Pace v. Alabama
| Pace v. Alabama | |
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| Argued January 16, 1883 Decided January 29, 1883 |
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| Full case name | Pace v. State of Alabama |
| Citations | 106 U.S. 583 (more)
1 S. Ct. 637; 27 L. Ed. 207; 16 Otto 583
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| Prior history | Defendants convicted, 5 Circuit Court, 1881; sentenced each to two years in the state penitentiary; affirmed, Alabama Supreme Court (69 Ala 231, 233 (1882)) |
| Holding | |
| The court affirmed the conviction of the plaintiff and declared Alabama's anti-miscegenation statute constitutional. | |
| Court membership | |
| Case opinions | |
| Majority | Field, joined by unanimous |
| Laws applied | |
| U.S Const. amend XIV; Ala. code 4184, 4189 | |
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Overruled by
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McLaughlin v. Florida, 379 U.S. 184 (1964) Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967) |
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Pace v. Alabama, 106 U.S. 583 (1883), was a case in which the United States Supreme Court affirmed that Alabama's anti-miscegenation statute was constitutional. This ruling was rejected by the Supreme Court in 1964 in McLaughlin v. Florida and in 1967 in Loving v. Virginia. Pace v. Alabama is possibly the first recorded interracial sex court case in America.
The plaintiff, Tony Pace, an African-American man, and Mary Cox, a white woman, were residents of the state of Alabama, who had been arrested in 1881 because their sexual relationship violated the state's anti-miscegenation statute. They were charged with living together "in a state of adultery or fornication" and both sentenced to two years imprisonment in the state penitentiary in 1882.
Because "miscegenation," that is marriage, cohabitation and sexual relations between whites and "negroes," was prohibited by Alabama's anti-miscegenation statute (Ala. code 4189), it would have been illegal for the couple to marry in Alabama. However, Tony Pace and Mary Cox were not married, for this reason, and they did not live together. They spent time together near their homes in Clarke County, north of Mobile.
They could not marry each other under Alabama law. Interracial marital sex was deemed a felony, whereas extramarital sex ("adultery or fornication") was only a misdemeanor. Because of the criminalization of interracial relationships, they were penalized more severely for their extramarital relationship than if they had been both whites or both black. The Alabama code stated:
“If any white person and any negro, or the descendant of any negro to the third generation, inclusive, through one ancestor of each generation was a white person, intermarry or live in adultery or fornication with each other, each of them must, on conviction, be imprisoned in the penitentiary or sentenced to hard labor for the county for not less than two nor more than seven years.”
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