Anti-Miscegenation Laws in 38 States Criminalize Black-White Relationships

By 1900, 38 states had laws criminalizing marriage or sexual relations between Black and white people. In Southern states, such relationships were treated as criminal even when consensual; Black men accused of sexual relations with white women faced lynch mobs without trial. The laws were not struck down by the Supreme Court until Loving v. Virginia in 1967. The enforcement of these laws was entirely one-directional: white men who raped Black women faced no prosecution, while Black men faced death for consensual relationships with white women.