Hello and welcome to this day in esoteric political history from Radiotopia.

My name is Jody Avergan.

This day, September 20th, 1664.

First off, it's the 1600s.

It's been a while.

We don't go back that far enough on the show, so it's nice to be there

in the 1600s, though, tough topic.

But here we are in 1664 and on this date Maryland passed the

first anti amalgamation law this was a law intended to prevent marriages

between black men and English women.

But of course in this time as in all times people from all sorts of backgrounds were falling in love and marrying and having children.

In colonial Jamestown there were white black children, black and Indian marriages, white and

Indian families.

Cut to a hundred years after this law that we're discussing by the time of the American

Revolution, some estimates say there were 60,000 maybe as many as 120,000 people of

quote mixed heritage residing in the colonies. But in 1664 Maryland did pass

this first anti amalgamation law and these types of laws were on the books for well

We'll talk about about way way too long many anti miscegenation laws weren't repealed until the 60s

the 1960s. The 1960s.

Yep, Alabama had a law in the books until the year 2000. But anyway, let's stay in colonial

times for now here as always Nicole Hammer of Vanderbilt and Kelly Carter Jackson of Wesley.

Hello there.

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