Rally Seeks to Add Multiracial Category on U.S. Census Forms

WASHINGTON —  Carrying signs that read “I’m Proud to Be Me” and “I’ll Choose My Category,” about 200 multiracial Americans held a rally Saturday to press the government to introduce a multiracial category for the 2000 census.

“To be proud of both your ancestries, you need something like that. It’s not anything we should be ashamed of,” said Gwen Loftus. Loftus, an African American married to a white man, had a sign on her daughter’s stroller: “Yes, I’m Her Mother.”

Multiracial groups have been lobbying the federal government for a change in racial categories that appear on official and unofficial forms, and speakers at the rally complained that they were not treated equally.

“We stand for the struggle to gain acceptance for being honest about racial tolerance, racial acceptance, racial integration,” said B.J. Winchester, president of the Unity Multiracial Social Group of Jacksonville, Fla.

Couples in interracial marriages complain that their mixed-race children have no appropriate category to check on many forms. They usually choose the “other” classification, if it exists, one that they feel does not identify the children accurately.

Some say a new category would eliminate the hurt they sometimes feel when forced to make the choice.

Dawn Loftus, 16, said when her class had to fill out a form for a test, she complained to the teacher that the form did not have an “other” category on it.

“She said you just consider yourself as black,” said Dawn, one of Gwen Loftus’ three daughters. “I was confused about it. . . . I didn’t want to deny my father.”