While reading your interesting story about artist Felis Sanchez in the September 1999 Jet City Maven, I felt compelled to comment on the statement regarding United States citizenship of aliens.

Mexicans, Chinese and others recruited as laborers into the United States to work on railroads, in mines, and on farms did not ever automatically become citizens with full voting rights. Chinese people have only been allowed to become U.S. citizens in the last 56 years.

According to Roger Daniels, author of "Coming to America: A History of Immigration and Ethnicity in American Life, the Naturalization Act of 1870" limited naturalization to "white persons and persons of African descent."

Mexicans, if they lived in what is now Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California after the Mexican War (1846-48), chose to stay north of the new border and became U.S. citizens by default, or they retained their Mexican citizenship but continued to live in the new U.S. territories, or they "returned" to Mexico.

Alien men (mostly from Europe, not Asians) had to live here for at least three years before they could declare their intent to become U.S. citizens, and after five years they could become fully naturalized, i.e., have voting rights. (Property-ownership rights were a different matter.)

Few women, of any race, were naturalized prior to 1920, since they weren't allowed to vote until then, in most states.

The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, intended to stop the immigration of "coolies," remained in effect until 1943. Children born in the United States to Chinese parents were granted citizenship, however. Some Chinese created "paper sons" after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, which had destroyed birth records. But other than those fraudulent individuals, very few native Chinamen were naturalized before World War II.

I picked up your paper at the History House in Fremont, so it seems appropriate for me to share a bit of history with you and your readers. I appreciate your publishing local news and wish you continued success.

-EVELYN ROEHL,

Wallingford