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69 N.Y.U. Ann. Surv. Am. L. 29 (2013-2014)
Between Muslim and White: The Legal Construction of Arab American Identity

handle is hein.journals/annam69 and id is 41 raw text is: BETWEEN MUSLIM AND WHITE: THE LEGAL CONSTRUCTION OF ARAB AMERICAN IDENTITY KHALED A. BEYDOUN* ABSTRACT This Article examines the legal origins of Arab American iden- tity during the racially restrictive Naturalization Era (1790 through 1952), when whiteness was a prerequisite for American citizen- ship. Ten of the fifty-three naturalization hearings during this era involved a petitioner from the Arab World. Judges during the Naturalization Era viewed Arab as synonymous with Muslim identity. Because Muslims were presumed to be non-white, and Arabs were presumed to be Muslims, Arabs were presumptively inel- igible for citizenship. This presumption, however, could be rebut- ted. Arab Christians could-and did-invoke the fact of their Christianity to argue that they were white. These arguments some- times secured citizenship for Christian petitioners, but did not al- ways rebut the presumption that every immigrant from the Arab World was Muslim. Legal scholars have paid insufficient attention to the Arab nat- uralization cases. These cases reveal not only how judges viewed re- ligion as a proxy for race, but also the ways in which they conflated Arab identity with Muslim identity to do so. This conflation persists today in that many people continue to believe that Arab is synony- mous with Muslim, a conflation that is especially salient following the September 11th terrorist attacks. Almost all of the current liter- ature on Arab Americans centers on how the government's re- sponse to 9/11 made people perceived to be Arabs, Muslims, or Middle Eastern vulnerable to legalized forms of racial surveillance, subordination, and violence. * Assistant Professor of Law, Barry Law School; Critical Race Studies Fellow, UCLA School of Law. The author would like to thank Khaled Abou El Fadl, Hishaam Aidi, Abed Ayoub, Sahar Aziz, Ash Bali, Fikrieh Beydoun, Luke Boso, Samuel Bray, Karen Brodkin, Devon Carbado, Maureen Carroll, Kim Crenshaw, Laura Gomez, Nadim Hallal, Timothy Han, Cheryl Harris, Jerry Kang, Randa Kayyali, Jasleen Kohli, Erik Love, Hiroshi Motomura, Jyoti Nanda, Jason Oh, Gabriela Ortiz, Ediberto Roman, Annalise Glauz-Todrank, William Wood, Jordan Blair Woods, William Youmans, and Noah Zatz. 29 Imaged with the Permission of N.Y.U. Annual Survey of American Law

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