Republicans really need to come out with a consistent position on inter-racial marriage.

Because the way the GOP talks, it seems they’re a dead-set against the Supreme Court’s famous decision in Loving v. Virginia, where the court ordered the state of the Virginia to recognize the marriage between a black woman and a white man.

At the time, the late 1960s, 17 states (all southern) had laws banning marriages between blacks and whites.

The Supreme Court in Loving ruled that such “anti-miscegenation” laws were unconstitutional, overruling the racist will of the Southern people.

So I find it troubling, and have for a long while now, that Republicans keep explaining their opposition to pro-gay-marriage court decisions in language that would have prevented the Supreme Court from ruling as it did in Loving. Republicans are, in essence, making arguments in favor of banning the mixing of the races. And that’s rather messed up.

Here’s the latest example from Republican Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, who is upset that a federal judge struck down the state’s ban on same-sex marriages:

“In 2008, Arizona voters approved a state constitutional amendment to define marriage as a union of one man and one woman. Now, with their rulings, the federal courts have again thwarted the will of the people and further eroded the authority of states to regulate and uphold our laws. “It is not only disappointing, but also deeply troubling, that unelected federal judges can dictate the laws of individual states, create rights based on their personal policy preferences and supplant the will of the people in an area traditionally left to the states for more than two hundred years. As Justice Scalia opined, such action is tantamount to ‘an assertion of judicial supremacy over the people’ and is an image of the judiciary ‘that would have been unrecognizable to those who wrote and ratified our national charter.’ “Simply put, courts should not be in the business of making and changing laws based on their personal agendas. It is not the role of the judiciary to determine that same-sex marriages should be allowed. Historically and traditionally, that power belongs to the states, and to the people. If society wants to recognize same-sex marriage or civil unions, that decision should be made through our elected representatives or at the ballot – not the courts.”

Now let’s edit Brewer’s statement, as it would have read in 1967:

“In 1924, Virginia voters, through their duly-elected legislators, approved legislation to define marriage as a union of one white man and one white woman. Now, with their rulings, the federal courts have again thwarted the will of the people and further eroded the authority of states to regulate and uphold our laws. “It is not only disappointing, but also deeply troubling, that unelected federal judges can dictate the laws of individual states, create rights based on their personal policy preferences and supplant the will of the people in an area traditionally left to the states for more than two hundred years. As Justice Scalia opined, such action is tantamount to ‘an assertion of judicial supremacy over the people’ and is an image of the judiciary ‘that would have been unrecognizable to those who wrote and ratified our national charter.’ “Simply put, courts should not be in the business of making and changing laws based on their personal agendas. It is not the role of the judiciary to determine that inter-racial marriages should be allowed. Historically and traditionally, that power belongs to the states, and to the people. If society wants to recognize inter-racial marriage, that decision should be made through our elected representatives or at the ballot – not the courts.”

Kinda racist, no?

There is no way to argue that “the will of the people” is what sets the agenda for marriage laws in the states without opposing the court’s decision in Loving.

And the entire notion of “unelected judges dictating laws of the individual states” in an “area traditionally left to the states for more than two hundred years” is exactly what the court did in both Loving and Brown v Board of Education as well.

It is a supremely racist argument for Republicans to be making. Per se civil rights decisions are counter to the will of the people. So if the Republican party has a problem with courts ruling on civil rights, then the Republican party has a problem with the most important advancements in the history of American civil rights.

Now, Brewer and Republicans generally like to trot out the “it’s not the same thing being back and being gay!” argument whenever people point out that their party’s latent intolerance is showing. But the question at hand is not whether being black is the same thing as being gay. The question is whether a federal court ever has the right to tell a state how to run its marriages; and Jan Brewer, and much of the Republican party, say “no.”

That means that if the Republican party had its druthers, blacks and whites would still not be permitted to marry in America today.

Keep that in mind when you vote in November.