The extent of American racism is widely underestimated. Northerners like to think that it is a southern white problem - which of course it is. But people are ignorant of the northern history. For example growing up in Levittown, Long Island - the deeds contained a covenant to sell only to persons of the Caucasian race. Of course by then Shelley v. Kramer had made it an illegal covenant. But that didn't prevent people from silent complicity as they bought houses via their 100% VA GI Bill mortgages. Levitt did not sell to black people.
Now Gerard Magliocca is fresh off American Founding Son - John Bingham and the Invention of the Fourteenth Amendment, his biography of Radical Republican John Bingham. Now he is thinking about doing the same for Justice Sutherland. In that effort he posted on U.S. v. Bhagat Singh Thind who had been denied citizenship because he was not "Caucasian". He explained that he was a Singh, an Aryan. But Justice Sutherland says not to get too technical. We know what "white" means....
Concurring Opinions » United States v. Bhagat Singh Thind:
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Now Gerard Magliocca is fresh off American Founding Son - John Bingham and the Invention of the Fourteenth Amendment, his biography of Radical Republican John Bingham. Now he is thinking about doing the same for Justice Sutherland. In that effort he posted on U.S. v. Bhagat Singh Thind who had been denied citizenship because he was not "Caucasian". He explained that he was a Singh, an Aryan. But Justice Sutherland says not to get too technical. We know what "white" means....
"...“What we now hold is that the words ‘free white persons’ are words of common speech, to be interpreted in accordance with the understanding of the common man, synonymous with the word ‘Caucasian’ only as that word is popularly understood. As so understood and used, whatever may be the speculations of the ethnologist, it does not include the body of people to whom the appellee belongs. It is a matter of familiar observation and knowledge that the physical group characteristics of the Hindus render them readily distinguishable from the various groups of persons in this country commonly recognized as white. The children of English, French, German, Italian, Scandinavian, and other European parentage, quickly merge into the mass of our population and lose the distinctive hallmarks of their European origin. On the other hand, it cannot be doubted that the children born in this country of Hindu parents would retain indefinitely the clear evidence of their ancestry. It is very far from our thought to suggest the slightest question of racial superiority or inferiority. What we suggest is merely racial difference, and it is of such character and extent that the great body of our people instinctively recognize it and reject the thought of assimilation.” - See more at: http://www.concurringopinions.com/archives/2013/09/united-states-v-bhagat-singh-thind.html#sthash.ZSKm2GUO.dpuf"
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