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The Sociopolitical Rhetoric Surrounding Anti-Miscegenation

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The Sociopolitical Rhetoric Surrounding Anti-Miscegenation The College of Wooster Libraries Open Works Senior Independent Study Theses 2016 In Black and White: The oS ciopolitical Rhetoric Surrounding Anti-Miscegenation Attitudes in Ohio Sarah McCrea The College of Wooster, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://openworks.wooster.edu/independentstudy Part of the United States History Commons Recommended Citation McCrea, Sarah, "In Black and White: The ocS iopolitical Rhetoric Surrounding Anti-Miscegenation Attitudes in Ohio" (2016). Senior Independent Study Theses. Paper 7072. https://openworks.wooster.edu/independentstudy/7072 This Senior Independent Study Thesis Exemplar is brought to you by Open Works, a service of The oC llege of Wooster Libraries. It has been accepted for inclusion in Senior Independent Study Theses by an authorized administrator of Open Works. For more information, please contact [email protected]. © Copyright 2016 Sarah McCrea The College of Wooster In Black and White: The Sociopolitical Rhetoric Surrounding Anti-Miscegenation Attitudes in Ohio (1861-1887) by Sarah McCrea Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements of Senior Independent Study Supervised by Katherine Holt Department of History Spring 2016 Abstract In this study, I argue that the appearance of anti-miscegenation writings in Ohio spiked during periods that saw massive threats to the notion of white male supremacy, such as the months just prior to the onset of the Civil War, several especially tense points during the Civil War and the Reconstruction period, and the early to middle years of the 1880s. During these times, Ohioans used at least one of three major rhetorical strategies—each of which coincided with a major trend in national events and politics— to justify and explain their anti-miscegenation attitudes. When the Ohio State Legislature first debated the 1861 anti-miscegenation bill, they placed their focus on the issue’s political nature and how passing such a measure would affect Ohio’s appearances in an extremely tense national context. During the Civil War and Reconstruction, white Ohioans called upon scientific notions of race and natural racial states to warn against the degradation that their state’s society would face if blacks were granted political and social equality. Finally, during the 1880s, white male Ohioans publicly castigated white women who engaged in interracial relationships with black men for the purpose of illustrating how their behavior challenged the era’s ideals of white femininity and masculinity. Table of Contents Acknowledgements .............................................................................................................. i Table of Figures .................................................................................................................. ii Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1: Establishing White Ohio ................................................................................. 17 Chapter 2: Maintaining White Ohio ................................................................................. 42 Chapter 3: Threatening White Ohio .................................................................................. 74 Chapter 4: Gendering White Ohio .................................................................................... 98 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 112 Annotated Bibliography .................................................................................................. 116 Acknowledgements I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of those whose support made this project possible—Dr. Katie Holt for her advising on this research, Lynette Mattson for her help with fleshing out my ideas and wording them clearly, my family for their love, Hunter Ramsay-Smith for the long nights and gallons of coffee, the sisters of Kappa Epsilon Zeta for reminding me that it is okay to relax occasionally—even in the face of mountains of work, Taylor Williams for chauffeuring me to research libraries when my car was beyond repair and for encouraging me to remember and believe in my own self- worth, and my work supervisors, Patti McVay-Gorrell and Michael Buttrey, for their support and guidance during this process. I would also like to acknowledge the Copeland Fund for Senior Independent Study for allowing me to conduct much of the research necessary for the completion of this paper, as well as the staff of the Archives at the Ohio History Connection for preserving the artifacts of Ohio’s history so that this type of research can be done. i Table of Figures Figure 1 US anti-miscegenation laws and years of repeal ................................................. 1 Figure 2 Ohio's black population in 1800 ........................................................................ 22 Figure 3 Increase in Ohio's black population from 1800 to 1830 .................................... 33 Figure 4 Ohio's black population in 1850 ........................................................................ 38 Figure 5 Republican votes for and against Ohio's 1861 anti-miscegenation law ............ 59 Figure 6 Counties that voted against black suffrage in 1867 ........................................... 93 ii Introduction Interracial marriage was illegal in at least some part of the United States for over three centuries, from the colony of Virginia’s first anti-miscegenation law in 1662, to the Supreme Court ruled all American anti-miscegenation laws unconstitutional in the Loving v. Virginia case of 1967.1 In between, laws prohibiting interracial marriage and sex came in waves throughout the nation. While this type of legislation is typically associated with the Reconstruction South, it is important to recognize that anti-miscegenation laws were established in almost every state at one time or another. The map in Figure 1 indicates the states where anti-miscegenation laws existed and the years in which they were repealed.2 As the map demonstrates, Ohio was also a state whose legislature felt it necessary to pass a law making interracial marriage and sex illegal—it did so in 1861. In order to conduct a Figure 1 Map depicting the states that passed anti-miscegenation laws historical examination of Anti-miscegenation law repealed 1887 or before Ohio’s anti-miscegenation law, Anti-miscegenation law repealed 1948-1967 or any anti-miscegenation law, Anti-miscegenation law repealed as a result of Loving v. Virginia (1967) for that matter, it is necessary No anti-miscegenation law 1 A. Leon Higginbotham Jr., In the Matter of Color: Race and the American Legal Process, The Colonial Period (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978), 43; “Legal Map,” LovingDay, 2012, http://www.lovingday.org/legal-map. 2 Roberta Jestes, “Anti-Miscegenation Laws Overturned in the US in 1967,” Native Heritage Project, May 31, 2012. 1 to understand the origins of the word. “Miscegenation” comes from the Latin miscere, meaning “to mix,” and genus, meaning “race, stock, or species.”3 The term first appeared in 1863 in a pamphlet entitled Miscegenation: The Theory of the Blending of the Races, written by David Goodman Croly and George Wakeman—two men who worked for a Democratic newspaper—as a response to the upcoming 1864 presidential election.4 Prior to this time, interracial relationships were called “amalgamation”—a term that is typically used to refer to the mixing of metals—which indicates white Americans’ desire to take a scientific approach to discussing race. This pamphlet was a satirical work that appeared to celebrate interracial marital and sexual relationships—especially those between white and black people. However, in his book Miscegenation, Melaleukation, and Mr. Lincoln’s Dog, historian J.M. Bloch argues that the authors’ intent for the pamphlet was to “raise the race issue in aggravated form in the 1864 presidential campaign, by attributing the view of Miscegenation [the pamphlet] to the abolitionist Republicans and the party in general.”5 Bloch also argues that viewing the pamphlet through this lens aids the reader in understanding “the parody of scientific opinion in support of [the] conclusion [that interracial sex and marriage would be a benefit to the white race, rather than a detriment.]”6 As we will see in Chapter 3 of this study, scientists who studied racial difference during the mid to late nineteenth century believed that mixed-race people were “degenerate[s], unnatural offspring doomed 3 “Miscegenation, N.,” OED Online (Oxford University Press, December 2015), http://0- www.oed.com.dewey2.library.denison.edu/view/Entry/119267?redirectedFrom=Miscegenation (accessed February 04, 2016). 4 David Goodman Croly and George Wakeman, Miscegenation: The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro (New York: H. Dexter, Hamilton & Co., 1864); J.M. Bloch, Miscegenation, Melaleukation, and Mr. Lincoln’s Dog (New York: Schaum Publishing, 1958), 36–37. 5 Bloch, Miscegenation, Melaleukation, and Mr. Lincoln’s Dog, 37. 6 Ibid. 2 by nature to work out [their] own destruction.”7 This context confirms the satirical nature of the pamphlet and, therefore, points to the authors’ political motives in writing it. Establishing a definition of the term “miscegenation” is also essential to a study of laws prohibiting interracial marriage and sex in the United States. The Oxford English
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