednesday's Woman is Mildred Loving.
Wednesday's Woman is a weekly feature dedicated to spotlighting women who are role models for our daughters. . . and the world.
photo credit: Jennuine Captures via photopin cc
