The Collaboration of Exclusionary Laws: Anti-Miscegenation Law in the Central Valley of California, 1870–1967

This poster presentation will be focused on how anti-miscegenation laws and other race-based laws supported and interacted with each other to uphold white supremacy. I use the case study of the Central Valley of California to show how this happened between about 1850-1967. I focus on the state of California, but I also show how California was both influenced by and influenced other states throughout the United States. I use the Central Valley of California as a case study to show how in what is now known as a diverse, inclusive, progressive state some of the most restrictive race-based laws in the country existed.

The other race-based laws I look at and compare to anti-miscegenation laws include those that deal broadly with citizenship and immigration. Laws in California were focused on race and controlling the purity of race overall. However, there was never a law that barred people of color from marrying each other in California which clearly shows that laws about interracial marriage was not about protecting all racial purity. When it came to protecting whiteness whether that was saving white men from their own vices or following the typical narrative of the rest of the United States by protecting white women the state was going to do anything it could to succeed in this way. I will show this through visuals of this distaste and hate towards marriage in public ways such as newspapers or personal narratives.

Immigration and citizenship laws were often used as an aid to anti-miscegenation laws not only to stop interracial relationships but ultimately to push or keep entire groups of people out of the United States. The process of repatriation of Mexicans in the United States can be linked to the strong idea of exclusion of certain groups that had been taking place for decades before this official program. I will show how these laws interact with laws about interracial marriage by mapping the events over time and showing ways they are alike in word choice and timing.

California’s anti-miscegenation law was declared unconstitutional in 1948 after the court case, Perez v. Sharp was decided by the California Supreme Court. Before this case was decided in 1948, couples across the United States had been fighting individually for the right to marry; however, now there was a precedent on record that stated the unconstitutionality of anti-miscegenation laws. The poster will show that this court case was not the end of the timeline even if it may seem like it is for California. I will show, through visuals and further mapping of events that continued after 1948, that people were still focused on upholding white supremacy even if couples had won a battle in state court. I will also show through the court case how visuals of couples and this history are difficult to find because the desire to stay private and safe.