"I am honored to unveil this historical marker memorializing the landmark Loving v. Virginia Supreme Court case and Mildred and Richard Loving's courageous struggle to fight for what they knew was right", said Governor McAuliffe. But the couple later recruited the help of the American Civil Liberties Union, "which unsuccessfully sought to reverse their convictions in the state courts of Virginia and then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court", the marker reads.
In a landmark case, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that states could not have laws that barred interracial marriages.
Richard and Mildred Loving were put in jail in 1958 for violating the commonwealth's prohibition on interracial marriage.
The marker now stands outside the former Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals, which ruled against the Lovings.
Weeks after the Lovings were married in Washington, D.C., in 1958, sheriff's deputies burst into their Virginia home in the middle of the night and threw them in jail for unlawful cohabitation.
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But in the unanimous 1967 U.S. Supreme Court opinion, Chief Justice Earl Warren said the state's argument that the policy was necessary to preserve racial integrity was "obviously an endorsement of the doctrine of White Supremacy". She called the Lovings "civil rights pioneers" who had the courage to stand up for the right to love.
Gov. Terry McAuliffe and other officials will dedicate a historical marker Monday commemorating the 1967 ruling and the Virginia couple behind the case.
After a long legal battle, the US Supreme Court overturned all state laws restricting marriage on the basis of race. Matt Fritzinger, who is in an interracial marriage, said the ceremony was a special way to honor the Lovings and hopefully a lesson for future generations.
Virginia's historical highway marker program, which began in 1927 with the installation of the first historical markers along U.S. Route 1, is considered the oldest such program in the nation. The Lovings remained married until 1975 when Richard was tragically killed when a drunk driver slammed into his auto.
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