In-Text References

Literary and Philosophical References

Nationalism

Nations are a super-recent invention. Like, around the same age as the USA.

Before this time, people were loyal to larger groups, but it was generally to things like ethnicity, tribe, or religion. For example, Europe used to be more conventionally known as Christendom (land of Christians), and if another Christian nation were discovered in Asia or Africa, it would have been considered part of it.

The Alien and Sedition Acts are a reaction to this brand new concept of national identity. The USA is, after all, a nation founded on some principles that were written down and agreed to. That's more than most countries had at the time. Those principles were what bound the people of the nation together.

So threats to them would be greeted with much the same reaction as a threat to a sovereign. This is the philosophical underpinnings of what they're getting at. Although, ironically, in trying to enforce this they were actively contradicting those same principles.

Yeah, it was a little weird.

References to This Text

Historical and Political References

Franklin D. Roosevelt, Executive Order 9066

The Alien Enemies Act was the justification for the needlessly cruel and unconstitutional action taken against Japanese Americans during World War II. Because Japan was an enemy nation, it was thought that the Japanese American community was harboring spies. So the government thought it would just lock everyone of Japanese descent because that was safer.