No, Alabama only removed their law against interracial marriage in 2001. As was mentioned earlier, interracial marriage in Alabama was legalized by Loving. And the result isn’t 40% opposed to interracial marriage; it’s 40% opposed to repealing the law against it, which isn’t necessarily the same thing.
Therefore, the phrase “officially legalized”. You’re just nitpicking.
My family, for one.
Hey, Bricker, you should know by now it’s against board rules to post under someone else’s name.
(Seriously, I would LOVE to hear an explanation of how someone could be ‘not opposed to interracial marriage, but opposed to repealing the law against it’. :dubious: )
Well that certainly is amazing nonsense.
Never said it was.
Bwahahahahahaha!
No, it’s true. We eat cheese constantly. Why, just for lunch today I had a cheese sandwich consisting of two slices of Swiss between two more slices of sharp Cheddar, with sliced Stilton on the side, chased by a Gruyere smoothie. Delightful.
(OK, no, seriously, what? Is this because of those people in Wisconsin with the stupid hats? Actually, don’t bother answering that; I’m just going to assume it’s about the hat thing.)
Yeah, really. BUT – what is being expressed here by many people is more along the lines of *“Yes, sure, we know that constitutionally we cannot forbid interracial marriage. But can’t we at least keep a law in our books to make the point we don’t like it, so my child does not catch the Jungle Fever?” *
That is, using the statutes, even if unenforceable, as declarations of principle and social sanction. I saw the same argument going on around here after Lawrence: “We should keep the sodomy statute in the books anyway to show that we don’t approve of it, or else our kids will feel it’s OK to be queer; I don’t care if it’s allowed, it’s still wrong!”, and this thinking was used just last week to stop an amendment to our Domestic Violence law that would clarify that it also covers abusing your lover/mistress - “That would mean we’re officially condoning adultery and now hussies will come after our husbands without fear of being treated like they deserve”. It’s also how come some seven states still have statutes on the books saying that office holders must believe in God or a Supreme Being or have any sort of a religious belief, even though it’s unenforceable.
A dumb use of the legislative power, but there you have it.
Actually the age breakdown in this particular poll suggests that it’s the youngest and the oldest who are most opposed to interracial marriage. The official poll results are in this pdf, and this particular question is broken down by age on the very last page. 54% of 18-29 year olds responded that interracial marriage should be illegal. For other age groups, it’s 38% of 30-49, 39% of 46-65, and 56% of 65+.
Of course, the 18-29 YO group is only 12% of respondents (sampled from Republican primary voters). I can’t find an easy cite for the proportion of 18-29 YO in the entire state, but it’s probably much higher than 12%. It’s likely that only the socially conservative extreme of young people are voting in the Republican primary, so the 54% opposition doesn’t extend to the age group as a whole.
(If anyone is interested in political muckracking, this particular question is also broken down by candidate preference, so you can dig up which politician is attracting the most racists…)
FWIW, I just added up the relevant groups from this chart of 2000 census data, and it looks like 18-29 year olds make up about 17.5% of the state population. And the poll’s sample probably includes a disproportionate amount of older people. Both of those facts imply that we can’t dismiss the younger respondents as easily as we’d like…
The younger respondents are probably extremely conservative (considering it usually takes an extreme to get people motivated to vote in a primary) AND younger people are often more extreme in general, to one side or another, whereas people a little older tend (not always!) to see things as more wishy-washy and grey.
Still, I’ll be honest, I’m surprised by this poll. I guess the reactions of my friends and family and acquaintances to my upcoming interracial marriage have lulled me into a false sense of societal acceptance.
Well, hypothetically, one could feel that since the statute has no effect, repealing it will have no effect, and is therefore a waste of time, and be opposed to it for that reason.
Indubitably true. I don’t even have indoor plumbing. :rolleyes:
Again, amazing nonsense. There is no waste of time taking part in a vote that is already taking place.
As Muffin says, that could be the logic behind not pushing for repeal in the first place, but once it’s a matter of saying yes or no when other people have already done the heavy lifting, how in the world is it more of a waste of time to repeal it than not repeal it?
Just damned cussedness? I mean, in a case like that, I’d probably vote no, and I don’t have a problem with interracial marriage. I do have a problem with symbolic, feel good stuff, like repealing laws that don’t have an effect.
But repealing the law does have an effect: it asserts that the state is restraining itself from injustice not because it is being forced to by outside forces, but because its people have recognized evil for what it is.
It’s bullshit to say that it doesn’t have an effect. Not having a profound legal effect is not the same as not having any effect.
Why do you think people deliberately pass laws they know are unconstitutional? It’s sending a message.
I imagine it’s a response to the posts critical of the south as one homogenous mass.