Ramtin Arablouei
speaker
199 appearances
5 recordings
3 series
first heard Dec 2024
last heard 29 Mar
Ramtin Arablouei’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Mar 2026 with 1.
Appearances
There really wasn't much truth to this idea. Chinese immigrants made up a very tiny percentage of the population of the United States in the 19th century. But this narrative, pushed by politicians and printed in the newspapers, became increasingly accepted.
And this effort didn't just come in the form of violent mob attacks. It was cemented into law. In 1882, Congress passed a bill called the Chinese Exclusion Act.
This is Jason Oliver Chang.
Jason says that as soon as the law passed, customs officials around the country began looking for Chinese laborers who might be in the U.S. in violation of the law.
There was also the Page Act, which barred all Chinese women, except for the wives of merchants, from entering the United States. There was also the Geary Act that required all Chinese immigrants to constantly walk around with identification papers.
And for many Chinese people in the U.S., the message was clear.
He had no idea that he would soon be stuck on a steamship off the coast of California within sight of his hometown, told by his own government that he was not allowed back into the country of his birth, that all of a sudden he was not a citizen.
Chief Justice Melville Weston Fuller was the leader of the nine justices that made up the Supreme Court. And let's just say they had a bit of a reputation.
So the United States government, represented by Holmes Conrad, swung first.
That was the first piece of Conrad's argument. But then he made a bigger, bolder claim.
Conrad was making this argument in 1897 in front of the Supreme Court, over 30 years after the ink on the 14th Amendment had dried.
The government made its argument. Then it was Wong Kim Ark's lawyers' chance to counter.
Their second claim is that this common law principle was adopted in the 14th Amendment.
Millions of immigrants from Europe and around the world had moved to the U.S. in the 19th century. They were encouraged to come and populate the West through laws like the Homestead Act. And their children who were born here were de facto citizens. They could vote, at least the men could, start companies, and they were making up more and more of the population.
So the Supreme Court was suddenly having to address a fundamental issue.
It took over a year, but finally, the Supreme Court issued a ruling in the case of U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark.
Quick note, all persons did not necessarily include Native Americans. And that's because tribes recognized by the U.S. government were considered sovereign nations with their own governments and court systems.
The court ruled that citizenship is determined by whether or not someone is born on U.S. soil, not by blood or race.
Wong Kim Ark, with the support of the Chinese six companies, had won his case. He was recognized by the U.S. government as a birthright citizen, a ruling that his lawyers knew would have an impact on generations to come. And Wong Kim Ark could finally go back to his life in San Francisco.
But Wong Kim Ark didn't need to leave the U.S. to land in trouble with authorities.
Showing 101–120 of 199 · page 6 of 10
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