In re Young

• Decision Date: 15 August 1912
• Docket Number: 1,089.
• Citation: 198 F. 715
• Parties: In re YOUNG.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

198 F. 715

In re YOUNG.

No. 1,089.

United States District Court, W.D. Washington, Northern Division.

August 15, 1912

John Speed Smith, Chief Naturalization Examiner, for the United states.

A. J Balliet, E. S. McCord, and R. W. McClelland, for applicant.

CUSHMAN District Judge.

The following causes are relied upon by applicant: Ludlam v Ludlam, 31 Barb. (N.Y.) 486; In re Saito (C.C.) 62 F. 126; In re Kumagai (D.C.) 163 F. 922; U.S v. Balsara, 180 F. 694, 103 C.C.A. 660; In re Hallajian (C.C.) 174 F. 834; In re Mudarri (C.C.) 176 F. 465; Bessho v. U.S., 178 F. 245, 101 C.C.A. 605; In re Camille (C.C.) 6 Fed. 256; In re Knight (D.C.) 171 F. 299.

This applicant for naturalization has fully complied with all of the requirements of the statutes as an alien petitioner to be admitted as a citizen of the United States, but it was heretofore decided by the judge of this court that he was not eligible for the reason that he was not a white man. By the proofs submitted, it was shown that he was born at a place in Yokohama, Japan, under the dominion of the Emperor of Germany, that he is a subject of the Emperor of Germany, and that his father is a German and his mother a Japanese woman. The court ruled that the right to become a naturalized citizen of the United States depends upon parentage and blood, and not upon nationality or status. After the making of this ruling, it was ordered that the cause be reopened for further consideration, presentation of argument and authorities, and disposition, which hearing has now been had.

In the former ruling, the court approved and adopted as its own the reasoning in the decision of In re Knight, 171 F. 299, which authority is reinforced by In re Ah Yup, 1 Fed.Cas. 223, No. 104, refusing the right of naturalization to a Chinaman, which case was decided prior to the act of May 6, 1882, section 14 of which case was at Large, 61, c. 126 (U.S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 1333)) expressly prohibits the admission of Chinese to citizenship; Fong Yue Ting v. United States, 149 U.S. 698, 716, 13 Sup.Ct. 1016, 37 L.Ed. 905; In re Camille (C.C.) 6 Fed. 256, in which latter case the son of a white Canadian father and an Indian mother was denied the right of naturalization; In re Saito (C.C.) 62 F. 126, rejecting the application of a Japanese; In re Kanaka Nian, 6 Utah, 259, 21 P. 993, 4 L.R.A. 726, to the same effect in the case of a Hawaiian; Elk v. Wilkins, 112 U.S. 94, 5 Sup.Ct. 41, 28 L.Ed. 643.

The fact that the petitioner was born within the German legation, giving him the status of a German subject, in no way affects the question. 'The power to say when and under what circumstances an alien may become a citizen belongs to Congress. ' In re Camille, supra. Congress has, by section 2169, R.S. (U.S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 1333), limited the right of naturalization to those aliens being 'free white persons and to aliens of African nativity and to persons of African descent.'

The term 'white person' must be given its common or popular meaning. As commonly understood, the expression includes all European races and those Caucasians belonging to the races around the Mediterranean Sea, whether they are considered as 'fair whites' or 'dark whites,' as classified by Huxley, and notwithstanding that certain of the southern and eastern European races are technically classified as of Mongolian or Tartar origin.

It is just as certain that, whether we consider the Japanese as of the Mongolian race, or the Malay race, they are not included in what are commonly understood as 'white persons.' In the abstractions of higher mathematics, it may be plausibly said that the half of infinity is equal to the whole of infinity; but in the case of such a concrete thing as the person of a human being it cannot be said that one who is half white and half brown or yellow is a white person, as commonly understood. In Louisiana, a person was deemed white if the African blood did not exceed one-eighth. The same was true in the Colonial Code Noir of France, 2 Kent, 72, note 'b.' In Ohio, if there was more white blood than black or red, the person was considered white; but, if the colored blood was equal, the person was not white. Jeffries v. Ankeny, 11 Ohio, 372; Gray v. State, ...