feb 19, 1923 - US v Bhagat Singh Thind

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Bhagat Singh Thind, an immigrant from India who had served in the US army during World War 1 wanted to become an American citizen. The supreme court unanimously agreed that Thind wasn’t white, and upheld the ban against Asian Indians. The purpose of this was to prove even more that Asians could not be American citizens, no matter what specific ethnicity they were or what they had done for America in the past. This shows the American government was incredibly confident that Asians and Americans were two completely different types of people, and that they could never mix. Even though Thind had served for the US during World War 1, they couldn’t get past their stereotypes that all Asians are ‘different’ and not American, so they ruled against him.

“First Arrivals, First Reactions.” History, Art & Archives, 2018.
https://history.house.gov/Exhibitions-and-Publications/APA/Historical-Essays/Exclusion
and-Empire/First-Arrivals/

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