Racial Integrity Laws: Impact on Whiteness and Privilege

According to the Commonwealth of Virginia Statutes, the Racial Integrity Laws (1924-1930), and the revision made, whiteness was legally defined as having “who has no trace whatsoever of any blood other than Caucasian”. This definition is aimed to establishing a complex boundary around the concept of whiteness, highlighting the purity of Caucasian ancestry. People without any non-Caucasian ancestry was to be excluded from becoming classified white under the Racial Integrity Laws. However, exceptions were made for individuals with very little amounts of non-white ancestry, for example the “Pocahontas Exception”, which allowed people with less than one-sixty fourth part Indian and no African American Heritage to still be considered white. It is these exceptions that catered to the elite and wealthy individuals that had an ability to trace their ancestry to key past figures such as Pocahontas and John Rolfe. The general legal definition of whiteness during this time was constructed on the absence of non-Caucasian ancestry and was enforced through strict racial classifications and regulations. The definition of whiteness that was outlined in the Racial Integrity Act and its revisions has many faults. The first fault is that it relies on pseudoscience and the notions of racial purity and disregarding human ancestry. The second is it doesn’t include the individuals with any trace of non-Caucasian ancestry from being identified as white and allows for vague and discriminatory barriers. Third, the definition mirrors the white supremacist ideologies of the time, maintaining racial segregation, and privilege. Lastly, the Racial Integrity Act fails to account for the diverseness

of an individual’s ancestry and the background identities of individuals who are mixed race. Its this strict enforcement through laws and regulations that marginalizes the individuals who do not fit within societal barriers. The definition that is used in the Racial Integrity Act established and supports the systems of oppression and racial hierarchies. And it becomes more and more important to understand how race is constructed and its intersection with power and privilege. The first problem that whiteness and white privilege present to minorities in the US is systemic discrimination in the criminal justice system. Research consistently shows that the people of color, particularly African American and Latino individuals, are excessively targeted, arrested and detained when directly compared to white individuals for comparable offensives. The racial bias preserves the cycle of inequality, as minorities can more frequently face harsh sentencing, increased probability of wrongful convicts and limited access to legal representation. This systemic discrimination contributes to the unequal representation of minorities in jails and prisons as well as maintaining the racial disparities in incarceration rates. The second problem is the economic inequality that becomes aggravated by white privilege, which obstructs the opportunities for minorities to become wealthy or to even achieve financial stability. Throughout history racial injustices such as slavery, segregation, and

discriminatory housing policies have created long lasting economic disparities between the white American and minority communities. White privilege can be displayed in many different ways, including the discriminatory treatment in hiring, promotion, and access to loans and housing. This keeps the cycles of poverty and non-improvement to an individual’s improvement in socioeconomic status in motion. They face barriers when accessing education, employment, and wealth building opportunities. The economic inequalities additionally increases in health, education, and the overall wellbeing, which keeps hindering the efforts for improving systemic injustices and achieving racial equality. Wolfe, B. (2021, February 25). Racial Integrity Laws (1924–1930) – Encyclopedia Virginia . Encyclopedia Virginia. https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/racial-integrity-laws-1924- 1930/

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Baldwin, B. (2010). The Modern American [Review of The Modern American ]. Digital Commons. https://digitalcommons.wcl.american.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi? article=1002&context=tma

SOC268.M3.Essay 2

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