How the One-Drop Rule caused confusion and discrimination for black people in America

Imagine living in a world where a small trace of a different ancestry could have a lasting impact on your life and that of your generation. This practice formed the foundation of colonial America's approach to instilling social and institutional racism. As a result, many lives were lost, dreams were broken, families were disunited, and self-hatred was recreated within the black community. In fact, this actually meant that you could look white without being classified as such. This principle is commonly referred to as the “one-drop rule.”?

Although there are no laws in the United States that apply the one-drop rule, it still resonates in the way we view some mixed race people today. The rule was so widespread in colonial America that even the American poet James Langston Hughes noted in his memoir that “in the United States, a Negro was used to refer to anyone with black ancestry, whereas in Africa, it refers to someone who is black.”

The one-drop rule was a legal principle pertaining to racial classification that gained prominence in the United States during the 20th century. It asserted that anyone with even one black ancestor was considered to be black.? The lengthy history of slavery and subsequent Jim Crow segregation shaped this rule, resulting in an advanced racial dynamic.?

When colonial America was at odds with racial divisions, this rule emerged from the American South and has since become a part of the nation's definition, which was gradually embraced by both whites and blacks. The one-drop rule was first used in Virginia in 1662 and has been used for over three centuries to set a strict social status for mixed race people.

The story of Thomas Jefferson and his enslaved partner, Sarah Hemings, is an important historical illustration of the one-drop rule.??During Jefferson's first term as president, the claim that he had children with Sally Hemings at Monticello, became a topic of discussion and disagreement for two centuries.?DNA evidence and historical records indicate that he had at least six mixed-race children with Sarah Hemings.??Four of them were reported to survive to adulthood and are mentioned in Jefferson's plantation records.

Sally was believed to be predominantly white and the half-sister to Jefferson's wife.? Despite possessing European characteristics that would have qualified her and her children as legally white, Virginia's law at the time deemed them to be black due to their mother's status as a slave in colonial America. This issue didn't end here, but it continued to be the basis of racial discrimination against people who had African blood in their bloodline.

In 1705, North America's first blood-fraction law used a one-eighth rule, which meant that a person was considered black if one great-grandparent was entirely of African ancestry. By the year 1910, twenty states had categorized their citizens based on their blood-fraction, with the majority utilizing one-fourth or one-eighth blood-fractions.

The state of Arkansas was the first to pass Act 320 (House Bill 79) in 1911, which became known as the “one-drop rule.” The goal of this law was to criminalize interracial relationship and to label as “Negro” anyone “who has any Negro blood whatsoever,” relegating to second-class citizenship anyone accused of having any African ancestry. Although the law was originally unique to Arkansas, it later spread to many other states across America. This meant that Black people had to accept a rule that they had no say in making.? ?

Before 1911, Arkansas, which was a predominantly white state, enacted the railroad segregation law, which redefined a Negro as someone with a visible and distinct mix of African blood. It was the emergence of this scientific racism that gave rise to the idea that a person could look and self-identify as white, but still somehow be Black.

Conditions in colonial America deteriorated to a degree of inhumanity towards anyone designated as black after the one-drop rule became a law. Where you landed on the racial spectrum was influenced by how you looked, as was the investigation of your ancestry.

Dark skin, broad nostrils, and tightly cooled locks were more of a physical characteristic than a social distinction. This classification resulted in a vicious hierarchy, wherein white pigmentation on one's skin signified freedom and prosperity, whereas melanin pigmentation on another's skin equated to slavery and poverty.

But life was not always easy for white people who considered interracial relationships because racial mixing began to blur the lines between race and status. On September 17, 1630, the Virginia Assembly ordered Hugh Davis, who was white, to get whipped for having sex with a Black woman. This established the prohibition of interracial relationships. In some parts of America, interracial relationships were eventually forbidden, and people were punished for doing it.?

Within the minds of the wealthy whites, there was a constant fear of losing control of their enslaved population. These white phobias were attributed to Eugenics and scientific racism, which asserted the superiority of the white race and depicted Blackness as a contaminant to eradicate or contain. To protect this ideology, it was critical to keep the color lines firm and clear. Therefore, segregation laws were born in most states in the United States.

Although these laws appeared to regulate interactions between different races, the goal was to supervise the conduct of white individuals, primarily because blacks had already been enslaved.?These laws had a significant impact beyond mere human relations, and also shaped legal definitions of race.

The purpose of these laws was not to regulate interactions between different races, but to oversee the behaviour of white people, primarily because black people had already been enslaved. These laws had a big impact on more than just human relations. They also changed the definition of race.

Different states had different laws about what it meant to be black or white. For example, in 1822, a Virginia law stipulated that to be referred to as a mulatto, (derived from the Latin word meaning mule person), one must possess a minimum of one quarter of African descent.

With the passing of time, the Nat Turner rebellion in 1831 also forced Virginia to make new laws that limited the freedoms of freed black people.? In 1853, when the one drop rule was proposed in Virginia, lawmakers realized it could hurt many people who were already considered white legally.? The regulations underwent modifications over time, and in 1910, Virginia extended this law to individuals with 116th black ancestry. By 1930, anyone with any trace of African descent in their lineage was considered black.

New Orleans' approach to racial classification was more diverse than Virginia's. This city had established a multi-tiered system that was quite different from the binary system that was common elsewhere in colonial America. Even though Whites still held the highest status and Blacks the lowest, there was actually a third race, known as the Creoles of Color, whose social status was in between the two.?

These Creoles were the outcome of generations of interbreeding between white individuals and indigenous Americans.? In simple terms, this was the birth of a third race with lighter skin. Compared to other regions, interracial relationships were more readily accepted and somewhat encouraged in Louisiana.? During this period of transition between classes, the Creole community served as a shield to whites while enforcing segregation for blacks.

The recognition and even freedom that many Creole children received from their white fathers allowed them to attain positions of privilege and be welcomed into the elite ranks. Despite having black ancestry, Creole people were treated as superior to blacks because of their European ancestry.? ?

The matter became even more complex because Louisiana had an intricate caste system based on fractions of black ancestry. This period also witnessed the widespread usage of terms such as quadroons and octoroon within the creole community. Even though the lines were extremely blurry, this granularity highlighted how desperate Society was to maintain these racial distinctions.

Following the Civil War, Southern states instituted laws to enforce segregation and restrict the rights of black individuals, thereby removing their right to vote. All former Confederate states followed suit and implemented these laws. States like Tennessee, Louisiana, Texas, and Mississippi adopted the one drop rule, while other states practiced it de facto. This made racial discrimination an integral part of American life.? ? ?

White supremacists, such as Walter Ashby Plecker and Naomi Drake, took the one drop rule to further Draconian measures in the 1940s.? Walter Plecker, an American physician and the first registrar of Virginia's Bureau of Vital Statistics, made sure that all babies born in Virginia got birth certificates with their race on them.?He believed that the White race was the divinely superior race, and therefore, it needed protection from the lesser races, such as black.??Plecker's racial integrity act, passed in Virginia in 1924, further prohibited interracial marriage and classified a person as white if they lacked any trace of any other ancestry.?

It was only in 1967 that Plecker's Racial Integrity Act was overturned by the United States Supreme Court in the Loving vs. Virginia case. Mildred and Richard Loving vs. the state of Virginia was a landmark decision that struck down Virginia's ban on interracial marriages and the underlying prejudicial principles of Plecker's racial integration act.?After decades of discrimination against people of mixed race backgrounds, this ruling marked a significant victory in the fight for racial equality.

The one-drop-rule was not solely confined to the United States; it had counterparts in other societies with a history of racial mixing, such as Latin America and Nazi Germany. The Nuremberg law in Nazi Germany contained some elements of the one-drop rule, which determined who belonged to which group. This law allowed the Nazis to criminalize marriages between Jewish people and Aryans. However, instead of adopting the American full version of the one drop rule, the Nuremberg law decreed that a Jewish person was anyone with three or more Jewish grandparents.? ?

Today, the one-drop rule continues to impact our societal consciousness mindset.? For example, the story of Rachel Dolezal, an American college activist who presented herself as a black woman despite being born to white parents, made major waves across America. This controversy sparked a national debate over the authenticity of racial identity. The confusion intensified during the year 2000, when the Census Bureau agreed to allow people in the United States to identify with multiple races.

Conclusion

The history of the one-drop rule exposes the contradictions and complexities of America's racial history. This demonstrates how laws and social conventions can establish racial boundaries that are fundamentally social. It also shows the continuing struggle to break down these rigid classifications and create a more equitable society free from race discrimination.