Linguistic evidence threatened to render non-Europeans white under naturalization law

Evidence

The second Dow case, In re Dow, was a rehearing of the original case, in which the court again considered the quagmire of ethno-racial and linguistic “scientific” evidence that risked casting such a wide white net that it would include non-Europeans like Dow. The judge reiterated that when Congress passed its first, foundational immigration law in 1790, it could not possibly have cal ed on knowledge of the Indo-European language tree that connects the preponderance of European languages to Asia via Persian and Sanskrit: It is safe to assume that no member of the congress that passed the act of 1790 knew either Sanscrit [ sic] or ancient Persian, or had the remotest idea of the connection between the Aryan or Indo-European languages. — Neda Maghbouleh, The Limits of Whiteness, 63

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes the corrected-claim thread on Indo-European language trees as a racial sorting device, tying Persian/Sanskrit connection to whiteness.