White by Law: The Legal Construction of Race

In 1790, Congress restricted naturalization to “white persons,” creating a racial requirement for US citizenship that endured until 1952. In Chapter 1, Haney López problematizes the concept of “white persons” by examining how definitions of whiteness shifted as new immigrants arrived in the US. Several cases addressing the “white person” prerequisite reached the highest state and federal courts, including the US Supreme Court. Citizenship applicants from various parts of Asia lost their cases, while those from Mexico and Armenia won. The courts were inconsistent with petitioners from India, Arabia, and Syria.

These cases are important because they forced the courts to define “white persons,” in addition to requiring rationales for the racial divisions being created. The courts weighed in on a wide range of issues, such as skin color, facial features, place of origin, ancestry, and culture, as well as scientific speculation and popular opinion. Chapter 1 studies the cases to generate a theory about the legal construction of race and its influence on contemporary white identity, introducing key concepts that recur throughout the book.

The Racial Prerequisite Cases

This section introduces readers to racial prerequisite cases. The cases were central to racial debates in the US after the Civil War, a period that saw a rise in both immigration and nativism, where established inhabitants were protected over immigrants.