Legal History Commons^™

Paradoxical Citizenship, Amanda Frost

William & Mary Law Review

In their article, The “Free White Person” Clause of the Naturalization Act of 1790 as Super-Statute, Gabriel J. Chin and Paul Finkelman make a powerful case that the Naturalization Act of 1790 is a “super-statute” that has shaped not only U.S. immigration law and policy, but also America’s conception of itself as a “White nation.”

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This Comment explores the conflict between the Naturalization Act’s racial restrictions on citizenship (and its proponents’ vision of the United States as a White nation) and the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause (and its proponents’ vision of the United States as a multiracial …