Marriage and Women's Citizenship in the United States - Essay Example

This paper will discuss whether the United States was a land of opportunity in the 1960s. In order to understand the trends of naturalization that allowed people to form an attachment with the United States as a political entity and other American during the 1960s, it is rational to review the trends in the previous decades (Cott 1443). Prior to 1850, the United States allowed the people of the ‘white’ descent to enter and settle in the United States of America as citizens. The absorption of whites and the conferment of civil, citizenship and political rights occurred without any barriers.

Evidently, whites had the advantage of exploiting the opportunities in the United States without any barriers. On the contrary, the people of color faced the compulsion to work as slaves and labors. Prior to the 1850s, the United States lacked any stipulations that defined concisely the requirements of becoming a citizen. However, 1855 saw the enactment of the initial law that defined the qualifications that an individual had to meet before successful naturalization (1450). This law still allowed whites the unlimited permission to become citizens of the United States as long as they were willing to express allegiance to the state and assume the responsibility of full citizens.

Moreover, this law highlighted that white women marred by American citizens were allowed to become citizens. However, women of color that intended to get married or were already married to American whites did not qualify for the naturalization process. Moreover, if American males bore children, these children qualified for citizenship. The 1855 law emphasized the factor of racial qualification because it forbade both women of color to become naturalized as American citizens. Even in cases where litigations resulted, many United States courts applied the 1855 stipulation with the racial qualification clause as the central exclusion factor (1465).

The 1855 limited people of color from accessing the opportunities in the United States. In 1840, some minority groups had gained entry into the United States and had access to the opportunities at that time. Since the law viewed women as dependents, those married by Americancitizens lacked the privilege of owning property. Moreover, the man served as a critical intermediary that linked the women to the state. In this case, women married to American males had to be content with the husband’s opinion, since the man passed for the family head with a dominant role as defined by the law (1467).

Evidently, the surging number of people who sought the naturalization process places emphasis that the United States was a territory with multiple opportunities. The enactment of the laws sought to regulate the number of people who accessed such opportunities. The 1860s saw the immigration department governed by the 1855 act. This act defined the requirements of people that wanted to become citizens to meet. During this period, farming was a leading agricultural activity after the exploitation of the California gold rush that had happened two decades prior to the 1960s (1470).

However, the 1860s saw reinforcement of the 1855 act that emphasized on the exclusion of certain people who sought to access these opportunities. Chinese women were adversely