Mental Health Institutions, Playgrounds, And Dozens More: Va. Governor Vows To Eliminate Racist Laws Still On Books
A task force assembled by Gov. Ralph Northam several months after a racist photo of him was found in his medical school yearbook recommended removing nearly 100 overtly discriminatory and racist laws still on the books.
The Associated Press:
Panel Calls For Virginia To Purge Dozens Of Old Racist Laws
The laws are still on the books in Virginia: Blacks and whites must sit in separate rail cars. They cannot use the same playgrounds, schools or mental hospitals. They can’t marry each other either. The measures have not been enforced for decades, but they remain in the state’s official legal record. A state commission on Thursday recommended that dozens of such discriminatory statutes finally be repealed, in some cases more than a century after they were adopted. (12/5)
The New York Times:
Gov. Northam Plans To Purge Racist Language From Virginia Law
Many of the laws, some of which are no longer enforced or have been invalidated, stem from the state’s segregationist past, including Jim Crow laws and the Virginia’s Massive Resistance policy, a coordinated effort to thwart federally mandated laws to integrate schools, transportation and neighborhoods. Other laws prohibited interracial marriage and imposed a poll tax designed to prevent black Virginians from voting. “Repeal of these outdated, unjust, and in many cases plainly racist Acts of Assembly is an important step in recognizing and correcting the sins of the past,” Cynthia Hudson, Virginia’s chief deputy attorney general and chair of the governor’s commission, said in a statement. (Rueb, 12/6)
The Washington Post:
Virginia Commission Cites Almost 100 Racist Laws Still On The Books
The report groups the laws by topic, illustrating how racism reached into so many areas of daily life — voting, education, health, transportation, housing and criminal justice. “We know that in Virginia, our history is difficult and extremely complex,” Northam said. “And we know that discrimination, racism and black oppression marched on, even after slavery ended. In the form of Jim Crow laws, massive resistance [to school integration] and now among other things, mass incarceration.” (Vozzella, 12/5)
