Statement on the Civil Rights Act of 1957, (14 June 1957) Washington, D.C.

Context

When Dalip Singh Saund came to the United States, South Asian residents were ineligible for citizenship. Saund was born in Punjab, India in 1899, and immigrated to the United States at twenty years of age to further his education. Even though Saund planned to return to India once he finished school, his next trip to India happened forty years later as a Member of Congress.1 After Saund earned his master’s and doctorate degrees at the University of California, Berkeley, he developed an interest in local affairs.2 Saund delivered robust speeches, joined community organizations, and served as president of the Hindustan Association of America. While delivering a speech at a Unitarian church, he met Marian Kosa, a UCLA student. The two fell in love and married in 1928.3

Despite Saund’s community ties, life in California was not without its challenges. In 1923, the Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Thind that South Asians were ineligible to naturalize as American citizens.4 Under the Cable Act of 1922, Saund’s wife was forced to relinquish her American citizenship to marry Saund because he was considered a “foreigner ineligible for citizenship.”5 When Saund applied to start a farm, he was rejected under the Alien-Land Law, which prohibited “aliens ineligible for citizenship” from purchasing land.6 As an interracial couple, Saund and his wife faced harsh discrimination and were legally obligated to enroll their children in a segregated school.7

In the face of such challenges, Saund chose to fight discrimination by organizing locally. During the 1940s, Saund campaigned on behalf of thousands of other disenfranchised South Asians for their citizenship rights to be recognized.8 His activism captured the attention of Representatives Emanuel Celler (D-NY) and Clare Boothe Luce (R-CT), two congressional leaders deeply involved in citizenship and immigration issues. Together, they introduced the Luce-Celler Act, which allowed Indian immigrants to naturalize as citizens for the first time in U.S. history.9 President Harry S. Truman signed the Bill into law in June 1946. Thirty years after arriving in Ellis Island, Saund officially became a U.S. citizen in 1949.10

Recognizing the power of his citizenship and his right to vote, Saund announced his intention to run for Congress in 1955, representing California’s 29th District. In 1956, Saund won the election with 52 percent of the vote against Republican Jacqueline Cochran, a popular pilot and business executive. He was sworn in on January 3, 1957. His appointment made him the first Asian American, first Indian American, and first non-Abrahamic religious person to be elected to the U.S. Congress.11

While Saund celebrated his victory, political turmoil was brewing across the country. The Democratic Party was experiencing intense intraparty polarization, which required Saund to take firm stances early in his congressional tenure. In May 1954, the Supreme Court delivered the landmark decision of Brown v. Board of Education.12 The case integrated public schools by overturning the “separate but equal” precedent instituted decades earlier in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896).13 Three years later, the Civil Rights Act of 1957 was introduced. As disagreements over desegregation and racial integration lingered, southern Democrats framed the Bill as disregarding “state rights,” while northern Democrats saw an opportunity to federally protect voting rights. Senator Strom Thurmond (D-SC), an ardent segregationist, delivered the longest filibuster in American history against the Act, which lasted over 24 hours.14 Congressman Saund argued in favor of this Bill that sought federal voting protections for Black Americans.

Saund expressed his support for the Civil Rights Act in a speech delivered on the House floor on June 14, 1957. Saund addressed his peers directly, pleading with them to “modify [their] way of thinking.”15 He cited his own experience as an immigrant from India, his struggle for citizenship, and his firm belief in the absurdity of denying Americans the right to vote.16 Saund connected his battle for citizenship with the Civil Rights Act, arguing “… in Uncle Sam’s family there are no foster children.”17 Saund’s speech solidified his stance that as a member of Congress, he would not sacrifice his moral convictions for the sake of political unity.18 The Civil Rights Bill passed the House with 286 members voting in favor and 126 members voting against.19 The Act established a Civil Rights Division in the Justice Department, increased federal power to prosecute those who prevent other citizens from voting, and created a commission on Civil Rights to investigate claims of voter infringement.20

Saund served three terms in Congress from 1957 to 1963. In May 1962, he suffered a life-altering stroke that rendered him unable to walk or speak on his own. Saund sought re-election in 1962 and even won the Democratic nomination for the seat, but he was unable to campaign effectively and lost to Patrick M. Martin (R-CA) in 1962. After complications from a second stroke, he passed away in his California home on April 22, 1973.21 Saund was survived by his wife, three children, and many grandchildren.22

Endnotes

  1. “Saund, Dalip Singh (Judge),” US House of Representatives: History, Art & Archives, accessed August 2, 2022, https://history.house.gov/People/Detail/21228.
  2. Dalip Singh Saund, Congressman from India, (New York City: E. P. Dutton and Company, 1960), http://www.saund.org/dalipsaund/cfi/cfi.html.
  3. Saund, Congressman from India.
  4. United States v. Bhagat Singh Thind, 261 U.S. 204 (1923).
  5. An Act Relative to the Naturalization and Citizenship of Married Women, Pub. L. No. 67-346, Stat. 42 (1922): 1021.
  6. “Alien Land Laws in California (1913 & 1920),” Immigration History, 2019, https://immigrationhistory.org/item/alien-land-laws-in-california-1913-1920/.
  7. Tom Patterson, “The Triumph and Tragedy of Dalip Singh Saund,” California Historian, June 1992, https://www-tc.pbs.org/rootsinthesand/dalip.pdf.
  8. Ipsita Chakravarty, “The Congressman from India: Dalip Singh Saund Won the First Battle for Settlers in California,” Scroll India, September 26, 2015, https://scroll.in/article/757515/the-congressman-from-india-dalip-singh-saund-won-the-first-battle-for-settlers-in-california.
  9. Grace Pusey, “Today In History: Luce-Celler Act Signed in 1946,” South Asian American Digital Archives, July 2, 2014, https://www.saada.org/news/20140702-3609.
  10. Saund, Congressman from India.
  11. Bhuvan Lall, “The Life of Dalip Singh Saund: Indian Blood and American Dream,” Daily Guardian, June 25, 2021, https://web.archive.org/web/20211105125705/https://thedailyguardian.com/the-life-of-dalip-singh-saund-indian-blood-and-american-dream/.
  12. Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka 347 US 483 (1954).
  13. The notion of “separate but equal” refers to a doctrine instituted in the landmark decision of Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) by U.S. Supreme Court. This doctrine allowed states and local governments to institute segregationist laws on the basis of race. Effectively, it permitted states to institute segregated schools, transportation, bathrooms, and other public facilities. See: “Separate But Equal,” Cornell Law School, January 2022, https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/separate_but_equal; Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896).
  14. Mark Memmott, “How Did Strom Thurmond Last Through His 24-Hour Filibuster?,” NPR, March 7, 2013, https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/03/07/173736882/how-did-strom-thurmond-last-through-his-24-hour-filibuster.
  15. Dalip Singh Saund, “Statement on the Civil Rights Act of 1957,” Congressional Record, 85th Congress, 1st sess., from June 14, 1957, https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-CRECB-1957-pt7/pdf/GPO-CRECB-1957-pt7-6-2.pdf, 9197, para. 8.
  16. Saund, “Statement on the Civil Rights Act of 1957,” paras. 3, 7.
  17. Saund, “Statement on the Civil Rights Act of 1957,” para. 5.
  18. Saund, Congressman from India.
  19. “HR 6127 Civil Rights Act of 1957,” Govtrack, accessed August 2, 2022, https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/85-1957/h42.
  20. “Civil Rights Act of 1957,” Civil Rights Digital Library, July 22, 2022, http://crdl.usg.edu/events/civil_rights_act_1957/?Welcome.
  21. “Saund, Dalip Singh (Judge).”
  22. Patterson, “The Triumph and Tragedy of Dalip Singh Saund.”