One Drop Still

‘THE United States is the only country in the world in which a white woman can-give birth to a black baby but a black woman cannot give birth to a white baby.” Not long ago, when the civil-rights movement was unquestionably on the side of the angels, liberals were fond of pointing that out, with a mixture of dismay and smugness. How stupid! they said. You were deemed black if either of your parents was black. Indeed, you were deemed black even if your only black ancestor was one great-grandparent—the infamous “one drop” rule made it so.

That rule was essential to the either-or logic of the Jim Crow system, in which being only part-black was as inconceivable as being part-pregnant. Nor was there room for people with other racial identities; those who were not white were thrown into the category of—as the Census Bureau traditionally termed it —“Negroes and other races.” Under this system, if you recognized the remarkably mixed ancestry of a Tiger Woods, what public school would you assign him to? Where would you have him sit on the bus?

ST

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Stephan Thernstrom

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‘THE United States is the only country in the world in which a white woman can-give birth to a black baby but a black woman cannot give birth to a white baby.” Not long ago, when the civil-rights movement was unquestionably on the side of the angels, liberals were fond of pointing that out, with a mixture of dismay and smugness. How stupid! they said. You were deemed black if either of your parents was black. Indeed, you were deemed black even if your only black ancestor was one great-grandparent—the infamous “one drop” rule made it so.

That rule was essential to the either-or logic of the Jim Crow system, in which being only part-black was as inconceivable as being part-pregnant. Nor was there room for people with other racial identities; those who were not white were thrown into the category of—as the Census Bureau traditionally termed it —“Negroes and other races.” Under this system, if you recognized the remarkably mixed ancestry of a Tiger Woods, what public school would you assign him to? Where would you have him sit on the bus?