The ruling sent a confused message about privilege and race, for while it blatantly discriminated against the middling Indo-Europeans whose sons were confined to the lowliest civil service jobs, it was also perceived as a direct affront to the European well-to-do Dutch-born and creole Dutch who were unwilling or unable to pack their sons off to Europe for a decade of their lives.

Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ E…, loc. 462