The US Supreme Court itself declared polygamy ‘Asiatic’ and ‘African’ in origin.

Evidence

The popular association of Mormonism with Islam validated accusations of imposture, arbitrary power, and infidelity. Congressman Caleb Lyon of New York stated in 1854, “Point me to a nation where polygamy is practiced, and I will point you to heathens and barbarians. It seriously affects the Prosperity of States, it retards civilization, it uproots Christianity.” The US Supreme Court agreed in 1878: “Polygamy has always been odious among the northern and western nations of Europe, and, until the establishment of the Mormon Church, was almost exclusively a feature of the life of Asiatic and of African people.” Although the Mormon Church instructed its followers to abandon polygamy in 1890, Mormons’ racialization as barbarian, savage, and uncivilized persisted until American national identity expanded to be Judeo-Christian in the mid-twentieth century. — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 328

Categorization

• XREF: The 1878 Supreme Court quote directly parallels the colonial logic in the immodesty moral-panic piece — an institution codifying religious practice as racial/civilizational inferiority. — connects to: The Supreme Court framed monogamy as the racial foundation of democratic society; Supreme Court rhetoric linked polygamy to racialized Asiatic and African family norms — Cyra Akila Choudhury, Racecraft and Identity in the Emergence…, 142
• SHARE: The 1878 SCOTUS quote is a fantastic single fact for anyone teaching religious liberty or the law of culture.
• SEED: Angle: ‘The Supreme Court once ruled that a religion of your own makes you non-White’ — polygamy as a racial marker in US law.