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Suit filed challenging race question for Virginia marriage license
Suit filed challenging race question for Virginia marriage license.
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Suit filed challenging race question for Virginia marriage license
BY FRANK GREEN Richmond Times-Dispatch Sep 6, 2019
A screenshot of the online marriage license form for Arlington County shows that people must select their race to obtain a license.
Arlington County
Three Virginia couples are challenging the constitutionality of a state law that requires they identify their race to be able to obtain a marriage license.
In a lawsuit filed in federal court in Alexandria Thursday, the couples claim that Virginia is one of eight states requiring people seeking a marriage license to include their race on the form, "using unscientific, highly controversial, misleading, useless, and tainted categories reflecting Virginia’s historical repression of non-white persons."
The suit was brought against the Virginia State Registrar and the clerks of the Arlington and Rockbridge Circuits, where the plaintiffs applied to be married but could not get a license after refusing to state their race, according to the 31-page complaint.
Michael Kelly, a spokesman for Attorney General Mark Herring wrote in an email Friday that, "Although it’s not readily apparent why state law requires the collection of this data on the marriage license application, we will examine the complaint closely and carefully to determine how best to proceed."
Kelly added that Herring is committed to equality and justice, including during Virginia’s same-sex marriage case, and that Chief Deputy Attorney General Cynthia Hudson is also chairing Gov. Ralph Northam’s commission to examine racial inequity in Virginia law.
Victor M. Glasberg, a civil rights lawyer in Alexandria, who filed the suit, said the law in question has been around in some form or another since at least the 1920s.
....
A motion for a temporary restraining order has been set for Oct.4, before U.S. District Judge Rossie D. Alston Jr., in Alexandria.
fgreen@timesdispatch.com
(804) 649-6340
BY FRANK GREEN Richmond Times-Dispatch Sep 6, 2019
A screenshot of the online marriage license form for Arlington County shows that people must select their race to obtain a license.
Arlington County
Three Virginia couples are challenging the constitutionality of a state law that requires they identify their race to be able to obtain a marriage license.
In a lawsuit filed in federal court in Alexandria Thursday, the couples claim that Virginia is one of eight states requiring people seeking a marriage license to include their race on the form, "using unscientific, highly controversial, misleading, useless, and tainted categories reflecting Virginia’s historical repression of non-white persons."
The suit was brought against the Virginia State Registrar and the clerks of the Arlington and Rockbridge Circuits, where the plaintiffs applied to be married but could not get a license after refusing to state their race, according to the 31-page complaint.
Michael Kelly, a spokesman for Attorney General Mark Herring wrote in an email Friday that, "Although it’s not readily apparent why state law requires the collection of this data on the marriage license application, we will examine the complaint closely and carefully to determine how best to proceed."
Kelly added that Herring is committed to equality and justice, including during Virginia’s same-sex marriage case, and that Chief Deputy Attorney General Cynthia Hudson is also chairing Gov. Ralph Northam’s commission to examine racial inequity in Virginia law.
Victor M. Glasberg, a civil rights lawyer in Alexandria, who filed the suit, said the law in question has been around in some form or another since at least the 1920s.
....
A motion for a temporary restraining order has been set for Oct.4, before U.S. District Judge Rossie D. Alston Jr., in Alexandria.
fgreen@timesdispatch.com
(804) 649-6340
2 replies
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