eme North, persons are white within the meaning of
the Constitution of Michigan who have less than one-fourth of Negro
blood.

In Ohio the rule, as established by numerous decisions of the Supreme
Court, was that a preponderance of white blood constituted a person a
white man in the eye of the law, and entitled him to the exercise of all
the civil rights of a white man. By a retrogressive step the color-line
was extended in 1861 in the case of marriage, which by statute was
forbidden between a person of pure white blood and one having a visible
admixture of African blood. But by act of legislature, passed in the
spring of 1887, all laws establishing or permitting distinctions of
color were repealed. In many parts of the state these laws were always
ignored, and they would doubtless have been repealed long ago but for
the sentiment of the southern counties, separated only by the width of
the Ohio River from a former slave-holding state. There was a bill
introduced in the legislature during the last session to re-enact the
"black laws," but it was hopelessly defeated; the member who introduced
it evidently mistook his latitude; he ought to be a member of the
Georgia legislature.

But the state which, for several reasons, one might expect to have the
strictest laws in regard to the relations of the races, has really the
loosest. Two extracts from decisions of the Supreme Court of South
Carolina will make clear the law of that state in regard to the color
line.

The definition of the term mulatto, as understood in this state,
seems to be vague, signifying generally a person of mixed white
or European and Negro parentage, in whatever proportions the blood
of the two races may be mingled in the individual. But it is not
invariably applicable to every admixture of African blood with the
European, nor is one having all the features of a white to be ranked
with the degraded class designated by the laws of this state as
persons of color, because of some remote taint of the Negro race.
The line of distinction, however, is not ascertained by any rule of
law.... Juries would probably be justified in holding a person to
be white in whom the admixture of African blood did not exceed the
proportion of one-eighth. But it is in all cases a question for the
jury, to be determined by them upon the evidence of features and
complexion afforded by inspection, the evidence of reputation as
to parentage, and th