Pace V. Alabama - Facts

Facts

The plaintiff, Tony Pace, an African-American man, and Mary Cox, a white woman, were residents of the state of Alabama, who had been arrested in 1881 because their sexual relationship violated the state's anti-miscegenation statute. They were charged with living together "in a state of adultery or fornication" and both sentenced to two years imprisonment in the state penitentiary in 1882. Because "miscegenation," that is marriage, cohabitation and sexual relations between whites and "negroes," was prohibited by Alabama's anti-miscegenation statute (Ala. code 4189), it would have been illegal for the couple to marry in Alabama. Because of the criminalization of interracial relationships, they were penalized more severely for their extramarital relationship than a white or a black couple would have been.

Little is known about Pace and Cox. In Alabama, they were charged with "adultery or fornication," not with marriage or attempted marriage. Both Pace and Cox appealed their conviction. They both claimed the anti-miscegenation statute violated the United States Constitution. On appeal, the Alabama Supreme Court affirmed their conviction, ruling that the statute did not violate the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because it did not constitute discrimination for or against either race to prohibit interracial sexual relations. While focusing on the crime of "adultery or fornication" and not mentioning the state statute's prohibition of interracial marriage directly, the court did go on to condemn all sexual relations between whites and blacks, whether extramarital or marital, because of the interracial offspring in which they could result: "The evil tendency of the crime is greater when committed between persons of the two races ... Its result may be the amalgamation of the two races, producing a mongrel population and a degraded civilization, the prevention of which is dictated by a sound policy affecting the highest interests of society and government." (Pace & Cox v. State, 69 Ala 231, 233 (1882)

Tony Pace's attorney, John Tompkins, appealed the ruling against his client to the Supreme Court. Apart from the Fourteenth Amendment, there was little legal precedent at the federal level for the Supreme Court to base its decision on.