The Study of Racialism

quin79 · Regular User Joined: 14 Mar 2007 {Posts: 57 }

Well, I thought that it would be interesting to reopen a discussion about the Susan Guillory Phipps Case that started as far back as the late 1970s concerning her attempt to change the racial designation on her birth certificate from "colored" to "white". Mrs. Phipps asserted that the label was a mistake because she claimed that she was pure white and that she was raised as white. Now, anyone who makes an assertion that she was white and wants to be recognized as such automatically sends a red flag. In order for someone to make this strong assertion, leads me to suspect that Mrs. Phipps was aware of non-europeon ancestry in her background. And I also believe that she was lying about her being raised as white by her parents as well. I say this because in one of her statements, she talks about being aware that she was something other than white when she was up for communion as a little girl. She recalled her going behind a white girl and being in front of a black girl when the black girls mother moved her out of the way. Also, in my efforts to find the original transcription of the research findings, Seven of Susie's siblings were also a part of the lawsuit. All of them were designated as "colored" on the birth certificates as well as Susie's. That tells me that her parents did not live as white people and that she was most likely not raised as such according to her claims. There were also other research findings that contradicted her claims as well. The court appointed a professional genealogist to trace her family ancestry. They went to the small community she was raised and found people who knew her when she was a little girl and her parents. Some of them were relatives as well. They said that they knew her as well as her parents as being "colored" or living as "coloured" instead of as white. Also many of her relatives live and self-identify as "coloured" as well. The genealogist was able to trace the ancestry of Susie Phipps from a colonial area french creole named Joseph Gregoire Guillory and a black slave woman named Marguerita. Susie Phipps descends from their son, Joseph Guillory, who married a free woman of color named Louise Meullion. She like him were both defined as mulatto libres or gens de coleur. Many of her ancestors were labeled with such terms as quadroons, mulattos, coloured up to the time of her birth in 1934 in a line stretching from 1764. This case also is of personal interest to because me and Susie Phipps are distant cousins. We both descend from Marguerite and Joseph Gregoire. Only,I directly descend from Joseph's brother, Jean-Baptiste Guillory, who married a free woman of mixed ancestry named Catherine Victoire Donato. My ancestors were labeled in similar terms as well. Im not saying that she was black or that she should be defined as black.. but I am saying she was attempting to change a historical document due to a "mistake". But if this was a mistake, then her parents would have be wrong as well. I suspect that she was not raised as "white" regardless of her phenotype but merely assimilated(if that is the right word) into the white community by marrying white men. Now, her kids, were all in likelihood raised white and see themselves as white. And given Susie Phipps appearance along with her white husbands, I wouldnt find it hard to believe that they "look" white. I dont have a problem with that. But, based on the facts gathered in the case and by cross examining the evidence, Mrs. Phipps was a woman who knew that she wasnt classified as "white" and lived her childhood as not being "white" who later on in her life, made a conscious decision to "become white". She seems to have wanted to make it official. Also, in continuing to read up on the facts of the case, I find a disturbing discomfort when she finds out about her black ancestry. One statement I read said that she was literally SICK for 3 days. I repeat LITERALLY SICK when she finds out about her black ancestry. That is also a later statement of her quoting that she believed that Marguerita was "brown" instead of "black". She obviously doesnt like the fact that she has african ancestry from the strength of these statements. I find that quite sad and all familiar. It reminds me of the countless stories of what happens when people find the specter of blackness in their DNA. I actually feel sorry for her though. I hope that she found peace in her life later on. Im not some one droppist guy saying that she should call herself "black". I want to reiterate this point. But I am saying that one should not be ashamed of their african ancestry regardless. I've read and heard of many bi-racial or persons of multi-racial background either deny their black ancestry or despise by expressing racism towards black people or use them as a scapegoat for the reasons why they have had a hard time in self-acceptance. Her case is one of the many examples of how the American racial classification as dehumanized human beings in this country by discriminating them based on their physical appearance or invisible traces. My next post will be the sources I used. Any comments would be great

quin79 · Regular User Joined: 14 Mar 2007 {Posts: 57 }

[color=blue][b]SUSIE GUILLORY PHIPPS CASE In 1977, at the age of 43, Susie Guillory Phipps
applied for a passport. She hadn't needed one before, and she needed a copy of
her birth certificate to obtain one. Susie Phipps went to New Orleans to obtain
a copy of her birth certificate from the Division of Vital Records. The clerk
took Mrs. Phipps aside and showed her that her birth certificate showed the race
of both parents as "Col." - colored. Mrs. Phipps responded with disbelief, shock
and later said that "she was sick for 3 days." Susie Guillory Phipps insisted
that an error had been made and wanted the birth certificate corrected. She
contacted Jack Westholz Jr., state official, chief of the New Orleans section of
the Office of the General Counsel of the Louisiana Department of Health and
Human Resources. This Division is the only office which is capable of correcting
errors or changing a birth certificate. Mr. Westholz asked Susie Guillory Phipps
to provide the following information: Complete names of her parents; Place of
birth of her brothers and sisters. After checking the records, Mr. Westholz
informed Mrs. Phipps that no errors had been made on her birth certificate. The
racial designations on her birth certificate were consistent with the
information on the birth certificates of her brothers and sisters. None showed
signs of tampering. The State of Louisiana conclusion: Susie Guillory was
correctly identified on her birth certificate as the child of two colored
people. Mrs. Phipps could have obtained her passport, which does not show racial
designation. After all, the legal separation of races system had been
dismantled. The racial designations on her birth certificate hadn't affected her
life for the previous 43 years. Susie Guillory Phipps had lived as a white
woman, was recorded as white on her children's birth certificates and when her
parents died, she had identified them as white on the death certificates. She
had brothers, sisters, nieces and nephews who lived as white people. No one had
challenged any of that. Virtually nobody even knew what her birth certificate
said. Instead, Mrs. Phipps refused to accept a copy of any birth certificate
that identified her as black. She insisted that her birth certificate be changed
to identify her as white. In some people's view, and the view of Mr. Westholz,
Mrs. Phipps was very insistent to the point of obsession to change her birth
certificate thereby receiving official blessing of her color. Mrs. Phipps
maintains it's wasn't because she has anything against black people, she simply
felt she had to stand up for what she believed in, that being that "she was
white." She also stated that "if her birth certificate didn't get corrected, her
descendants might come across it and think she was somebody she wasn't." Mr.
Westholz might have followed the course of least resistance and allowed her to
change her birth certificate to whatever race she wanted. He could have
fulfilled the obligations of his office in following the law by advising Mrs.
Phipps to seek a court order to change the birth certificate, then opposing the
order in only a token manner, which would allow Mrs. Phipps to achieve her goal
of changing the certificate. Mr. Westholz, partly out of a belief that a rare
opportunity for a test case, which might result in needed administrative reforms
regarding racial designation which the legislature was extremely reluctant to
deal with. Mr. Westholz hoped a court might provide guidelines to his Department
for settlement of disputed racial designations without the need for litigation.
He even hoped that a court would get rid of the 1970 on-thirty-second law, which
his Department considered unworkable and unconstitutional. Mr. Westholz was also
defending the integrity of his Department. The Department was in charge of the
gathering and preserving of records. The Dept. is also charged with prevention
of anyone tampering with those records. Mr. Westholz believed that the
information on Mrs. Phipps birth certificate was correct. Of Mrs. Phipps
certificate he stated "Mrs. Phipps birth certificate is a historical record. Let
it be. We can't go back and change history." The documents, which were
available, were extensive and unaltered. Mr. Westholz commissioned a
Genealogist, Ruth Robertson Fontenot to trace the Guillory family tree. Dozens
of birth certificates, baptismal records, marriage contracts and other
historical documents were gathered together. Documents such as "Copy of the
Inventory from the 1764 Succession of Manon LaCaze," a copy of an "Agreement
between Pierre Ricard and Francois Allain with Louis (Ricard) regarding
renumeration for caring for cattle, dated November 8, 1762" were among those
researched. Westholz tracked down people who were related to Susie Guillory
Phipps. Two large cardboard boxes full of exhibits, depositions, a Genealogy
going back to the Eighteenth Century, and a chart depicting the race of the
Guillory family according to the "Robertson Fontenot System of Visual Percentage
Analysis" were accumulated. Susie Guillory Phipps most significant ancestor,
Marguerite, was her great-great-great-great grandmother, a former slave.
Marguerite was a historical figure of prominence. In Spanish legal records the
Spanish records always refers to Marguerite as "Margarita." In the early 1780s
when the Spanish controlled Louisiana, a noted legal battle took place in the
Court of Alcalde Panis. Marguerite was seeking to ensure the freedom of herself
and her children. Joseph Gregoire Guillory, known in the records as a French
Planter, had a family of eight children by his white wife, Marie Jeanne LaCasse.
Marguerite had been his wife's slave. Just before Joseph Gregoire was to move
his family and possessions to Old Opelousas Post, (what is now Opelousas,
located in what is now Acadian Parish, Louisiana) Marie Jeanne LaCasse died.
Joseph Gregoire Guillory moved his family and their possessions to Old Opelousas
Post in Louisiana. There he had four children by Marguerite. Shortly after, his
son-in-laws from Old Mobile filed suit in Dupont vs Guillory for their (their
wives) share of Marie Jeanne LaCasse's property. This legal dispute resulted in
a valuation of property assets of Joseph Gregoire Guillory, which were owned by
Marie LaCasse Guillory. Marguerite and her children are listed in the valuation
as property. Joseph Gregoire Guillory was forced to turn over Marguerite and her
children to his white children as their share of their mother's property. Joseph
Gregoire Guillory went to his eldest son's home (Jean Baptiste Guillory) with a
knife and kidnapped Marguerite from his children. Joseph Gregoire Guillory
accomplished for Marguerite and her children, a manumission freeing them on
condition Marguerite stayed with him until his death. Marguerite did so. After
Joseph Gregoire Guillory's death, his white children disputed Marguerite and her
children's freedom and filed in court to have them returned to their control.
Marguerite sued in court, presenting her case and won. Although her children
would have to work for their half-siblings for a period of time to pay back a
certain amount of money, they indeed had their freedom. One son of Joseph
Gregoire Guillory & Marguerite married a Free Person of Color, named Eloise
Meuillon. This Guillory genealogical tree was studded with people described in
various documents with words such as "quadroon" and "marabout" and the line led
straight down to Susie Guillory's birth in 1934. Mr. Westholz went to the area
where Joseph Gregoire Guillory had settled over a hundred and fifty years
before. Elderly people who still living in the old Frey Community where Susie
Guillory Phipps grew up remembered the Guillory family. Many in nearby towns
were related in one way or another to Susie Guillory Phipps. He obtained school
records, census field reports. Documents and interviews were all consistent. The
Guillorys in the area were known as mulattoes. All of the documents amassed
showed that Susie Guillory Phipps racial designation on the birth certificate
was indeed correct. Mr. Westholz showed the information to Mrs. Phipps New
Orleans lawyer, Brian Begue, expecting him to drop the case. The alternative was
a major challenge in court of state law. By this time, the Department of Health
and human Resources had passed new regulations which would have allowed Susie
Phipps to acquire a copy of the birth certificate in short form, which included
nothing about race. Mrs. Phipps belief that she was white didn't seem to be
affected by the information presented about her family genealogy. She continued
to insist that her racial designation was a mistake. Although Mrs. Phipps
continued to insist that she was white, she stated in a 1983 interview "she came
to believe that Margarita had been dark rather than black." Rarely did she
acknowledge the existence of the tri-racial society that existed during
Marguerite's time. After many delays, Mrs. Phipps case came to trial in New
Orleans District Court, 5 years after she had applied for her birth certificate.
Although some of her relatives joined her suit, many others dropped out of the
suit. Throughout the legal wrangling, the issue of race, or designation of race,
how a person was designated as a certain race by "traceable amount of black
ancestry" dominated the trial. Mrs. Phipps lawyer Brian Begue tried the case in
the court of public opinion, through the newspapers. Articles appeared which
tended to leave an impression that the state was trying to designate a white
person as black via a bizarre 1970s law. Mr. Westholz insisted that the State
merely preserves information by its residents. He further insisted that his
Department had been hoping to get rid of the 1970 law for years. Louisiana had
adopted the policy that other states follow in determining racial designations
on birth certificates - "the race is whatever the new born baby's parents say it
is." The blank is filled in with the cooperation of the parents. In the trial,
it was stated "Race information is needed on birth certificates, for example,
sickle cell anemia is found almost exclusively among blacks, while
phenlketonuria, a genetic defect that can cause mental retardation unless
treated early, is found almost exclusively in whites. A person seeking their
birth certificate in order to find their parents for medical purposes would need
racial designation in order to determine possible medical history or potential
problems. Scientists testified by deposition and on the witness stand that
modern science didn't offer any better way than that of determining race - the
child is the race of whatever the parents say. Mr. Westholz stated "I know you
can't scientifically ascertain race, I knew that before the trial." Mr. Westholz
view was that the Judge had to decide whether Susie Guillory Phipps could prove
beyond any doubt that the information on her birth certificate was incorrect.
Mr. Begue tried to demonstrate that partly because of imprecise use of terms
inherited from Colonial days, genealogical records could not reflect racial
ancestry with mathematical certainty. The State had the burden of proving that
it could legally classify Mrs. Phipps as black because of the one-thirty-second
law. Begue didn't refute the genealogical evidence, but argued that if any
racial classification had to be done, it should be based on the "self image" of
the classified. Begue maintained that people who think of themselves as white,
their neighbors think they are white, should not have to prove in court that
they are white. Colored relatives disputed Mrs. Phipps claim that "she was
raised white. I am white. I am all white. I was raised as a white child. I went
to a white school. I married white twice." May 1983, the Court found that the
State Vital Statistics Law "clearly places the burden of proving the propriety
of an alteration on the person seeking to have it made. The plaintiff's
contention that because they appear to be white, the State must prove otherwise
was without legal foundation." In his decision, the Judge stated "it was clear
that the plaintiff's have the appearance of "white people", having fair skins
and in some cases blue eyes and blond hair. It is also entirely clear that they
are of mixed white and Negro blood." Mrs. Westholz considered the verdict a
bittersweet victory, since the court did not alter the burden of proof and did
not offer any guidelines for the future. He stated, "he hoped Mrs. Phipps would
appeal." June 1983, a month after the Phipps case, the legislature repealed the
1970 one-thirty-second law and established a preponderance of the evidence as
the burden of proof borne by someone who wanted to argue that information on a
vital record should be changed. Mrs. Phipps appealed the verdict in her case.
The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the original verdict. The Court
pointing out that it was Mrs. Phipps parents racial designations that Mrs.
Phipps would have to change, stated "We do not believe that an individual may
change the racial designation of another person, whether his parent or anyone
else. That appellants might today describe themselves as white does not prove
error in a document, which designates their parents as colored. This anomaly
shows the subjective nature of racial perceptions but does not give appellants a
cause of action to alter it." The Appeals Court further stated" Individual
racial designations are purely social and cultural perceptions, and the evidence
conclusively proves those subjective perceptions were correctly recorded at the
time appellants' birth certificates were issued." Mrs. Phipps lawyer, Begue
applied for a hearing before the Louisiana Supreme Court. By a vote of 5 to 2,
the Supreme Court of Louisiana denied the application. Begue argues that when it
comes to racial designation, "Susie Guillory Phipps should not be bound by the
racist notions of 1934, but by the same policy that is in effect for someone
today in filling out a birth certificate application in a New Orleans Hospital,
you are whatever race you think you are." Mr. Westholz argues "history is
history; he doesn't quarrel with Mrs. Phipps calling her children white, but he
doesn't think there is anything she can do about her parents' being colored. The
birth certificates were filled out by the plaintiff's parents, who apparently
listed their children's race as black because that is what the parents' own
birth certificates read. It's our position that the plaintiffs are asserting
that there's something wrong with records that their parents submitted, in which
case the burden of proof is upon them." Mrs. Phipps after the original court
verdict stated, "if she lost in Louisiana, she would go to the Supreme Court of
the United States. If she lost there, she would go to the President. She would
ask him if he thought she was colored." RESOURCES: Lake Charles American Press
Sept 15, 1982 Lake Charles American Press Sept. 16, 1982 Monroe Newspaper Oct
19, 1985 The New Yorker Magazine Article "American Chronicles Black or White"
1986
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[b]SUIT ON RACE RECALLS LINES DRAWN UNDER SLAVERY Susie Guillory Phipps.

NATIONAL DESK New York Times SUIT ON RACE RECALLS LINES DRAWN UNDER SLAVERY By
GREGORY JAYNES (NYT) 2030 words Published: September 30, 1982 NEW ORLEANS, Sept.
23 - A Louisiana woman who the state contends is black has gone to court to have
herself declared white, and that is but the short of it. The story, a story as
old as the country, has elements of anthropology and sociology special to this
region, and its message, here in 1982 America, is that it is still far better to
be white than black. Some New Orleans blacks are cheering the woman on. Her name
is Susie Guillory Phipps. She is a 48-year-old, blackhaired woman with big dark
eyes, and she says she was flabbergasted and sickened to learn when she applied
for a birth certificate five years ago that the state's Bureau of Vital
Statistics had her down as ''colored.'' ''I'm not light,'' she said, pointing to
her face. ''I'm white.'' Traced Back 222 Years So say thousands of Louisianians
with Negroes in their ancestry, while thousands of others, blue-eyed and light
as day, consider themselves black. In Mrs. Phipps's case, the state has traced
her geneology back 222 years, to a black slave named Margarita, Mrs. Phipps's
great-great-great-great grandmother. The great-great-great-great grandfather was
a white planter named John Gregoire Guillory. Louisiana law since 1970 has held
that if a person has one thirty-second ''Negro blood,'' the person is black.
Before 1970 ''a trace'' of Negro ancestry made a person black in the eyes of the
state. The 1970 law is the only one in the country that gives any equation for
determining a person's race. Elsewhere in most of the nation, race is simply a
matter of what the parents tell the authorities to record on the birth
certificate, with no questions asked. The chief advocate of the Louisiana law at
the time it was passed, a New Orleans lawyer who asked not to have his name
published, said he was then representing a white family whose child was given a
black birth certificate because when the documents came through the state
office, someone ''saw the name and it alerted him to the fact that the family
had a trace of Negro blood.'' A Hassle Over Fractions The lawyer traced the
family geneology and found that the child might be ''one two-hundred and
fifty-sixth Negro.'' He said he had gone to the Legislature with his bill, and
what followed was: ''I got into a hassle with some of them, and so they started
off at one onehundred and twenty-eighth, and just to have some bargaining power
I started off with an octaroon, or an eighth. We finally struck the bargain at
one thirty-second, and it sailed through. There was no debate.'' ''What I was
trying to do was help a white person get a white birth certificate,'' the lawyer
said. ''Whatever you feel on the race question, it's a fact that white people
don't want to be known as colored and maybe colored people don't want to be
known as white.'' Mrs. Phipps, who lives in Sulphur, La., with her husband,
Andy, a white, wealthy seafood wholesaler, has spent $20,000 in legal fees
trying to get the law declared unconstitutional and herself declared white. A
decision is pending in Orleans Parish Civil District Court, where hearings on
the matter were held last week. The state has spent $5,000 hiring a geneological
researcher and tracking Mrs. Phipps's heritage to prove she is black. Jack
Westholz is the attorney for the state, and though he says he does not like the
law at all, he argues that Mrs. Phipps has known for years that she is
''colored.'' Her Parents' Burial Recalled ''This is where Susie's people are
from,'' said Mr. Westholz, tracing a finger on a map across tiny communities
called Mowata, Frey and Iota along Bayou Mallet in southwest Louisiana. ''Now
you turn off Highway 13 here at Mowata, and right by this railroad track lives a
man named Daigle.'' ''He wouldn't give me a deposition, but he'll tell you he
remembers that little black-eyed Susie,'' Mr. Westholz continued. ''He'll tell
you how she nearly caused a race riot in 1969 when she planted - he uses the
word planted - her parents in the white section of the cemetery. They died two
months apart.'' Mr. Daigle was not home when a reporter visited this week.
Repeal of Law Called Unlikely ''My problem,'' Mr. Westholz said, ''is not
whether she's black or white. My problem is how to deal with a statute that's
very burdensome. I'm looking for guidelines. If she loses and I receive no
guidelines, then I've lost.'' He added that the Legislature was not likely to
repeal the law because the issue was too ''hot.'' The issue is as old as the
Louisiana Purchase and no less heated now, nearly two centuries later. A
paragraph of history would begin with the mating of the French and Spanish
colonists with black slaves. These were a Roman Catholic people who accepted
paternal responsibilities and set up their own system of classifying their
progeny. Some 64 terms evolved, beginning with ''mulato'' in Spanish,
''mulatre'' in French, then ''griffe,'' the offspring of mulatto and Negro,
''quadroon,'' ''octoroon,'' and ending with ''ahi-te-estas,'' meaning ''there
you are.'' Records Kept by Churches Elsewhere, Protestant slave owners simply
classified each infant according to the race of the mother. In Louisiana,
impeccable records of the blood mixtures were kept by the Catholic churches. The
Louisiana colonists as a matter of course freed their issue from slavery. These
were known as ''free persons of color.'' On old records, Mr. Westholz says, the
bayou where Mrs. Phipps was born is called a free-person-of-color community. In
New Orleans in the late 18th century, quadroon balls, at which white men
selected women who were one-quarter Negro to be their concubines, were extremely
popular. The 1788 New Orleans city directory lists 1,500 free women of color who
lived alone in little houses near the ramparts. The law forbade marriage between
a white and a descendant of a Negro, regardless of how remote the Negro ancestry
was. That law was not repealed until the mid-20th century. Dr. Munro Edmonson, a
professor of anthropology at Tulane University, testified last week in Mrs.
Phipps's behalf, making the points that there is no such thing as a pure race
and that there is no way to determine what percentage Negro Mrs. Phipps's slave
ancestor was. Thus, he says, there is no way to determine what percentage black
Mrs. Phipps is. Called Black Creoles In an interview, Dr. Edmonson said of the
so-called black creoles: ''From the time of the Louisiana Purchase the
Anglo-Saxons have done their dead-level best to wipe out this group of people,
and the way they've done it is to reclassify them as black. That's what this one
thirty-second law is all about, and that's what laws in this state have been
about going back before the Civil War. Beginning in the 1820's, restrictive laws
were passed against this group. In the 1840's it was against the law for anyone
free and colored to emigrate here.'' Dr. Edmonson called the present law
''nonsense.'' The free persons of color, or black creoles, gained political
power in Reconstruction and held it for quite a time. In 1896 they went all the
way to the United States Supreme Court in fighting a state statute requiring
''separate accommodations for white and colored persons in coaches on
railroads.'' That case, Plessy v. Ferguson, resulted in the ''separate but
equal'' ruling that was struck down in 1954 in Brown v. Board of Education. Many
members of this ''third caste,'' as Dr. Edmonson calls it, left the state and
passed for white. A Father 'Crossed the Line' A New Orleans woman, Gladys
Stevens, who had learned that her father had gone to California and lived for 40
years as a white lawyer, wrote in 1957: ''It is hard to say which had the
greater impact, learning after 40-odd years that Papa was alive until 1954 or
that he had 'crossed the line,' 'gone on the other side,' 'passed for white,'
whatever you want to call it. I thought he was dead.'' In a 1977 pamphlet
entitled ''Colored Creole, Color Conflict and Confusion in New Orleans,''
another woman, Aline St. Julien, wrote: ''My mother says I am Creole. My teacher
said I am Negro. Some Europeans say I am colored, and others call me nigger. Who
am I?'' Mrs. St. Julien said she was ''blissfully happy until a schoolteacher
explained that Creoles were people of mixed French and Spanish decent. ''When I
proudly stated to the whole class that I was a Creole, my teacher said what my
mother would never say, You are a Negro,'' she continued. ''I was crushed.''
'Look at Me - I'm White' Mrs. Phipps said in an interview that as a child she
went to a rural school with 29 relatives and that the subject of race never came
up. She said she had always considered herself white, that she ''married white
twice'' and that she is once and for all white. ''Look at me -I'm white,'' she
said. She produced a family photograph album, going back through three
generations of blue eyes. ''When I found out about the slave was last March,''
she said. ''We went to court March 2d, and when Jack told me about this
Margarita person I was so sick. I was so sick.'' Mr. Westholz also took
depositions from some of Mrs. Phipps's relatives, who consider themselves
''colored,'' meaning black. An aunt, Virginia Fretty, a sister of Mrs. Phipps's
mother, said, ''Well, I always followed the colored.'' Another aunt, Alcina
Jordan, said, ''I was raised colored.'' An uncle, Victor Jordan, explained how
he knew he was colored: ''Well, we just followed them. Where they'd go, we went,
and that's the way we've been raised, and that's the way after we got grown up
since that's the way we went.'' Daughters Not Told Victor and Alcina Jordan have
a son, Buford, who considers himself colored, and a daughter, Beulah, who lives
10 miles away and considers herself white and has not told her daughters about
the existence of her parents, who ''live colored,'' according to Mr. Westholz.
Among the many people here who are acutely attentive to this case are Dr. Dan
Thompson, a black sociologist at Dillard University who is the great-grandson of
a white slaveowner in Georgia, and his wife, Barbara Guillory, also a
sociologist and a distant relative of Mrs. Phipps. ''I am cheering Susie Phipps
on for two reasons,'' Dr. Thompson said. ''First, she is emphasizing something
we've said all along: It is a great advantage to be white in American society.
It costs several thousand dollars a year to be black. Schools, clubs, economic
advantages are still to this day much better if you are white.'' ''Secondly,''
he said, ''I hope her case will dramatize the foolishness of race as a criterion
in our society. I would like to see this distinction abolished. I would like to
see racial designation gone. When you apply for a job and somebody asks you your
race, it's demeaning. What the hell difference does it make? You're an American
citizen, period. 'Race Does Make a Difference' ''Finally, I would say race does
make a difference, and if I were her, by God, I'd try to get it changed too if I
could. This isn't a black woman claiming to be white. This is a white woman
disclaiming to be black.'' Mrs. Phipps said in the interview, ''Take this color
off my birth certificate. Let people look at me and tell me what I am.'' ''With
Susie,'' said her attorney, Brian Begue, ''we are talking about self-identity.
If you think of yourself a certain way and the record shows you're not, then it
is important to correct that record. Secondarily, in her part of the country,
colored is considered inferior.'' He said you could argue with the attitude all
you want, but ''country folks are hard to get around.''

[/b][color=red][/color]

fwsweet · Posted: Sun 25 Jan 2009 13:10 Post subject:

To me, the interesting thing is not whether Phipps had African ancestry. One-third of White-identified Americans have detectable ancestry from African slaves whose descendants passed through the color line within the past few centuries. Furthermore, this genetically irrefutable fact was known to the Louisiana authorities of the time. See Robert S. Stuckert, “The African Ancestry of the White American Population,” Ohio Journal of Science no. 55, May (1958): 155-160.

In other words, if the same genealogical search for Black roots had been performed on every White American, it would have revealed more White folks with Black ancestors (74 million) than there are Black folks (36 million). And the authorities knew it!

To me, the interesting question is, "Why was Phipps singled out?"

quin79 · Regular User Joined: 14 Mar 2007 {Posts: 57 }

Frank, I dont know if she was singled out or not.. But I am amazed at the lengths that the state of Louisiana went through to prove that Mrs. Phipps was black or at least had african ancestry. Basically, it was a case of proving someones "race". I believe that her case was unique in the fact that she was one of the few people to actually make an attempt to CHALLENGE the racial label on her birth certificate. How do you know you're white? How do you know your black? I think those are the most interesting questions. There are millions of self-identified white people who have african ancestry in this country. But yet they are not considered black. Queen Elisabeth has african ancestry through her great great grandmother, Queen Charlotte of England. Does that make her black? Given the fact, the one-drop rule deemed anyone with any known african ancestry black, they would be considered black. But the keyword is KNOWN. I just think that many of her assertions and statements were false in an attempt to change her racial classification on her birth certificate from colored to white. But, if she changed the label of her record, that would mean the labels of her ancestors(which are my ancestors) are a mistake as well. Louisiana is a very wacky state I tell you. A friend of mine from New Orleans recently discovered that his birth certificate does not have his race recorded on there. Isnt that interesting? When he was born, the 1/32 rule was active in Louisiana. And given the fact that both of his parents had mixed african and europeon ancestry, he thinks the persons present didnt know his "race".

fwsweet · Posted: Mon 26 Jan 2009 03:29 Post subject:

quin79 · Regular User Joined: 14 Mar 2007 {Posts: 57 }

G-Man · Moderator Joined: 27 Nov 2004 {Posts: 2904 }

More information about the Phipps case can be found in the book Creole: The History and Legacy of Louisiana's Free People of Color.

Melani23 · Superuser Joined: 30 Aug 2005 {Posts: 1159 } Location: USA

I was living in N.O and in Junior High School when this case was being tried. It was 'all the talk', but mostly among Blacks. Many felt she was perpretratin' a fraud, lol. Rolling Eyes

[I also have distant Phillips' relatives in my family, but to my knowledge no relation to Susan. Laughing

]

I vaguley remember the details of this case, but that it was vehemtly contested by the gov't officals. And I do remember the outcome - she lost her case and was legally declared Black/AA. Rolling Eyes

However, the funny thing is that Mrs. Phillps went back to being White Laughing

, none the wiser. Her children were NOT declared Black and she went back into the White community, from whence she came...LOL!

Laughing

Moral of this story: You have to look Black/part Black to be really pigeon-hold/treated as a Black. I recall reading some articles at this site where some Whites were 1-dropped and had to relocate to the Black side of town (back in the day) while other areas ignored court cases/legal prescedent and still welcomed these folks as fellow Whites, no questions asked! Smile

I have known many 'White-by-Phenotype' Creole people who do claim to be Black/AA, but unless they insist, many Whites ignore it - even in the South. I've been told that White people told them: "I don't consider you Black". LOL!

Cool

fwsweet · Posted: Tue 27 Jan 2009 20:07 Post subject:

Powell · Guru Joined: 27 Nov 2004 {Posts: 2361 }

Virginia Dominguez found that Phipps was in no way unique. She just received more publicity due to her lawsuit and the social climate of the time.

http://rutgerspress.rutgers.edu/acatalog/__White_By_Definition_1725.html

http://www.anthro.uiuc.edu/faculty/dominguez/

http://understandingkatrina.ssrc.org/Dominguez/

quin79 · Regular User Joined: 14 Mar 2007 {Posts: 57 }

Melani23 · Superuser Joined: 30 Aug 2005 {Posts: 1159 } Location: USA

Re: Powell's links-

FWIW - The Times Picayune (N.O. legal organ and newspaper) did an analysis of all Katrina related deaths several months after the storm. It noted that the majority of storm death victims (over 55%) were White elderly residents.

Hmm...notice how the media didn't hype that.... Laughing

quin79 · Regular User Joined: 14 Mar 2007 {Posts: 57 }

This is a little background on Marguertite Guillory, my ancestor as well as Susie Phipps.

http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Acres/5571/margarita.htm

http://www.chavismartin.com/guillorydocuments/slaverydoc.htm

whiteisbeautiful · Posted: Wed 07 Oct 2009 05:30 Post subject:

I'm white, as are my parents according to birth records etc. Being of nearly all Southern Italian descent I've dealt with enough inadvertent racism in the US and questions to ask myself how I'd feel if I was in Phipps position.

Honestly, its hard from your description which claims Phipps DID know of her trace ancestry and the media reports which said she had no idea and was sick etc to fairly ask how I feel about her...

Nevertheless, I think if she felt sick she should not be faulted, for Christ sake she found out she'd being classified as something that she is not by her own country and state! In one of the most racist parts of the world.
I know I'd be very sick. In California she'd have had no issues changing anything, but due to the clannish and close knit nature of race and community history in the South, the mid wife made sure she was incorrectly labeled. She has a right, every right to be angry.

Ultimately I'd be sick and angry too. No one would want to defend you in the 80's but if it had come up today, she'd most likely win, antagonizing blacks and whites and receiving death threats along the way but today she'd be able to change the records to suit reality not the one perpetrated by the ODR.

Creole GAL · Mentor Joined: 12 Mar 2007 {Posts: 373 }

Thanks Guinn.I remember reading of her story in Ebony magazine.
I wondered what had happened to her story.
In my opinion, her
birth cert. should have been changed to WA. SGPhipps is WA. The state did not change it when she brought her case up in the 1980's.
has it been changed since then?
Lets say,if a person had W on his/her birth cert. from LA,was Creole and lived as Creole/BA,married the same, and wanted it changed to BA,the state of LA would have had no problem changing it for that person.
If there was a case in reverse of hers, that would have been great for her case. Thing is, anyone who had W was leaving there.