This article analyzes the High Court of American Samoa’s 1980
ruling in Craddick v. Territorial Registrar and compares the decision’s
reasoning with preceding cases that had also evaluated the constitutionality
of racial restrictions under the equal protection guarantees of the
Fifth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment. The article then compares
the legal analysis used by the High Court in Craddick with the legal
analysis used by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Wabol v. Villacrusis,
a case that was based on similar facts and had a similar outcome to
Craddick, but which relied on a different and completely incompatible
analysis of the Constitution’s equal protection guarantees. Finally, this
article compares the legal analysis in Craddick with the Supreme Court’s
recent decision in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. Harvard and concludes
that if a challenge to Craddick were to make it into a federal court
today, the Supreme Court’s analysis in Harvard would require that Craddick
be overturned.