Legal Research

Mildred Loving, a plaintiff in the landmark case Loving v. Virginia that overturned the last segregation laws, died on May 2 at age 68.  From the New York Times: 

By their own widely reported accounts, Mrs. Loving and her husband, Richard, were in bed in their modest house in Central Point in the early morning of July 11, 1958, five weeks after their wedding, when the county sheriff and two deputies, acting on an anonymous tip, burst into their bedroom and shined flashlights in their eyes. A threatening voice demanded, ?Who is this woman you?re sleeping with??

Mrs. Loving answered, ?I?m his wife.?  

Mr. Loving pointed to the couple?s marriage certificate hung on the bedroom wall. The sheriff responded, ?That?s no good here.?

The certificate was from Washington, D.C., and under Virginia law, a marriage between people of different races performed outside Virginia was as invalid as one done in Virginia. At the time, it was one of 16 states that barred marriages between races.

For those who haven't heard their story before, it is well worth clicking through to read.