It is also my understandiing that Virginia did not have a miscegenation law until 1691 so the Rolfe-Pocahontas marriage was not a legal problem. Could anyone confirm that?
Edward Truslow
Williamsburg, Vrginia
>From: David Kiracofe <[log in to unmask]>
>Date: 2008/05/07 Wed PM 07:48:25 CDT
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: [VA-HIST] Mildred Jeter Loving (1940-2008), & an apology (was Re: What would Jeffer...
>John Rolfe was the Englishman who married Pocahontas--not John Smith -- although I fear there will be someone who will insist that DNA must somehow be brought to bear on the discussion to demonstrate that it is preposterous that Smith could have had a sexual relationship with Pocahontas! (Sorry, that's a joke-- brought on the punchiness of too many hours grading).
>
>Dave Kiracofe
>
>David Kiracofe
>History
>Tidewater Community College
>Chesapeake Campus
>1428 Cedar Road
>Chesapeake, Virginia 23322
>757-822-5136
>>>> Paul Finkelman <[log in to unmask]> 05/07/08 6:40 PM >>>
>Smith and Pocahontas were an early mixed race couple. In the 1920s VA
>passed its law declaring that any person with ANY non-white ancestry was
>not white! A few years later the legislature passed an amendment to say
>that people with less than 1/16th Indian ancestry were also "white." It
>was known as the Pocahontas law because many FFV's claimed to be
>descendants of Smith and his Indian bride. Before the Civil War people
>who were less than 1/4th non-white were considered white. The
>definition of "white" or "black" has alway been socially and legally
>constructed.
>
>Paul Finkelman
>President William McKinley Distinguished Professor of Law
> and Public Policy
>Albany Law School
>80 New Scotland Avenue
>Albany, New York 12208-3494
>
>518-445-3386
>[log in to unmask]
>>>> [log in to unmask] 05/07/08 5:53 PM >>>
>Weren't John Smith and Pocahontas a mixed race marriage in Virginia
>
>
>
>
>
> We quote the late Ned Heite, who wrote about white-Indian couplings 30
>Jan 2000:
>
>
>
>What happened to
> the Delmarva Indians? Dr. Helen C. Rountree, in her several
>excellent
> publications, has given us a picture of those Eastern Shore
>Indian descendants
> who have been identified. Many of our neighbors are clearly
>identified
> as Indians, and their ancestry is not in doubt.
>
>
>
>
>
>However, I am coming
> to the conclusion that most of the Indian descendants in the
>Middle Atlantic
> region today are identified as "white," and not "mulatto"
> or "black."
>
>
>
>
>
>There is plenty
> of unwritten evidence that intermarriage between Indians and
>whites was
> the rule, rather than the exception, in the early years of
>European colonization.
> In the latest issue of the Archaeological Society of Virginia
>bulletin
> is Martha McCartney's insightful analysis of the census records
>for the
> Virginia colony compiled in 1619-1620. Most settlers were male;
>in some plantations, all were male. There simply were no "available"
> English women.
>
>
>
>
>
>Therefore, we must
> assume that these fellows were either gay, celibate, or mated
>with Indian
> women. Take your choice, but remember that they were largely
>young and
> robust single Englishmen, away from home and not terribly well
>regulated.
> So only the third choice stands the test of reasonableness.
>
>
>
>
>
>Flash forward nearly
> a century, and? ---the Virginia legislature passes a law stating
>that the
> child of a white and an Indian is a mulatto, but the child of a
>white
> and a half Indian (that is, with one Indian grandparent) is
>white.--- ? This
> rule seems to have held in Delaware and Maryland, too.
>
>
>
>
>
>Why do legislatures
> pass laws? Because some constituent believes there is an issue
>to be addressed.
> We don't talk about gun laws unless there is gun violence.
>Clearly there
> is a reason to enfranchise as "white" anyone with only one
>Indian
> grandparent. My suggestion: The legislators, or their
>constituents, needed
> to define a difference between "mulatto" and "white"
> for purposes of the civil law.
>
>
>
>
>
>The logical inference
> from the Virginia legislature's definition is that there must
>have been
> plenty of white planters with Indian ancestry who wanted their
>franchise
> protected during a period when racial divides were becoming
>sharper and
> sharper.
>
>
>
>
>
>Indian wives would
> help explain why so many genealogies are easily traced through
>the male
> line, but hit dead ends at the female side. If the mother was an
>Indian,
> and if the marriage was sanctioned only in the most irregular
>way, a child's
> legal record (in cases of probate for example) would refer only
>to his
> or her father's side, the mother's family being outside the
>English legal
> system.
>
>
>
> B&R Terry
>
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: [log in to unmask]
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Sent: Wed, 7 May 2008 3:47 am
>Subject: Re: [VA-HIST] Mildred Jeter Loving (1940-2008), & an apology
>(was Re: What would Jeffer...
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>Weren't John Smith and Pocahontas a mixed race marriage in Virginia some
>
>time before the Loving's decided to make a Federal case out of the whole
> thing.
>
>J South
>
>
>
>
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