Political status and decolonisation

Timeline: American Samoa political status

Dated events associated with this case. Each event is a shared record: the same event appears identically wherever it is relevant.

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  1. · Legal decision

    Fitisemanu v. United States Tenth Circuit ruling, 2021

    A federal appeals court ruled that American Samoans are not entitled to birthright US citizenship, a decision the territorial government itself had argued for.

    Significance here: A decisive legal ruling preserving American Samoa's distinct US-national (not citizen) status, aligned with the territorial government's own position.

Dates show their real precision. Approximate or uncertain dates are labelled and never converted into an exact day.