Question

why were many asian immigrants unable to become american citizens under the 1795 naturalization law, while mexican immigrants were allowed citizenship

Answer 1

• The first statute in the United States to codify naturalization law. Alternately known as the Nationality Act, the Naturalization Act of 1790 restricted citizenship to "any alien, being a free white person" who had been in the U.S. for two years. In effect, it left out indentured servants, slaves, and most women. This implied that black and, later, Asian immigrants were not eligible to be naturalized, but it said nothing about the citizenship status of non-white persons born on American soil. Subsequent nineteenth-century legislation included a racial requirement for citizenship. It was one of several early immigration laws that shaped the framework and outcome of the Ozawa v. United States case in 1922.

• Upon declaring independence from Great Britain, the leaders of the new republic aspired to create a distinct American nationality and minimize the risk of another monarchy. When they drafted the 1787 Constitution, they did not define what they meant by "natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States" and said very little about immigration. As historian Rudolph Vecoli notes, "one became an American by choice, not by descent," through a common commitment to the doctrine of natural rights. Consequently, the only distinction between "natural born" and naturalized citizens it made was that the latter were to be ineligible for the presidency. It did authorize Congress to "establish a uniform Rule of naturalization" and allowed for the "migration or importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit," resulting in a steady flow of slaves until 1808.