View source for Anti-miscegenation laws

{{Short description|Legislation prohibiting interracial relationships}}
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'''Anti-miscegenation laws''' are laws that enforce [[racial segregation]] at the level of marriage and intimate relationships by [[criminalization|criminalizing]] [[interracial marriage]] and sometimes, they also criminalize sex between members of different [[Race (classification of humans)|races]].

In the United States, interracial marriage, cohabitation and sex have been termed "[[miscegenation]]" since the term was coined in 1863. Contemporary usage of the term is infrequent, except in reference to historical laws which banned the practice. Anti-miscegenation laws were first introduced in North America by the governments of several of the [[Thirteen Colonies]] from the late seventeenth century onward, and subsequently, they were introduced by the governments of many [[U.S. state]]s and [[U.S. territories]] and they remained in force in many US states until 1967. After the [[World War II|Second World War]], an increasing number of states repealed their anti-miscegenation laws. In 1967, in the landmark case ''[[Loving v. Virginia]]'', the remaining anti-miscegenation laws were ruled unconstitutional by the [[Supreme Court of the United States|U.S. Supreme Court]] under Chief Justice [[Earl Warren]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|url=https://www.oyez.org/cases/1966/395|title=Loving v. Virginia|website=Oyez|language=en|access-date=2019-10-03}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/388/1|title=Loving v. Virginia|website=LII / Legal Information Institute|language=en|access-date=2019-10-03}}</ref>

Anti-miscegenation laws were also enforced in [[Nazi Germany]] as a part of the [[Nuremberg Laws]] which were passed in 1935, and they were also enforced in [[South Africa]] as a part of the system of [[apartheid]] which was introduced in 1948.

==United States==
{{Main|Anti-miscegenation laws in the United States}}
{{Sex and the law}}
The first ever anti-miscegenation law was passed by the [[Maryland General Assembly]] in 1691, criminalizing interracial marriage.<ref name="Anti-miscegenation"/> In a speech in [[Charleston, Illinois]], in 1858, [[Abraham Lincoln]] stated, "I am not, nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people".<ref>{{cite book |first=Stephen A. |last=Douglas|title=The Complete Lincoln-Douglas Debates of 1858 |date=1991 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |page=235}}</ref> By the late 1800s, 38 U.S. states had anti-miscegenation statutes.<ref name="Anti-miscegenation"/> By 1924, the ban on interracial marriage  was still in force in 29 states.<ref name="Anti-miscegenation"/> While interracial marriage had been legal in [[California]] since 1948, in 1957 actor [[Sammy Davis Jr.]] faced backlash for his relationship with a white woman, actress [[Kim Novak]].<ref name="Smithsonian" /> In 1958, Davis briefly married a black woman, actress and dancer Loray White, to protect himself from mob violence.<ref name="Smithsonian">Lanzendorfer, Joy (August 9, 2017) [https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/hollywood-loved-sammy-davis-jr-until-he-dated-white-movie-star-180964395/ "Hollywood Loved Sammy Davis Jr. Until He Dated a White Movie Star"], ''[[Smithsonian (magazine)|Smithsonian]]'' Retrieved February 23, 2021.</ref>

In 1958, officers in [[Virginia]] entered the home of [[Loving v. Virginia#Plaintiffs|Richard and Mildred Loving]] and dragged them out of bed for living together as an interracial couple, on the basis that "any white person intermarry with a colored person"— or vice versa—each party "shall be guilty of a felony" and face prison terms of five years.<ref name="Anti-miscegenation">{{cite news |title=Eugenics, Race, and Marriage |url=https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/eugenics-race-and-marriage |access-date=February 23, 2021 |website=Facing History.org}}</ref> When former president [[Harry S. Truman]] was asked by a reporter in 1963 if interracial marriage would become widespread in the U.S., he responded, "I hope not; I don’t believe in it", before adding "Would you want your daughter to marry a Negro? She won't love someone who isn't her color."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Wallenstein |first1=Peter |title=Tell the Court I Love My Wife: Race, Marriage, and Law--An American History |date=2004 |publisher=St. Martin's Publishing Group |page=185}}</ref> In 1967 the law banning interracial marriage was ruled unconstitutional (via the [[Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|14th Amendment]] adopted in 1868) by the U.S. Supreme Court in ''[[Loving v. Virginia]]''.<ref name="Anti-miscegenation"/>

Anti-miscegenation is a part of [[American domestic terrorist]] ideology; the [[Phineas Priesthood]], considered by the ADL to be more an ideology without organizational structure, opposed interracial marriage. The name is a reference to the [[Old Testament]] priest [[Phineas]] who, according to the Bible, [[heresy of Peor|murdered an Israelite man as he lay with a Midianite woman]].

==South Africa==
{{Main|Racism in South Africa}}
Early prohibitions on interracial marriages date back to the rule of the [[Dutch East India Company]] when High Commissioner [[Hendrik van Rheede|Van Rheede]] prohibited marriages between European settlers and ''heelslag'' or full-blooded slave women (that is, of pure Asian or African origin) in 1685.  The ban was never enforced.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Giliomee|first1=Hermann|title=The Afikaners: Biography of a People|date=2009|publisher=Tafelberg|isbn=978-0-624-04823-7|page=19|edition=2nd}}</ref>

In 1905, German South West Africa banned the "Rassenmischehe" (racial mixed marriage). These bans had no legal basis in German citizenship laws (issued in 1870 and 1913) and the "decrees [were] issued by either a colonial governor or the colonial secretary", they were "not laws that had received the approval of the Reichstag". Similar such laws were also adopted in the German colonies of German East Africa (1906) and German Samoa (1912).<ref>{{cite book|last1=Wildenthal|first1=Lora|title=German Women for Empire, 1884-1945|date=2001|publisher=Duke UP|isbn=978-0-8223-2819-3|pages=84–5|edition=1st}}</ref>

In 1927, the Pact coalition government passed a law prohibiting marriages between whites and blacks (though not between whites and "coloured" people).  An attempt was made to extend this ban in 1936 to marriages between whites and coloureds when a bill was introduced in parliament, but a commission of inquiry recommended against it.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Giliomee|first1=Hermann|title=The Afikaners: Biography of a People|date=2009|publisher=Tafelberg|isbn=978-0-624-04823-7|page=344|edition=2nd}}</ref>

[[South Africa]]'s [[Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act]], passed in 1949 under [[apartheid]], forbade marriages between whites and anyone who was deemed to be non-whites. The [[Population Registration Act]] (No. 30) of 1950 provided the basis for separating the population of South Africa into different races. Under the terms of this act, all residents of South Africa were to be classified as white, [[coloured]], or native (later called [[Bantu peoples|Bantu]]) people. Indians were included under the category "Asian" in 1959. Also in 1950, the [[Immorality Act]] was passed, which criminalized all [[human sexual behavior|sexual relations]] between whites and non-whites. The Immorality Act of 1950 extended an earlier ban on sexual relations between whites and blacks (the Immorality Act [No. 5] of 1927) to a ban on sexual relations between whites and any non-whites.<ref>{{Citation|url=http://countrystudies.us/south-africa/|title=South Africa: A Country Study|location=Washington|publisher=GPO for the Library of Congress|year=1996|chapter=Legislative Implementation of Apartheid|chapter-url=http://countrystudies.us/south-africa/25.htm|editor=Rita M. Byrnes|access-date=2008-01-04}}</ref> Both Acts were repealed in 1985 as a part of the reforms which were carried out during the tenure of [[P. W. Botha]].

==Australia==
{{Main|Racism in Australia}}
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, laws which were called [[Half-Caste Act]]s and included anti-interracial marriage clauses were enacted in some of the Australian states, including the Northern Territory, Western Australia and Queensland.<ref>{{cite web |last1=of Australia |first1=Parliament of |title=History of Marriage Laws in Australia |url=https://www.aph.gov.au/parliamentary_business/committees/house_of_representatives_committees?url=spla/bill%20marriage/report/chapter2.pdf |website=aph.gov |language=en}}</ref>  From the start there was a widespread ideology in lawmaking of separating races due to inferiority. However, by the mid-1930s there was a shift in which they used the anti miscegenation clauses to control who specifically Aboriginal peoples can marry in order to promote "assimilation" but this did not change their views on their inferiority, just merely to improve them by "whitening".<ref>{{cite web |last1=Verass |first1=Sophie |title=Illegal love: Is this NT couple Australia's Richard and Mildred Loving |url=https://www.sbs.com.au/nitv/article/2017/04/07/illegal-love-nt-couple-australias-richard-and-mildred-loving |website=Special Broadcasting Service |language=en}}</ref> At the beginning when these acts were passed the biggest fear was not interracial aboriginal and white intermarriage, but aboriginal and Asian intermarriage, a reflection on Australia's extreme stance during the [[yellow peril]] era, but after the [[white Australia Policy]] which banned all Asian immigration from 1901 on, these fears subsided and their attention was put on aboriginal and white interracial marriages and sexual behavior.{{citation needed|date=August 2022}}

==East Asia==
{{Main|Racism in Asia}}

===China===
{{Main|Racism in China}}
Laws and policies which discouraged miscegenation were passed during the rule of [[Dynasties of China|various dynasties]], including an 836 AD decree which forbade Chinese people from having relationships with members of other people groups such as Iranians, Arabs, Indians, Malays, Sumatrans, and so on.<ref>{{Citation
|last=Gernet
|first=Jacques
|title=A History of Chinese Civilization
|edition=2
|publisher=Cambridge University Press
|year=1996
|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jqb7L-pKCV8C
|page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=jqb7L-pKCV8C&pg=PA294 294]
| isbn =978-0-521-49781-7}}</ref>

===India===
{{Main|Ethnic relations in India}}
While there are no specific provisions regarding the freedom to marry someone who is a member of a different race in the [[Constitution of India]], Article 21 of the Constitution, which is a [[Fundamental rights in India|Fundamental Right]], is widely regarded as to provide that freedom as it comes under "personal liberty", which the Constitution guarantees to protect.<ref name="MARRIAGE IN INDIA">{{cite web|url=https://www.lawctopus.com/academike/marriage-india/
|title=MARRIAGE IN INDIA|last=Gupta|first=Shivani |date=February 14, 2015 |website=lawctopus.com|access-date=May 18, 2020 }}</ref>

After the events of the [[Indian Rebellion of 1857]],<ref>{{citation|title=Vanishing Women: Magic, Film, and Feminism|first=Karen Redrobe|last=Beckman|publisher=[[Duke University Press]]|year=2003|isbn=0-8223-3074-1|pages=31–3}}</ref> several anti-miscegenation laws were passed by the [[British Raj|British colonial government]].<ref>{{citation|title=Converting Women|first=Eliza F.|last=Kent|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] US|year=2004|isbn=0-19-516507-1|pages=85–6}}</ref>

===North Korea===
{{Main|Racism in North Korea}}
After the deterioration of relations between North Korea and the Soviet Union in the 1960s, North Korea began to enact practices such as forcing its male citizens who had married Eastern European women to [[divorce]] them.<ref>[[Andrei Lankov]], ''[[The Real North Korea: Life and politics in the failed Stalinist utopia]] (Oxford 2015) page 20</ref>

Additionally, the North Korean government has been accused of performing [[forced abortion]]s and [[infanticide]]s on repatriated [[North Korean defectors|defectors]] to "prevent the survival of half-Chinese babies".<ref>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/3204509.stm|title=BBC NEWS - Asia-Pacific - N Korea 'kills detainees' babies'|date=22 October 2003|access-date=7 October 2014}}</ref>

==Europe==
{{Main|Racism in Europe}}
===Nazi Germany===
{{Main|Racial policy of Nazi Germany}}
The U.S. was the global leader of countries where codified racism was practiced, and its race laws fascinated the Nazis.<ref name="Whitman"/> The ''National Socialist Handbook for Law and Legislation'' of 1934–1935, edited by the lawyer [[Hans Frank]], contains a pivotal essay by Herbert Kier on the recommendations for race legislation which devoted a quarter of its pages to U.S. legislation—from segregation, race based citizenship, immigration regulations, and anti-miscegenation.<ref name="Whitman">{{cite book|last1=Whitman|first1=James Q.|title=Hitler's American Model: The United States and the Making of Nazi Race Law|date=2017|publisher=Princeton University Press|pages=37–43}}</ref> The Nazis enacted miscegenation statutes which discriminated against Jews, Roma and Sinti ("Gypsies"), and Black people. The Nazis considered the Jews to be a race supposedly bound by close genetic (blood) ties to form a unit which one could neither join nor secede from, rather than a religious group of people. The influence of [[Jew]]s had been declared to have detrimental impact on [[Nazi Germany|Germany]], in order to justify the discrimination and persecutions of Jews. To be spared, one had to prove one's [[Aryan race|Aryan descent]], normally by obtaining an [[Aryan certificate]].

====Jews, Romani and Black people====
Although [[Nazism|Nazi]] doctrine stressed the importance of physiognomy and genes in determining race, in practice, race was only determined through the religions which were followed by each individual's ancestors. Individuals were considered non-'Aryan' (i.e. Jewish) if at least three of four of their grandparents had been enrolled as members of a Jewish congregation; it did not matter if those grandparents had been born to a Jewish mother or had converted to Judaism. The actual religious beliefs of the individual himself or herself were also immaterial, as was the individual's status under [[Halakha|halakhic]] law.
[[File:Nuremberg laws Racial Chart.jpg|thumb|1935 chart shows racial classifications under the Nuremberg Laws and the definitions of a German, a Mischlinge and a Jew.]]

An anti-miscegenation law was enacted by the [[Nazi Party|Nazi]] government in September 1935 as a part of the [[Nuremberg Laws]]. The ''Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour'' ('Gesetz zum Schutze des deutschen Blutes und der deutschen Ehre'), enacted on 15&nbsp;September 1935, forbade sexual relations and marriages between Germans classified as so-called 'Aryans' and Germans classified as Jews.<ref>{{cite book|author=Diemut Majer|title="Non-Germans" under the Third Reich|year=2003|page=102|publisher=Texas Tech University Press in association with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum|isbn=978-0-89672-837-0}}</ref> This applied also to marriages concluded in Germany with only one spouse of German citizenship. On 26&nbsp;November 1935, the law was extended to include, "Gypsies, Negroes or their bastard offspring".<ref>{{cite book | author = S. H. Milton | chapter = "Gypsies" as social outsiders in Nazi Germany| title =  Social Outsiders in Nazi Germany | editor = Robert Gellately and Nathan Stoltzfus | year = 2001 | publisher = Princeton University Press | isbn = 9780691086842 | pages = 216, 231}}</ref><ref name="Burleigh1991">{{cite book | author = Michael Burleigh | title = The Racial State: Germany 1933-1945 | url = https://archive.org/details/racialstate00mich | url-access = registration | date = 7 November 1991 | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn = 978-0-521-39802-2 | page = [https://archive.org/details/racialstate00mich/page/49 49]}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007695 |title=The Nuremberg Race Laws |access-date=1 May 2016 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140519233009/http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007695 |archive-date=19 May 2014 }}</ref> Such extramarital [[Sexual intercourse|intercourse]] was marked as ''[[Rassenschande]]'' ("race defilement") and could be punished by imprisonment&nbsp;&mdash; later usually followed by the deportation to a [[Nazi concentration camps|concentration camp]], often entailing the inmate's death. Germans of African and other non-European descent were classified following their own origin or the origin of their parents. Sinti and Roma ("Gypsies") were mostly categorised following police records, e.g. mentioning them or their forefathers as Gypsies, when having been met by the police as travelling peddlers.

The existing 20,454 (as of 1939) marriages between persons ''racially'' regarded as so-called 'Aryans' and non-Aryans&nbsp;&mdash; called ''mixed marriages'' ({{lang-de|Mischehe}})&nbsp;&mdash; would continue.<ref>Beate Meyer, ''Die Verfolgung und Ermordung der Hamburger Juden 1933–1945'', Landeszentrale für politische Bildung (ed.), Hamburg: Landeszentrale für politische Bildung, 2006, p.&nbsp;80. {{ISBN|3-929728-85-0}}</ref> However, the government eased the conditions for the divorce of mixed marriages.<ref>Before 1933 the term Mischehe referred to interfaith marriages, which was a tax office phenomenon. German tax offices deducted [[church tax]] from taxpayers, enrolled with a religious body, with the general tax collection by a surcharge on the income tax and then transferred it to the respective religious body. Interfaith mixed marriages, who were taxed as a unit, would have the charged church tax halved among the two respective religious bodies. Mostly the Roman Catholic Church, the respective Protestant [[Landeskirche|regional church bodies]] and the Jewish congregations (in their case ending by Nazi act in March 1938) collected contributions from their members by way of church tax. Since the Nazis gave the term ''Mischehe'' a new meaning the tax offices were ordered to change their terminology to ''konfessionsverschiedene Ehe'' ({{lang-en|denominationally different marriage}}). Cf. Cornelia Schmitz-Berning, ''Vokabular des Nationalsozialismus'', Berlin et al.: de Gruyter, 1998, p.&nbsp;409. {{ISBN|3-11-013379-2}}</ref> In the beginning the Nazi authorities hoped to make the 'Aryan' partner get a divorce from their non-Aryan-classified spouses, by granting easy legal divorce procedures and opportunities for the 'Aryan' spouse to withhold most of the common property after a divorce.<ref>By the "Gesetz zur Vereinheitlichung des Rechts der Eheschließung und der Ehescheidung (EheG)" ("Act on standardisation of the law of contraction and divorce of marriages", as of 6&nbsp;July 1938) divorce on so-called racial grounds was enabled. Cf. [[Reichsgesetzblatt]] (RGBl., i.e. the Reich's law gazette) 1938&nbsp;I, p.&nbsp;807, §&nbsp;37 EheG (Bedeutungsirrtum), cf. also Alexandra Przyrembel, ''"Rassenschande": Reinheitsmythos und Vernichtungslegitimation im Nationalsozialismus'', Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2003, (Veröffentlichungen des Max-Planck-Instituts für Geschichte; vol.&nbsp;190), p.&nbsp;86 ({{ISBN|3-525-35188-7}}) or&nbsp;&mdash; as to contesting or dissolving a marriage&nbsp;&mdash; see Bernhard Müller, ''Alltag im Zivilisationsbruch: Das Ausnahme-Unrecht gegen die jüdische Bevölkerung in Deutschland 1933–1945; eine rechtstatsächliche Untersuchung des Sonderrechts und seiner Folgewirkungen auf den "Alltag" der Deutschen jüdischer Abstammung und jüdischen Bekenntnisses'', Munich: Allitera-Verlag, 2003, simultaneously Bielefeld, Univ., Diss., 2002, pp.&nbsp;344–348. {{ISBN|3-935877-68-4}}</ref> Those who stuck to their spouse would suffer discriminations like dismissal from public employment, exclusion from civic society organisations, etc.<ref>Based on an evaluation of divorce decrees, however restricted to only one former [[Reichsgau]], the discriminations and easements caused a divorce rate of mixed marriages 20% above the general average. Many divorces followed after the couple succeeded in achieving a visa and thus emigration for the Jewish-classified spouse, so the divorce would lift the discriminations hitting the 'Aryan'-classified spouse, who stayed at home. Cf. Beate Meyer,'' 'Jüdische Mischlinge'&nbsp;&mdash; Rassenpolitik und Verfolgungserfahrung 1933–1945'' (<sup>1</sup>1999), Hamburg: Dölling und Galitz, (<sup>1</sup>2002), (Studien zur jüdischen Geschichte; vol.&nbsp;6), simultaneously Hamburg, Univ., Diss., 1998, {{ISBN|3-933374-22-7}}</ref>

Any children&nbsp;&mdash; whenever born&nbsp;&mdash; within a mixed marriage, as well as children from extramarital mixed relationships born until 31&nbsp;July 1936, were discriminated against as ''[[Mischling]]e''. However, children later born to mixed parents, not yet married at passing the Nuremberg Laws, were to be discriminated against as ''[[Geltungsjude]]n'', regardless if the parents had meanwhile married abroad or remained unmarried. Any children who were enrolled in a Jewish congregation were also subject to discrimination as ''Geltungsjuden''.

According to the Nazi family value attitude, the husband was regarded the head of a family. Thus people living in a [[interracial marriage|mixed marriage]] were treated differently according to the sex of the 'Aryan' spouse and according to the religious affiliation of the children, their being or not being enrolled with a Jewish congregation. Nazi-termed mixed marriages were often not [[interfaith marriage]]s, because in many cases the classification of one spouse as non-Aryan was only due to her or his grandparents being enrolled with a Jewish congregation or else classified as non-Aryan. In many cases both spouses had a common faith, either because the parents had already converted or because at marrying one spouse converted to the religion of the second ([[marital conversion]]). Traditionally the wife used to be the convert.<ref>This was maintained by the pre-1939 practice of Jewish congregations in Germany, which denied Jewesses who married Gentiles, to be precise non-converts to Judaism, to keep their membership in a congregation. This turned the Jewesses, if they did not convert to another faith, legally into irreligionists. On the other hand, Jews marrying Gentile women could (stay) enroll(ed) as member of a Jewish congregation.</ref> However, in urban areas and after 1900, actual interfaith marriages occurred more often, with interfaith marriages legally allowed in some states of the [[German Confederation]] since 1847, and generally since 1875, when [[civil marriage]] became an obligatory prerequisite for any religious marriage ceremony throughout the [[German Empire|united Germany]].

Most mixed marriages occurred with one spouse being considered as non-Aryan, due to his or her Jewish descent. Many special regulations were developed for such couples. A differentiation of privileged and other mixed marriages emerged on 28&nbsp;December 1938, when [[Hermann Göring]] discretionarily ordered this in a letter to the ''Reich's Ministry of the Interior''.<ref>Beate Meyer, "Geschichte im Film. Judenverfolgung, Mischehen und der Protest in der Rosenstraße 1943", in: ''Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaft'', vol.&nbsp;52 (2004), pp.&nbsp;23–36, footnote&nbsp;23 on p.&nbsp;28. {{ISSN|0044-2828}}. Some historians judge this intervention of Göring as a tactical measure, in order not to arouse protests by so-called 'Aryan' kinship, since after secret service reports the government organised [[November Pogrom]] in 1938 the regime did not feel so safe about the public's opinion on further anti-Semitic discriminations. Cf. Ursula Büttner, "Die Verfolgung der christlich-jüdischen 'Mischfamilien{{'"}}, in: Ursula Büttner, ''Die Not der Juden teilen. Christlich-jüdische Familien im Dritten Reich. Beispiel und Zeugnis des Schriftstellers Robert Brendel'', Hamburg: Christians, 1988, p.&nbsp;44. {{ISBN|3-7672-1055-X}}</ref> The "Gesetz über die Mietverhältnisse mit Juden" ({{lang-en|Law on Tenancies with Jews}}) of 30 April 1939, allowing proprietors to unconditionally cancel tenancy contracts with Germans classified as Jews, thus forcing them to move into houses reserved for them, for the first time enacted Göring's creation. The law defined ''privileged mixed marriages'' and exempted them from the act.<ref>Cf. Reichsgesetzblatt (RGBl., i.e. the Reich's law gazette) 1939&nbsp;I, 864 §&nbsp;7 [http://alex.onb.ac.at/cgi-content/anno-plus?apm=0&aid=dra&datum=19390007&zoom=2&seite=00000864&x=15&y=7 law text]</ref>

The legal definitions decreed that the marriage of a Gentile husband and his wife, being a Jewess or being classified as a Jewess due to her descent, was generally considered to be a ''privileged mixed marriage'', unless they had children who were enrolled in a Jewish congregation. Then the husband was obviously not the dominant part in the family and the wife had to wear the [[yellow badge]] and the children as well, who were thus discriminated against as ''Geltungsjuden''. Without children, or with children not enrolled with a Jewish congregation, the Jewish-classified wife was spared from wearing the yellow badge (else compulsory for Germans classified as Jews as of 1&nbsp;September 1941).

In the opposite case, when the wife was classified as a so-called 'Aryan' and the husband as a Jew, the husband had to wear the yellow badge, if they had no children or children enrolled with a Jewish congregation. In case they had common children not enrolled in a Jewish congregation (irreligionist, Christian etc.) they were discriminated as ''Mischlinge'' and their father was spared from wearing the yellow badge.

Since there was no elaborate regulation, the practice of exempting ''privileged mixed marriages'' from anti-Semitic invidiousnesses varied amongst [[Nazi Germany|Greater Germany]]'s different [[Reichsgau]]e. However, all discriminations enacted until 28&nbsp;December 1938, remained valid without exemptions for ''privileged mixed marriages''. In the Reichsgau Hamburg, for example, Jewish-classified spouses living in ''privileged mixed marriages'' received equal food rations like Aryan-classified Germans. In many other Reichsgaue they received shortened rations.<ref name="Beate Meyer 2006, p. 83">Beate Meyer, ''Die Verfolgung und Ermordung der Hamburger Juden 1933–1945'', Landeszentrale für politische Bildung (ed.), Hamburg: Landeszentrale für politische Bildung, 2006, p.&nbsp;83. {{ISBN|3-929728-85-0}}</ref> In some Reichsgaue in 1942 and 1943, privileged mixed couples, and their minor children whose father was classified as a Jew, were forced to move into houses reserved for Jews only; this effectively made a privileged mixed marriage one where the husband was the one classified as so-called 'Aryan'.

The inconsistent application of ''privileged mixed marriages'' led to different compulsions to forced labour in 1940: Sometimes it was ordered for all Jewish-classified spouses, sometimes for Jewish-classified husbands, sometimes exempting Jewish-classified wives taking care of minor children. No document or law indicated the exemption of a mixed marriage from some persecutions and especially of its Jewish-classified spouse.<ref>''Meldungen aus dem Reich: Auswahl aus den geheimen Lageberichten des Sicherheitsdienstes der SS 1939–1944'' (<sup>1</sup>1965; Reports from the Reich: Selection from the secret reviews of the situation of the [[SS]] 1939–1944; 1984 extended to 14&nbsp;vols.), Heinz Boberach (ed. and compilator), Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag (dtv), <sup>2</sup>1968, (dtv-dokumente; vol.&nbsp;477) p.&nbsp;208. ISBN B0000BSLXR</ref> Thus if arrested, non-arrested relatives or friends had to prove their exemption status, hopefully fast enough to rescue the arrested from any deportation.

Systematic [[Deportation#Deportation during World War II|deportations of Jewish Germans and Gentile Germans of Jewish descent]] started on 18&nbsp;October 1941.<ref>The earlier deportations of Jews and Gentiles of Jewish descent from [[Austria]] and [[Province of Pomerania (1815–1945)|Pomerania Province]] (both to [[General Government|occupied Poland]]) as well as [[Baden]] and the [[Palatinate (region)|Palatinate]] (both to [[Military Administration in Belgium and North France|occupied France]]) had been organized in those specific areas and not generally throughout the Reich.</ref> German Jews and German Gentiles of Jewish descent living in ''mixed marriage'' were in fact mostly spared from deportation.<ref>At the [[Wannsee Conference]] the participants decided to include persons classified as Jews, but married to persons classified as so-called 'Aryans', however, only after a divorce. In October 1943 an act, facilitating compulsory divorce imposed by the state, was ready for appointment, however, [[Hitler]] never granted the competent referees an audience. Pressure by the [[NSDAP]] headquarters in early 1944 also failed. Cf. Uwe Dietrich Adam, ''Judenpolitik im Dritten Reich'', Düsseldorf: 2003, pp.&nbsp;222–234. {{ISBN|3-7700-4063-5}}</ref> In case a mixed marriage ended by death of the 'Aryan' spouse or divorce, the Jewish-classified spouse residing within Germany was usually deported soon after, unless the couple still had minor children not counting as Geltungsjuden.<ref name="Beate Meyer 2006, p. 83"/>

In March 1943, an attempt to deport the Berlin-based Jews and Gentiles of Jewish descent living in non-privileged mixed marriages, failed due to public protest by their relatives-in-law of 'Aryan kinship' (see [[Rosenstrasse protest]]). Also, the Aryan-classified husbands and Mischling-classified children (starting at the age of 16) from mixed marriages were taken by the [[Organisation Todt]] for forced labour, starting in autumn 1944.

A last attempt, undertaken in February/March 1945 ended, because the [[extermination camp]]s already were liberated. However, 2,600 from all areas of the Reich, not yet captured by the Allies, were deported to [[Theresienstadt]], of whom most survived the last months until their liberation.<ref>8,000 Berliners whom the Nazis had classified as Jews because of three or four grandparents survived to the summer of 1944. Their personal faith&nbsp;&mdash; Jewish, Protestant, Catholic or irreligionist&nbsp;&mdash; is mostly not recorded, since only the Nazi files report on them, which use the Nazi racial definitions. 4,700 out of the 8,000 survived due to their living in a mixed marriage. 1,400 survived by hiding, out of 5,000 who tried. 1,900 had returned from Theresienstadt. See Hans-Rainer Sandvoß, ''Widerstand in Wedding und Gesundbrunnen'', Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand (ed.), Berlin: Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand, 2003, (''Schriftenreihe über den Widerstand in Berlin von 1933 bis 1945'', No.&nbsp;14), p.&nbsp;302. {{ISSN|0175-3592}}</ref>

With the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945 the laws banning mixed marriages were lifted again. Marriage dates could be backdated, if so desired, for couples who lived together unmarried during the Nazi era due to the legal restrictions, upon marrying after the war.<ref>''Bundesgesetz über die Anerkennung freier Ehen'' (as of 23&nbsp;June 1950, Federal law on recognition of free marriages).</ref> Even if one spouse was already dead, the marriage could be retroactively recognised, in order to legitimise any children and enable them or the surviving spouse to inherit from their late father or partner, respectively. In the [[West Germany|West German Federal Republic of Germany]] 1,823 couples applied for recognition (until 1963), which was granted in 1,255 cases.<ref>Beate Meyer, ''{{'}}Jüdische Mischlinge'&nbsp;&mdash; Rassenpolitik und Verfolgungserfahrung 1933–1945'' (<sup>1</sup>1999), Hamburg: Dölling und Galitz, (<sup>1</sup>2002), (Studien zur jüdischen Geschichte; vol.&nbsp;6), simultaneously Hamburg, Univ., Diss., 1998, p.&nbsp;469. {{ISBN|3-933374-22-7}}</ref>

===France===
{{Main|Racism in France}}
In 1723, 1724 and 1774 several administrative acts forbade interracial marriages, mainly in colonies, although it is not clear if these acts were lawful. On 2 May 1746, the [[Parlement|Parlement de Paris]] validated an interracial marriage.<ref>{{wikicite|reference=M. Allemand in "Traité du Mariage", imprimerie E. Leboyer (Riom France, 1847)|ref={{harvid|Allemand|1847}} }} p.129</ref>

Under [[King Louis XVI]], the order of the [[Conseil du Roi]] of 5 April 1778, signed by [[Antoine de Sartine]], forbade "whites of either sex to contract marriage with blacks, [[mulatto]]s or other people of color" in the Kingdom, as the number of blacks had increased so much in France, mostly in the capital.<ref>Arrest du Conseil d'état du Roi concernant les mariages des noirs, mulâtres, ou autres gens de couleur, du 5 avril 1778  (Lille: NJB Peterinck-Cramé, 1778).</ref> Nevertheless, it was an interracial marriage prohibition, not an interracial sex prohibition. Moreover, it was an administrative act, not a law. There was never any racial law about marriage in France,<ref>{fr} Pétition des hommes de couleur de la Martinique et de la Guadeloupe, Impriperie E. Duverger, Paris (feb. 1829), p. 8-9</ref> with the exception of [[Louisiana (New France)|French Louisiana]].<ref>Louisiana code, art.</ref> But some restricted rules were applied about [[Cultural heritage|heritage]] and [[nobility]]. In any case, nobles needed the King's authorization for their marriage.

On 20 September 1792, all restrictions regarding interracial marriage were repealed by the Revolutionary government.<ref>Law of September 20th, 1792</ref> On 8 January 1803, a Napoleonic governmental circular forbade marriages between white males and black women, or black men and white women,<ref>Archives nationales (henceforward A.N.) BB15–211, R4, no 3266</ref> although the 1804 [[Napoleonic code]] did not mention anything specific about interracial marriage. In 1806, a French court validated an interracial marriage.<ref>{{harvnb|Allemand|1847|p=130}}</ref> In 1818, the highest French court (''[[Court of Cassation (France)|cour de cassation]]'') validated a marriage contracted in [[New York (state)|New York]] between a white man and a colored woman.<ref>Sir Beguin and Emilie born slave in Guadeloupe&mdash;{{harvnb|Allemand|1847|p=131}}</ref> All administrative prohibitions were canceled by a law in 1833.<ref>Law of April 24th, 1833</ref>

===Italy===
{{Main|Racism in Italy}}
After the [[Fall of the Western Roman Empire|fall]] of the [[Western Roman Empire]] in the late 5th century, the [[Ostrogoths]] under the [[Theodoric the Great]] established the [[Ostrogothic Kingdom]] at [[Ravenna]], ruling [[Italy]] as a [[dominant minority]].<ref name="Theodoric">{{cite web |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Theodoric-king-of-Italy |title=Theodoric |website=[[Encyclopædia Britannica Online]] |access-date=August 23, 2018 |quote=With his people, who may have numbered 100,000 persons, Theodoric arrived in Italy in late August 489... his people could not legally intermarry with Romans... He never missed an opportunity to propagate the idea of civilitas (“civilized life” or “civilization”), a concept that includes the maintenance of peace and order, racial harmony, and the outlawing of oppression and violence. }}</ref><ref name="Italy">{{cite web |url=https://www.britannica.com/place/Italy/History#ref27619 |title=Italy: The Ostrogothic Kingdom |website=[[Encyclopædia Britannica Online]] |access-date=August 23, 2018 |quote=Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, conquered Italy and killed Odoacer in 493. The decades of the Ostrogothic kingdom in Italy (493–552) can be seen as the first true period of Germanic rule in the peninsula, for an entire tribe of 100,000 to 200,000 people came with Theodoric... Theodoric, who did not want the Ostrogoths to become Romanized, encouraged them to keep their distance from the Romans. Yet such apartheid did not last. Some Romans joined the army; many more Goths became landowners, legally or illegally, and adopted civilian Roman cultural traditions.}}</ref><ref name="Ancient Rome">{{cite web |url=https://www.britannica.com/place/ancient-Rome/The-Later-Roman-Empire#ref26709 |title=Ancient Rome: The Barbarian Kingdoms |website=[[Encyclopædia Britannica Online]] |access-date=August 23, 2018 |quote=The barbarians were everywhere a small minority. They established themselves on the great estates and divided the land to the benefit of the federates without doing much harm to the lower classes or disturbing the economy.}}</ref> In order to prevent the [[Romanization (cultural)|Romanization]] of his people, Theodoric forbade intermarriage between [[Goths]] and Romans.<ref name="Theodoric"/><ref name="Italy"/> Theodoric's effort to separate Goths and Romans was however not successful, as intermarriages and assimilation were common.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Freeman |first1=Charles |title=Egypt, Greece, and Rome: Civilizations of the Ancient Mediterranean |date=March 2014 |publisher=OUP Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-965192-4 |page=640 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UtMVAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA640 |language=en}}</ref><ref name="Italy"/> The [[Rugii]], a [[Germanic peoples|Germanic]] tribe which supported Theodoric  while preserving its independence within the Ostrogothic Kingdom, avoided intermarriage with Goths and other tribes in order to maintain administrative control.<ref name="Rugii">{{cite web |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Rugi |title=Rugi |website=[[Encyclopædia Britannica Online]] |access-date=August 23, 2018 |quote=The remaining Rugi followed Theodoric for revenge, although they maintained their independence even within the Ostrogothic state, keeping their own administrators and avoiding intermarriage with the Goths. They disappeared with the fall of the Ostrogothic state.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Modern Humanities Research Association |author-link=Modern Humanities Research Association |date=1967 |title=The Modern Language Review, Volume 4 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1uJDAQAAMAAJ |quote=The Rugians kept their race pure by refusing to intermarry with other tribes}}</ref>

As part of the [[Manifesto of Race|Charter of Race]] in [[Kingdom of Italy under Fascism (1922–1943)|Fascist Italy]], laws prohibiting marriage between Italians and non-Europeans were passed in Italy and its colonies. A subsequent [[Grand Council of Fascism|Grand Council]]'s resolution reiterated the prohibition of marriage between Italians and people belonging to Semitic, Hamitic, African and other non-European (or "non-Aryan") races; it established also a ban on marriage between public servants and foreigners.<ref>Davide Rodogno (3 August 2006). Fascism's European Empire: Italian Occupation During the Second World War. Cambridge University Press. p. 65.</ref> A list made in summer 1938 classified [[Negroid|Negroes]], Arabs and Berbers, [[Mongoloid|Mongolians]], Indians, Armenians, Turks, Yemenites, Palestinians as non-Aryans.<ref>{{cite web | title=Rassegna stampa: "Arabi e negri? Non sono ariani" Le leggi razziali del '38 e le circolari emanate dal regime fascista | website=Università degli Studi di Roma "Tor Vergata" | url=http://www.uniroma2.it/quaderni/AttSci/Manifest | language=it | access-date=8 August 2023}}</ref>

An analogous legislation was adopted in 1942 in the [[Sammarinese Fascist Party|fascist Republic of San Marino]].<ref>{{cite web |title=provvedimenti in materia matrimoniale e in difesa della razza |trans-title=Archive of Laws, Decrees and Regulations  |url=https://www.consigliograndeegenerale.sm/on-line/home/archivio-leggi-decreti-e-regolamenti/scheda17010145.html |website=Consiglio Grande e Generale|language=it |date=1942}}</ref>

===Pre-Islamic Iberia===
{{Main|Racism in Spain}}
After the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the late 5th century, the [[Visigoths]] established the [[Visigothic Kingdom]] in [[Iberia]], ruling the peninsula as a dominant minority. The Visigoths were subjected to their own [[Code of Euric|legal code]], and were forbidden from intermarrying with indigenous Iberians. This law was abolished in the end of the 6th century however, and by that time so many intermarriages had occurred that any reality of a biologically-linked Visigothic identity were "visibly crumbling", in the words of [[Gavin I. Langmuir|Gavin Langmuir]]. The Visigothic nobles and princes married Hispano-Romans and converted to Nicean Christianity, and the connection between Visigoths, their religion and royal authority became obscure.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Langmuir |first1=Gavin I. |title=Toward a Definition of Antisemitism |date=1 February 1996 |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=978-0-520-90851-2 |page=80 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3md6PVqRKTEC&pg=PA80 |language=en}}</ref><ref name="Spain">{{cite web |url=https://www.britannica.com/place/Spain/Iberians |title=Spain: Visigothic Spain to c. 500 |website=[[Encyclopædia Britannica Online]] |access-date=August 23, 2018 |quote=Despite the collapse of imperial rule in Spain, Roman influence remained strong. The majority of the population, probably about six million, were Hispano-Romans, as compared with 200,000 barbarians... A Roman law that prohibited intermarriage between the two peoples was, however, abolished in the late 6th century. Still, the task of bringing the two peoples together and of achieving some sort of political and cultural unity was a formidable one.}}</ref>

==See also==
{{Div col|colwidth=30em}}
*[[Amalgamation (history)]]
*[[Endogamy]]
*[[History of Bob Jones University]]
*[[Historical race concepts]]
*[[Hypodescent]]
*[[Judicial aspects of race in the United States]]
*[[Loving Day]]
*[[Mixed Race Day]]
*[[One drop rule]]
*[[Race of the future]]
*[[Racial hygiene]]
*[[Scientific racism]]
*[[Social interpretations of race]]
{{colend}}

==References==
{{Reflist|30em}}

===Bibliography===
* {{cite book |last1=Crowe |first1=David M. |author1-link=David M. Crowe |title=A History of the Gypsies of Eastern Europe and Russia |date=1995 |publisher=[[Palgrave Macmillan]] |isbn=978-0312086916 |edition=1995}}

==Further reading==
* {{cite web|url=https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/parenting/mothers-day/the-canadian-marriage-at-150-a-look-back/article33962570/|title=The Canadian marriage at 150: A look back|date=November 12, 2017|publisher=theglobeandmail.com|access-date=December 8, 2017}}
* {{cite web|url=https://www.cpsa-acsp.ca/papers-2008/Thompson.pdf|last=Thompson|first=Debra|title=Nation and Miscegenation: Comparing Anti-Miscegenation Regulations in North America|publisher=Canadian Political Science Association|year=2008}}

{{Segregation by type|state=collapsed}}
{{Racism topics}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Anti-Miscegenation Laws}}
[[Category:Racism]]
[[Category:Interracial marriage]]
[[Category:Politics and race]]
[[Category:Marriage reform]]
[[Category:Racial segregation]]