Mixed Marriage: A Memoir
by Janet Cheatham Bell

It was the sixties. Everything was changing. People were demanding freedom of every kind. Freedom from racism, from the war in Vietnam, from sexism, from police brutality, from college courses that ignored the achievements of everyone except those of European descent. So, why not, also, the freedom to marry whomever you choose?

In 1965, before the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the ban on mixed marriages was unconstitutional, in many states it was a crime to marry “outside your race.” And less than 1% of Americans chose to commit that crime. This is the story of how I came to defy that ridiculous law.