In leaving in place an appeals court decision, the court also passed up an invitation to overturn a series of decisions dating back to 1901 known as the Insular Cases, replete with racist and anti-foreign rhetoric.

Justice Neil Gorsuch had called for the cases to be overturned in April.

Justice Neil Gorsuch had called for the cases to be overturned in April.

But the justices refused to take up an appeal from people born in American Samoa, and living in Utah,

Who argued that a federal law declaring that they are "nationals, but not citizens, of the United States at birth" is unconstitutional.

A trial judge in Utah ruled in their favor, but the federal appeals court in Denver said Congress, not courts, should decide the citizenship issue.

The appeals court also noted that American Samoa's elected leaders opposed the lawsuit for fear that it might disrupt their cultural traditions.

American Samoa is the only unincorporated territory of the United States where the inhabitants are not American citizens at birth.

The only federal election they can cast a vote in is the race for American Samoa's nonvoting U.S. House seat.