Dismantling Rights: Forthcoming Independence and the Revocation of US Military Benefits from Filipino WWII Veterans

Abstract

This article explores the plasticity of rights by examining how the US government promised and revoked naturalization rights and military benefits from Filipino colonial soldiers who served on behalf of the United States in World War II. Rarely have legal scholars of the US military, citizenship, and the welfare state addressed the rights of colonial subjects. Drawing on data collected from six libraries and archives, the Congressional Record, and oral histories, I document how key actors in the US government dismantled the rights of Filipino soldiers. I find that colonialism, war, and a rapidly changing geopolitical situation—forthcoming Philippine independence—allowed members of the US Congress and the administrator of Veterans Affairs to dismantle rights. By arguing that the Philippines was not a colony, that colonial subjects were not entitled to equal treatment, and that Filipino veterans were not US military, members of the US executive and legislative branches casually eroded rights. US state actors thus were able to claim that Filipino veterans’ rights were merely cumbersome and expensive foreign aid. This case suggests that rights are more malleable during times of state transition.