Discrimination shows we’ve got a long way to go

In Louisiana, a judge named Keith Bardwell issues marriage licenses to couples. Before agreeing to marry a couple, he will ask if they are interracial. If the answer is a yes, he directs the happy couple to another judge who will grant them their license. He does not feel right giving them a marriage license.

"I now pronounce you man and . . . whoops. I retract my last statement. Forgot to look at your skin color". In Louisiana, a judge named Keith Bardwell issues marriage licenses to couples. Before agreeing to marry a couple, he will ask if they are interracial. If the answer is a yes, he directs the happy couple to another judge who will grant them their license. He does not feel right giving them a marriage license.

In 1967, the Supreme Court ruled that the government could not tell people whom they were fit to marry. But, a judge in Louisiana apparently has not been keeping up with his laws lately. I feel like I just stepped into the Jim Crow South. Sorry, "blacks" and "whites" must be separated for the betterment of society. This mini history lesson needs to stop right here.

Judge Bardwell has practiced law for 34 years and his current term extends until December of 2014. During his years of practice, he has denied four couples marriage licenses on the basis of race alone. They have all been under three years in time. That isn't so bad because he refers them to someone else who doesn't have a problem with their interracial relationship.

Bardwell claims to not be a bit racist. In fact, he has married several black couples. They are even, get this, allowed to use his bathroom. (I secretly wonder if he has one specifically for "them"). His justification for separating the "races"? He has asked both black and white people and found out that kids of interracial relationships are not accepted in either community. So, these adults need Daddy Bardwell to tell them whom to marry. He feels personally responsible for keeping them out of trouble and he tries to stop them. It is a great evil to bring children into the world without Daddy Bardwell's permission. Think what trouble this could bring! Goodness me!

Actually, I don't know if anyone, especially Americans, can lay claim to one line of ancestors. I have many different groups of people in my ancestry. To say that I have a "pure" bloodline would be laughable. If I decide to marry, I doubt that my spouse will have a "pure" bloodline either. And I sure would put up a fight if some judge said that our pedigrees did not match up enough to warrant a marriage license.

Personally, I am appalled that such discrimination still exists in our courtrooms. You would have thought that we have moved past the 1960s. Do the wounds that exist from then need to be reopened and salt poured into them? I don't think that we need judges telling us whom we can and can't marry based on skin color alone! That is ridiculous.

Sorry that no one has told you this before, Judge Bardwell, but Jim Crow laws were tossed out with smiles decades ago. So, you can throw away those old rulebooks. Also, your personal judgments about who is "fit" to marry whom based on skin color need to stay at home. Your job as a judge does not include evaluating the potential lives of the children whose parents your issue marriage licenses to. Discrimination based on skin color cannot influence judgments. And saying that you will refer them to someone else does not justify your discriminatory policies.

Speaking of interracial individuals not getting accepted, I wonder where Bardwell has been hiding for the past eleven months? I just wonder what Judge Bardwell thinks of President Obama? "I wish I could have been there to stop his parents??"

Other famous people whose parents were not of the same "race" include Tiger Woods, Tony Gonzalez, Halle Berry, Soledad O'Brien, Bob Marley and Vin Diesel. Looking back into history, Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois made great impacts on history despite, what Bardwell calls, their "disadvantage". This is just a partial list of people who are nationally known. Some I didn't mention include other presidents of other countries. If these individuals did experience discrimination, it certainly didn't stop them from becoming the great influencers that they did.

Am I surprised that this happens? Not really.

Discrimination based on race still exists in many forms in today's society. I am sure Judge Bardwell is not the last of the great Jim Crow law enforcers.

But actions need to be taken so that we can move on to bigger concerns.

Allowing people whose skin color is not perfectly identical to marry is not a big deal.

That we have to devote so much time to saying that over and over again is.

Colleen is a graduate student.