WASHINGTON (AP) - A unanimous Supreme Court on Monday struck down part of an unusual immigration law that treats fathers and mothers differently when it comes to conferring citizenship on children born outside the U.S.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg called the 1940s-era law "stunningly anachronistic" in the way it stereotypes men and woman. The justice’s choice was intentional, as she criticized the federal law that had permitted the children immediate American citizenship if their mother was a U.S. citizen who lived in the United States just one year prior to giving birth but required American fathers to have lived in the United States for 10 years for the child to be considered an American at birth. In the case, New York resident Luis Ramon Morales-Santana, who was born to a now-deceased American father and a Dominican mother, risked being deported to the Dominican Republic after committing a series of crimes in 1995. Ginsburg, known for her work on gender equality before she became a jurist, wrote for the court that in light of the Supreme Court’s various rulings regarding the equal protection guarantee since 1971, having separate “duration-of-residence requirements for unwed mothers and fathers who have accepted parental responsibility is stunningly anachronistic.”

The arguments made in defense of the law by former President Barack Obama’s administration before he left office in January “cannot withstand inspection under a Constitution that requires the government to respect the equal dignity and stature of its male and female citizens,” Ginsburg wrote.
In a unanimous decision (8–0), the U.S. Supreme Court strikes down a gender distinction in U.S. immigration law that treats mothers and fathers differently.