—bases,” but “can only be determined in the light of history” and included only “those peoples of the white race who, at the time of the formation of the government, lived in Europe and were inured to European governmental institutions, or upon the American continent,” who, “from tradition, teaching, and environment, would be predisposed toward our form of government …

The defense' s reliance on Armenian Christianity as evidence of whiteness follows a theme among racial eligibility cases during the early twentieth century of associating whiteness with Christianity.

Wolverton had held that a Syrian applicant was a “free white person” and therefore racially eligible for naturalization.

—case were much more explicit in their use of race as a marker of a particular cultural and political disposition.

—the court reiterated the fact twice in the first paragraph of its decision: “The applicant is a Syrian, a native of the province of Palestine, and a Maronite... It may be said, further, that he was reared a Catholic, and is still of that faith” (In re

—holding that a Syrian who was “a native of the province of Palestine” and “a Turkish subject” was a “white person

In another, the court held that a Syrian could become a naturalized citizen because he was ' 'of Semitic stock, a markedly white type of race

See David Carliner, The Rights of Aliens: The Basic ACLU Guide to an Alien's Rights,(New York: Avon Books, 1977), pp. 171-172 142.

Mexicans constituted the only significant non-European group to be allowed to naturalize in the face of racial qualifications.

—granting Syrian petitioners naturalization rights on the theory that they descended from Semitic stock, possessed general acceptance as Caucasians, and had demonstrated assimilability

[BOOK] Sajjilu Arab American: A reader in SWANA studies

[BOOK] The racial Muslim: when racism quashes religious freedom