When the U.S. Navy told American Samoa’s leaders in the 1920s that the federal government did not recognize American Samoans as U.S. citizens, community leaders organized a new political movement known as the Mau, whose slogan was “citizenship and civil government for the Samoans.” They pushed for decades to be recognized as full U.S. citizens, while at the same time advocating for the continued protection of their land or culture – they did not see any conflict between U.S. citizenship and the Fa’a Samoa. 

The efforts of American Samoa’s leaders to be recognized as full U.S. citizens failed because of racist opposition from the Navy and Members of Congress, who called American Samoans “primitive” “savages,” “absolutely unqualified,” and “poor unsophisticated people.”

Read more about all this in a legal brief filed by the Samoan Federation of America here or watch Fa’a Samoa, Sovereignty, and Self-Determination in American Samoa: Past and Present in our Building Understanding series.