In the wake of the claims of Tiger Woods and the actions of Michael Jackson and others, a question has been raised in black internet chat rooms around the country as to whether there is a legal or biological definition of who is black
Actually, there is no law operable today which defines what percentage of "black blood" makes one black. The oft-repeated notion that one drop of black blood makes one black is a cultural definition which has neither a legal nor biological foundation.
The history of the notion can be traced to slavery and the period right after slavery called Reconstruction. Originally, in a bid to stop slaves who had been fathered by white slave owners and overseers from claiming freedom, property rights or possible inheritance, several Southern sates passed laws that in effect defined a black person as anyone with any "discernible" amount of "colored" or "African" blood.
But after slavery ended in 1865, these laws began to either die a natural death or were actually repealed during Reconstruction. The controversy which brought the race definition issue back up again was the infamous 1896 U.S. Supreme Court "separate but equal" decision in Plessy v. Ferguson.
Our high school history classes and Black History Month presentations have given us a distorted idea of who Plessy was and what he was about. We have generally been led to believe that Plessy was a black man arguing that blacks should be allowed the same accommodations as whites. This is not true. Plessy was actually a light skinned black man arguing that "he" should be given the same accommodations as whites because he had "7/8 caucasion and only 1/8 African" blood. Thus, he argued that he should not be treated as "black" under an 1890 Louisiana law requiring blacks and whites be seated in separate railway cars.
It was the Supreme Court which largely ignored Plessy's "I am not a negro" argument and told him if he did not think he was black he would have to go back to Louisiana and argue that issue on the state level. The Court then went forward and assumed Plessy to be black and rendered its decision saying a state was within its rights to mandate separate accommodations for blacks in order to keep the races apart.
Thus, the net result of the Plessy v. Ferguson decision was two-fold: It legalized the racist "separate but equal" doctrine AND it left an attitude or mood within the nation that the highest court in the land considered all "blacks" - no matter how light in complexion or how absent of African features - to be black. This cultural attitude stuck. Although technically the Supreme Court never ruled on Plessy's contention that he should be treated as a white man because he had been accepted as white in the Louisiana community in which he lived and because his "African blood was not discernible."
However, it was discernible enough that the train conductor who required Plessy to sit in the "colored section" of the train felt he was black. And this in part helped to foster the notion that the government considered you black if you had just one drop of "black blood." But, down to this very day, there is no law defining what makes one black, or white for that matter. It is basically a socio-cultural attitude based in major measure on how a person looks.
Simply put, in America, if you "look" in anyway black, you "are" black. That is not law. That is not science. It just is, a practical reality. Thus Tiger Woods' mother may be from Thailand and Tiger may object to being called black. But it does not make a practical difference.
Further, it may be too late in history as well as potentially dangerous to be tampering with the socio-cultural definition of blackness even though the definition is a product of slavery. When the Census Bureau decided a few years ago to include a category called "mixed race" in the census, many people rightfully saw it as potentially divisive, asking what practical good does the "mixed race" category serve but to further divide people along largely artificial lines?
Finally, if one just has to ask the question, the real question should not be "who is black" but instead "who is white." For if the theories of evolution and "out of Africa" are correct, there is only one "race" on the planet Earth and it had its origin in East Africa (around present-day Ethiopia) and then spread to all other parts of the world. Adapting to environmental conditions such as the degree of sunlight and developing in relative isolation, some groups evolved lighter skins and others evolved darker skins. Thus technically every person on the planet - from the darkest skinned person in the Congo to the lightest skinned person in Sweden - is of African ancestry.
In other words, like Plessy, we all have a degree of "African blood" whether "discernible" or not.
Joined: 05 Apr 2006 {Posts: 274 } Location: Chatsworth, CA
Posted: Thu 09 Nov 2006 03:54 Post subject:
Quote:
Further, it may be too late in history as well as potentially dangerous to be tampering with the socio-cultural definition of blackness even though the definition is a product of slavery. When the Census Bureau decided a few years ago to include a category called "mixed race" in the census, many people rightfully saw it as potentially divisive, asking what practical good does the "mixed race" category serve but to further divide people along largely artificial lines?
I completely disagree with this part of his argument. It's never "too late in history" for any change to occur. In fact changes will occur, and are occuring. No one knows what the future holds. In fact, those in the past who attempted to predict the future were usually wrong.
Why would a person with a parent from one culture and one parent from a different culture - say, Thai and black identified mixed black/native/white Alabama southerner, not identify as mixed? Would the author have us believe that Tiger's Thai mother had little influence on him? Do the Steele brothers, Shelby and Claude, want us to believe that their Russian Jewish mother had no influence on their impressive academic achievements?
What's dangerous about simply telling the truth? Well, as well travelled, well read man in his thirties, I know perfectly well that telling the truth is one of the most dangerous things you can do.
Still, I don't believe anybody is helped by this kind of lying. Certainly not black Americans.
Posted: Thu 09 Nov 2006 04:31 Post subject: Re: What makes a person black?
Ordinarily I would not nitpick political debate but, since this is posted in a history forum of the "Technical and Scholarly" section, I must point out three errors of fact
Robert N. Taylor wrote:
The history of the notion can be traced to slavery and the period right after slavery called Reconstruction. Originally, in a bid to stop slaves who had been fathered by white slave owners and overseers from claiming freedom, property rights or possible inheritance, several Southern states passed laws that in effect defined a black person as anyone with any "discernible" amount of "colored" or "African" blood. But after slavery ended in 1865, these laws began to either die a natural death or were actually repealed during Reconstruction.
There was no such law in any of the slave states. Most had statutory definitions based on a specific blood fraction: either 1/8, 1/4, or 1/2. One state (SC) had a class-based definition (You were legally and socially White if you were rich and owned slaves). Far from being repealed or "dying a natural death" (whatever that means) after Reconstruction, the first one-drop statute was not passed until 1910. Most were passed in the 1910s and 1920s.
Robert N. Taylor wrote:
It was the Supreme Court which largely ignored Plessy's "I am not a negro" argument and told him if he did not think he was black he would have to go back to Louisiana and argue that issue on the state level. ... However, [Plessy's Blackness] was discernible enough that the train conductor who required Plessy to sit in the "colored section" of the train felt he was black.
Plessy was biologically European (12 percent African is trivial and less than many other White Anglo-Americans). The Supreme Court wanted to rule on his "race," but he refused to argue this point. He insisted that he was "spiritually" Black. He claimed to be Black in order to highlight the idiocy of it all. His goal was not to personally be allowed in the White cars. His goal was to kill segregation for everyone. The conductor initially refused to believe that he was serious in demanding to be ejected from the White car due to his invisible Blackness. The conductor complied only when Plessy threatened to report him for not ejecting a Black man.
Robert N. Taylor wrote:
down to this very day, there is no law defining what makes one black, or white for that matter.
EEOC regulations are specific as to what makes a person be of the Black, White, or Hispanic "races." They are hard to enforce because they are internally inconsistent and hoplessly ambiguous. But they exist -- they are on the books and currently in effect.
Frank, regarding the one drop statutes. I think I saw one from 1886 in one of the southern states. But im not totally sure about that.
If you can find such a statute anywhere before 1910, present it and you will become very well-known among historians of the color line. As far as anyone has been able to find (and many scholars have searched), the first ODR statute anywhere was 1910 Tennessee.
Courts had ruled for the ODR before 1910. See the footnoted tables in the essay The Invention of the One-Drop Rule for details. But those rulings were based on alleged court precedents, not on any written laws. The first pro-ODR court ruling that was upheld on appeal in any former slave state was Scott v. Raubb 1892 Virginia (88 Va. 721). This historically important watershed case is explained in detail in the essay The One-Drop Rule in The Postbellum North and Upper South. Again thouigh, this was caselaw. Legislated statutes did not appear until 1910, as far as anyone has been able to find.
Ah okay Frank, that was the problem. I mistook case-law for statutory law.
But I would like to know, whats the difference really? case law follows custom, and statutory law follows the law-code, but doesnt it amount to the same thing more or less?
But I would like to know, whats the difference really? case law follows custom, and statutory law follows the law-code, but doesnt it amount to the same thing more or less?
From the point of view of someone being charged with a crime or being sued, there is little difference. If a new precedent has been established by a court, you might have a shot at having it overturned on appeal, since supreme courts tend to be conservative. It is harder to get a ruling based on written statute overturned.
But from the historian's viewpoint, it is interesting that lawyers began arguing ODR about 15 years before judges ruled in its favor. And judges were ruling in favor of the ODR (and having their rulings overturned on appeal) for about 15 years before appeals (supreme) courts began accepting the ODR. And appeals courts were upholding the ODR for about 15 years before state legislatures wrote it into law. And so, as generations passed, successful opposition to the ODR slowly shifted from being a no-brainer to being virtually impossible.
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