ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the history of the term “personhood” as it becomes increasingly important from the mid-1800s on. Immigrants, African Americans, Native Americans, and women were “persons” rather than citizens but it is important to note that this term did not mean second class citizenship. Rather, personhood standards were introduced just as eugenic policies were increasingly popular, providing a legal mechanism for exclusion and dehumanization. The Chinese Exclusion cases were paradigmatic in claiming that foreigners were “non-persons” at the federal level, while “persons” at the state and local level. An opposite trajectory occurred for racial minorities who were “persons” at the federal level but disenfranchised in multiple ways at the state and local level, particularly through Jim Crow. The treatment of Native Americans was founded on the plenary power doctrine – also established as the authority to rule over all matters of immigration – and allowed for legal recognition and yet, non-personhood. This doctrine provided the basis for removal and confinement. Although marginalized groups were “persons” or non-persons for different reasons, the development of (non-)personhood in one sphere strengthened that in others. As Monica Varsanyi suggests, since 1996 non-personhood has dovetailed with neoliberal policies to produce a politically vulnerable and thus, highly exploitable worker.
