Includes bibliographical references (p. [261]-295) and index.

Sex, marriage, race, and freedom in the early Chesapeake -- Indian foremothers and freedom suits in revolutionary Virginia -- From the Chesapeake colonies to the state of California -- Race, marriage, and the crisis of the union -- Post-civil war Alabama -- Reconstruction and the law of interracial marriage -- Accommodating the law of freedom the law of race -- Interracial marriage and the federal courts, 1857-1917 -- Drawing and redrawing the color line -- Boundaries, race and place in the law of marriage -- Racial identity and family property -- Miscegenation laws, the NAACP, and the federal courts, 1941-1963 -- A breakthrough case in California -- Contesting the antimiscegenation regime, the 1960s -- Virginia versus the Lovings, and the Lovings versus Virginia -- America after Loving v. Virginia -- Appendices. 1. Permanent repeal of state miscegenation laws, 1780-1967 ; 2. Intermarriage in Nazi Germany and Apartheid South Africa ; 3. Identity and authority: an interfaith couple in Israel ; 4. Transsexuals, gender identity, and the law of marriage.