Courts admitted Arabs to whiteness via cultural contribution discourse, not religion

Evidence

In Mohriez, Judge O’Sullivan writes magnanimously: In the understanding of the common man the Arab people belong to that division of the white race speaking the Semitic languages. Both the learned and the unlearned would compare the Arabs with the Jews towards whose naturalization every American Congress since the first has been avowedly sympathetic. As every schoolboy knows, the Arabs have at various times inhabited parts of Europe, lived along the Mediterranean, been contiguous to European nations and been assimilated culturally and otherwise, by them. From the Battle of Tours to the capitulation of Granada, history records the wars waged in Europe by the Arabs. The names of Avicenna and Averroes, the sciences of algebra and medicine, the population and the architecture of Spain and of Sicily, the very words of the English language, remind us as they would have reminded the Founding Fathers of the action and interaction of Arabic and non-Arabic elements of our culture. Indeed, to earlier centuries as to the twentieth century, the Arab people stand as one of the chief channels by which the traditions of white Europe, especially the ancient Greek traditions, have been carried into the present. It follows that even by the narrow criteria which were adopted in the opinions of Mr. Justice Sutherland the Arab passes muster as a white person. — Cyra Akila Choudhury, Racecraft and Identity in the Emergence…, 169

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: INS declared Arabs white by shared civilization, reversing court rulings to the contrary — , Selod, Saher - Forever Suspect_…, 123; Religion shaped whether courts classified Arab immigrants as White for citizenship — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim: When Racism Quashes…, 521; Courts constructed whiteness on shifting criteria including religion. — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 183 (+6 more)

Broader Connections

• INS declared Arabs white by shared civilization, reversing court rulings to the contrary #corroborates (0.85) — , Selod, Saher - Forever Suspect_…, 123
• Religion shaped whether courts classified Arab immigrants as White for citizenship #contradicts (0.85) — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 521
• Whiteness by law was defined as Christian, excluding Muslims from citizenship #contradicts (0.85) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 150
• Courts distinguished biological whiteness from culturally acceptable whiteness for citizenship #corroborates (0.80) — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 539
• Muslim identity was legally treated as proof of non-whiteness #contradicts (0.80) — Moustafa Bayoumi, How Does It Feel to Be a Problem? Being…, 979
• Early U.S. courts racialized Arab Christians as Muslim others to deny citizenship #contradicts (0.80)
• Courts constructed whiteness on shifting criteria including religion. #contradicts (0.75) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 183
• Whiteness is a manufactured legal and cultural status, not a biological condition #expands (0.75) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 1696