Immigrants and the Right to Petition - NYU Law Review

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NEW YORK UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW
[Vol. 78:667
them across each colony; budgetary struggles to accommodate the financial
hardships imposed on local communities; and legislation providing
for "binding out" of Acadian children as indentured
laborers.' 2 6 The refugees responded as the disenfranchised long had
done in Britain: by petitioning. 127 Acadian petitions were directed to
the King, 12 8 other authorities in Britain, 12 9 and even to French and
Spanish officials.
30
Acadians in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania petitioned
in opposition to legislation authorizing the forced binding out
of children by local officials and won repeal of the measures in both
colonies. 131 Refugees in Maryland and Massachusetts petitioned for
permission to leave the colony or to be reunited with relatives. 132 At
least one group of Acadians actually petitioned to determine their citizenship
status. 1 33
The lack of a relationship between citizenship status and the right
to petition was not unusual in colonial America. "Citizenship" was a
fundamentally unsettled concept in the colonies and did not serve as
the classifier of rights implied by the Verdugo-Urquidez majority; even
a political right of the highest order, the franchise, was frequently extended
to noncitizens under colonial laws. 134 While the colonists generally
did consider themselves subjects of Britain, subjectship law in
126 See generally Griffiths, supra note 123, at 95-127; Plank, supra note 123, at 149-50.
127 Griffiths, supra note 124, at 216.
128 See Griffiths, supra note 123, at 103 & n.22 (citing Petition to the King of Great
Britain, c. 1760, reprinted in L. Smith, Acadia: A Lost Chapter in American History 369
(1884)).
129 Id. at 116 (recounting petition from Acadians resettled in Pennsylvania to Penn
brothers in London regarding restitution of property seized during war); Griffiths, supra
note 124, at 218 & n.20 (describing 1763 petition by Acadians in British seaports to Sick
and Hurt Board of Admiralty requesting relocation).
130 Griffiths, supra note 124, at 216, 220-21.
131 See Griffiths, supra note 123, at 108 & n.39 ("[French] spelling and grammar [in one
Massachusetts petition] indicate that it was most probably written by the Acadians themselves.");
id. at 115-16 & nn.76-77 (quoting petitions from Acadians in Pennsylvania). In
their Pennsylvania petition, the Acadians pleaded that the binding out of their children
made them "the most unhappy People that ever appeared, if, after having lost what God
had given us, for the Subsistence of our Families, we see ourselves forced to tear our Children
from the Arms of our tender Wives." Griffiths, supra note 124, at 218 (quoting Philadelphia
petition).
132 Griffiths, supra note 123, at 109 (noting Acadian petitions to Massachusetts authorities
seeking to reunite with relatives); id. at 117 (commenting on Acadian petition to justices
of peace of Cecil County, Maryland for assistance to depart for "the Mississippi").
133 Griffiths, supra note 124, at 221 (quoting Philadelphia petition that asked, "Be
pleased to tell us whether we are Subjects, Prisoners, Slaves or Freemen").
134 See Jamin B. Raskin, Legal Aliens, Local Citizens: The Historical, Constitutional
and Theoretical Meanings of Alien Suffrage, 141 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1391, 1399 (1993) ("[Colonial
law] generally required only that voters be local 'inhabitants or residents,' and not
British citizens. . . . Thus, many alien 'inhabitants' who met the appropriate property,
wealth, race, religion, and gender tests possessed the right to vote in the colonies.").