Book Quote: "I was getting ready to go out the door to work when the phone rang. I didn't want to answer it, but something told me to pick up the phone. When I did, the voice on the other end said, 'Hello, Louise, this is Alex Haley.' I was shocked " -Louise "Bunch" King

In 1924, Walter Plecker, Director of Vital Statistics, drafted and lobbied for The Racial Integrity Act, describing it as "the most perfect expression of the white ideal." Plecker directed offices under his authority to change vital statistic records and reclassify thousands of mulattoes (persons with mixed-race ancestry) as black without their consent and without notifying them. The existence of mixed-race people greatly disturbed Plecker, who was convinced that mulatto offspring were slowly contaminating the white race...referring to them as rats that needed to be stopped. Many mixed-race families came under fire from Plecker, who delighted in informing such families that they were not white, only negro (black). Shortly after, in 1930 the United States Census Bureau, under pressure from white southern legislators, discontinued using "the racial classification of mulatto" altogether. As a result, the long social recognition of mixed-race people was lost. i] Walter Plecker's belief that..."one drop of Black blood makes one Black and only Black" was a lie perpetuated by Plecker and Aryan supremacists in their effort to purify the white race. Sadly, their teaching still resonates across America today. Its residue still covers the minds of Americans, most of whom have never even heard of the one-drop rule. One-drop rule thinking, however, is so ingrained into our culture that people of all ethnicities don't even notice the many ways they perpetuate this belief...But if they pause, and look closely... they will see it.

From White to Black - pocket, Engelska, 2014