American by Birth: Wong Kim Ark and the Battle for Citizenship

by Carol Nackenoff, Julie Novkov

American by Birth explores the history and legacy of Wong Kim Ark and the 1898 Supreme Court case that bears his name, which established the automatic citizenship of individuals born within the geographic boundaries of the United States. In the late nineteenth century, much like the present, the United States was a difficult, and at times threatening, environment for people of color. Chinese immigrants, invited into the United States in the 1850s and 1860s as laborers and merchants, faced a wave of hostility that played out in organized private violence, discriminatory state laws, and increasing congressional efforts to throttle immigration and remove many long-term residents. The federal courts, backed by the Supreme Court, supervised the development of an increasingly restrictive and exclusionary immigration regime that targeted Chinese people. This was the situation faced by Wong Kim Ark, who had been born in San Francisco in the 1870s and who earned his living as a cook. Like many members of the Chinese community in the American West he maintained ties to China. He traveled there more than once, carrying required re-entry documents, but when he attempted to return to the United States after a journey from 1894 to 1895, he was refused entry and detained. Protesting that he was a citizen and therefore entitled to come home, he challenged the administrative decision in court. Remarkably, the Supreme Court granted him victory.

This victory was important for Wong Kim Ark, for the ethnic Chinese community in the United States, and for all immigrant communities then and to this day. Though the principle had links to seventeenth-century English common law and in the United States back to well before the American Civil War, the Supreme Court’s ruling was significant because it both inscribed the principle in constitutional terms and clarified that it extended even to the children of immigrants who were legally barred from becoming citizens. American by Birth is a richly detailed account of the case and its implications in the ongoing conflicts over race and immigration in US history; it also includes a discussion of current controversies over limiting the scope of birthright citizenship.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Law, American History, Immigration

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2021

Reviews

[Lobstergirl · Rating 4 out of 5]

If Scotus agrees to hear the case, the Trump administration will argue that the 14th Amendment (1866) didn't intend for babies born in the U.S. to parents not legally here or with temporary status to be citizens. They will focus on the "subject to the jurisdiction" of the United States language and claim that babies of noncitizen parents are not subject to U.S. jurisdiction. Traditionally that clause has meant that babies born to foreign diplomats or hostile occupying forces do not acquire birthright citizenship because their parent(s) aren't subject to U.S. jurisdiction.

The Supreme Court will have to ignore 127 years of precedents and statutes confirming the 14th Amendment's meaning, beginning with U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark (1898), in order to rule in the administration's favor.


Countries with birthright citizenship:

https://worldpopulationreview.com/cou...

"Interestingly, nearly every nation that offers birthright citizenship is located in North or South America. This is considered by many scholars to have begun in colonial times, in which European countries eager to populate their settlements in the “New World” established more lenient and immigration-friendly citizenship policies."

[Taylor Gakle]

DNF - even though I like nonfiction and was interested in the topic, the book reads like just a string of statistics and dates

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

A comprehensive guide to the history of birthright citizenship and the most famous Supreme Court case on it, Wong Kim Ark.

The authors provide a deep history into the fact of birthright citizenship in British and American law, and then apply it to the issue of Chinese immigration to the US. They then delve into the facts of the case and the arguments before the Court.

This book may not put to rest the debate over birthright citizenship, but it’s an important contribution to appreciating its history and legal background.

[Katie Lovejoy]

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