Bhagat Singh Thind

In more detail

Thind, a Sikh from Punjab, arrived at Seattle in 1913. In July 1918 he began serving in the US Army at Camp Lewis, Washington, in his turban. On 9 December 1918 he was granted citizenship in Washington State. Four days later it was revoked: a naturalisation examiner charged that as a “Hindu” he did not meet the law’s racial rule. Section 2169 of the Revised Statutes let only “free white persons”, “aliens of African nativity” and “persons of African descent” become citizens by naturalisation. With the war over, he was honourably discharged, as a non-citizen.

In 1920 Judge Charles Wolverton of the US District Court in Portland, Oregon, ruled that he was “entitled to his naturalization”. The government filed to cancel the certificate, lost, and appealed to the Circuit Court of Appeals, which certified a question to the Supreme Court: “Is a high caste Hindu of full Indian blood, born at Amrit Sar, Punjab, India, a white person within the meaning of section 2169, Revised Statutes?” (261 U.S. 206). “Hindu” was the US label for any Indian; Thind was a Sikh.

Three months earlier, in Ozawa v. United States (1922), the court had held that the words “white person” meant “a person of what is popularly known as the Caucasian race” and imported “a racial and not an individual test” (260 U.S. 197).

What his lawyers argued, and why the film does not endorse it. Thind’s lawyers argued from the race science of the time: that anthropologists classed the people of north and north-west India, “including the Punjab”, as Aryan and so Caucasian (argument for Thind, 261 U.S. 205), and that caste had kept that ancestry from mixing: “With this caste system prevailing, there was comparatively a small mixture of blood between the different castes” (261 U.S. 206). Historian Johanna Ogden calls it “the convoluted math of racial pseudo-science”, and notes that it leaned on caste “despite his being a Sikh, a religion doctrinally opposed to caste”. She also explains why it was made at all: the law’s “white persons” rule forced Asian applicants into “an ugly American game: seeking Whiteness legally premised on distancing from Blackness”. The film reports the argument as his lawyers’ and names it race science. It does not say he was Caucasian or white, and it does not endorse the argument: race science is discredited, and Sikhi rejects caste. The court’s reading was racial too: it called its own test “a racial test” (261 U.S. 209).

On 19 February 1923 the court, in an opinion by Justice Sutherland, set the science aside: “The words of the statute are to be interpreted in accordance with the understanding of the common man from whose vocabulary they were taken” (261 U.S. 209), and “white persons” was synonymous with “Caucasian” “only as that word is popularly understood”, “whatever may be the speculations of the ethnologist” (261 U.S. 214 to 215). Its last line: “Answer to question No. 1, No.” (261 U.S. 215).

His citizenship was formally cancelled in 1926, and dozens of other Indian Americans lost theirs. Having given up British status to naturalise, some were left stateless.

In 1935 Congress waived “the racial limitations” for “any alien veteran of the World War” who met the act’s conditions (49 Stat. 397). Thind petitioned under it, and on 2 March 1936 he was admitted to citizenship in New York, certificate No. 3954377. On 2 July 1946 the Luce-Celler Act made “persons of races indigenous to India” racially eligible to naturalise (60 Stat. 416). Thind kept his citizenship until his death in 1967.

Notes and caveats

• The Army. The National Park Service calls him “the first turbaned soldier in the American military”; Ogden says “one of the first turbaned Sikhs to serve in the U.S. Army”. The film claims neither. He served six months, all at Camp Lewis, and never saw combat; the film never says he fought.
• No title. Many accounts call him Dr Thind and credit him with a PhD from UC Berkeley. Ogden found no record of his attendance or a degree, so the film uses no title.
• Four days. Two peer-reviewed sources (Deslippe 2023, Kanwar 2023) give “four days”; others say “days later”. The film’s REVOKED 13 DEC 1918 is 9 December plus four days, which the family’s site also states. No original record of the revocation was inspected.
• 1920. Wolverton’s opinion is dated 18 October 1920; the certificate is reported as 18 November 1920. The film says only 1920. “Petition granted.” on screen is the law reporter’s summary at the head of the case, and the film labels it REPORTED DISPOSITION; Wolverton’s own last words are “entitled to his naturalization”.
• The road to the Supreme Court ran through a bill to cancel his certificate, its dismissal, an appeal to the Circuit Court of Appeals and that court’s certified questions. “The government’s appeal reached the Supreme Court” covers the chain; the government did not appeal straight there. The court’s second question (on the 1917 Immigration Act) was never answered and is left out.
• “Pure” is the film’s summary word, from Ogden’s “racial purity”. Counsel did not use it, so it is not in quotation marks; counsel’s own words are on screen with the page. One sentence of the same argument on p. 206 compares caste to American attitudes to Black Americans; the film neither voices nor shows it.
• “The common man”. Ozawa had already said “popularly known” in 1922. The film shows the two readings side by side and the court choosing one; it does not claim the court invented a test for Thind or reversed itself.
• Dozens. Counts of the Indian Americans who lost citizenship run from “some fifty” to “more than seventy”. The film says dozens and gives no number. The on-screen 1923 TO 1926 follows the 1926 Senate hearing’s list.
• 1935 or 1936. The National Park Service says he became a citizen in 1935. The Chief Examiner’s memorandum of 18 February 1937 and Ogden give 2 March 1936; 1935 appears to be the year he petitioned.
• The 1935 act had conditions: service between 6 April 1917 and 11 November 1918, an honourable discharge, permanent residence, and a petition before 1 January 1937. “Whatever their race” means race no longer barred them, not that every veteran qualified.
• 1946. The National Park Service gives 1940; the statute is 1946, “Approved July 2, 1946” (some accounts say 3 July). It amended section 303 of the Nationality Act of 1940, not section 2169. “Could become citizens” means racially eligible to naturalise, with a quota of 100 immigrants a year from India; it does not mean every Indian in the US qualified.
• The cards are typeset by us, not replicas. Cards 1 and 2 show an empty “No.” field because their numbers were not found; only card 3’s number (No. 3954377) is from a record.

What the film leaves out

why the government fought him (the examiner raised his ties to the Ghadar party, and historians read part of the opposition as politics; the motive is argued, not settled). The Cable Act, under which American women who married men ineligible for citizenship risked their own. That the remaining racial bars on naturalisation were lifted in 1952. That Dalip Singh Saund, a Sikh from Punjab, campaigned for the 1946 act and was elected to Congress in 1956. Thind’s later life as a lecturer on spirituality, based in Los Angeles, for about forty years. No photograph is used: the 1918 photographs of Thind in uniform have no clear public-domain status, and the reel shows no people.