The Supreme Court echoed the racist sentiments of the McKinley Administration. Justice Brown, who authored Plessy v. Ferguson (which upheld racial segregation) expressed concerns in Downes v. Bidwell, the most prominent of the Insular Cases, that acquisition of the new territories would mean that “children thereafter born, whether savages or civilized, are . . . entitled to all the rights, privileges and immunities of citizens.” Justice White worried that the acquisition of overseas territory “peopled with an uncivilized race, yet rich in soil, and valuable to the United States” would not be possible if annexation meant “the immediate bestowal of citizenship on those absolutely unfit to receive it.” Ultimately, however, the Supreme Court’s decisions in the Insular Cases avoided any clear answer on whether people born in island territories have a right to U.S. citizenship, maintaining ambiguity and in effect giving leeway to the political branches to address a question the Constitution already answered.