Civics 101 is supported in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Hi, Nick. Hi, Anna. Hey, Felix. Hello, Felix. Listeners, if you don't know who this is, this is Felix Poon.

Felix has been in terms with Civics for the last summer and has been a delight to work with.

I'm very glad you're here today, Felix. Yeah, and Felix, you are going to guest-tose today, right?

I am because I've got a story for you. And this story starts in 1895. A man named Wankim Arck,

his on a steamship, returning to his hometown of San Francisco, the city where he was born.

And when he lands, a customs agent says he can't enter the United States. He says,

you're Chinese, and there's a Chinese exclusion law, so you can't come in.

But you said it was his hometown of San Francisco, right? So, are you saying that someone

born on US soil was not allowed back into the country? That's right. That's what I'm saying.

And he wasn't the only one. This was actually pretty common at that time. Customs agents tried

to keep as many Chinese Americans out as they could. But some Chinese Americans sued the US

government to be granted entry. Wankim Arck sued, and his case went all the way to the Supreme Court.

And it's his case that solidifies birthright citizenship. Nowadays, pretty much everybody knows

about birthright citizenship, which is anybody born in this country as a US citizen. And that's the law.

But not many people have ever heard of Wankim Arck, and the landmark Supreme Court decision that

decided his fate and the fate of US immigration policy that endures to this day. And that, my friends,

is the story I'm going to tell you about today.

I'm Felix Poon, and this is Civics 101, the podcast refresher course on the basics of how our

democracy works. Today, the story of Wankim Arck, the man, the landmark Supreme Court case,

and the legacy of birthright citizenship.

Before I tell you about Wankim Arck, I need to tell you about the America that he was born into.

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