If the Supreme Court’s draft opinion eliminating abortion rights that was leaked recently becomes official, interracial marriage is in the bull’s-eye of the current composition of that tribunal.
Abortion should no longer be Constitutionally-safeguarded, according to the leaked draft, because it is not “deeply rooted in history” or expressly mentioned in the Constitution.
The same is true of interracial marriage. It can hardly be considered historically anchored because it was outlawed for years in many states and practiced by very few individuals until it was legitimized by the High Court’s ruling in Loving v. Virginia in 1966.
Nor is it explicitly referenced in the Constitution; indeed, “marriage” is not mentioned there at all.
These two criteria, or their absences, make interracial marriage among the many accepted features of American life that are now on the endangered species list.
Marshall H. Tanick
Minneapolis
