To the editor:

As the Kansas Legislature rushes to vote on the same-sex marriage law, here’s something for all of us to think about: Until June 12, 1967, it was illegal for people of different races to marry in 16 states of our country. The couple who pushed the issue to the U.S. Supreme Court (aptly named Richard and Mildred Loving) were sentenced in 1961 to one year in jail for violating Virginia’s “Act to Preserve Racial Integrity.” The judge in that case argued that since God had created different continents for the different races, it was clearly the will of God that the races remain separate.

How will history remember those of us who today are trying to legislate the perceived “will of God?” Whose integrity does the current push toward legalizing bigotry protect? What will our actions, or lack thereof, say to future generations when they ask us what our role was in this historic battle for civil rights?

Angela Richmond,

Lawrence