Uint and char casting for Unicode character code

Can someone explain exactly what is going on with this code:

var letter= 'J';
char c = (char)(0x000000ff & (uint)letter);

      

        
        
        
      

    

I understand that it is getting a Unicode representation of the character, however I do not fully understand the role:

(0x000000ff & (uint)letter

      

        
        
        
      

    

What is the purpose of 0x000000ff and casting a letter into (uint) and is there a short way to achieve the same result?

thank

Update

OK, it looks like most people think this is a bad example, I didn't want to include the whole class, but I guess I could do it well so you can see the context. From the WebHeaderCollection Reference Source :

  private static string CheckBadChars(string name, bool isHeaderValue)
    {
        if (name == null || name.Length == 0)
        {
            // emtpy name is invlaid
            if (!isHeaderValue)
            {
                throw name == null ? 
                    new ArgumentNullException("name") :
                    new ArgumentException(SR.GetString(SR.WebHeaderEmptyStringCall, "name"), "name");
            }

            // empty value is OK
            return string.Empty;
        }

        if (isHeaderValue)
        {
            // VALUE check
            // Trim spaces from both ends
            name = name.Trim(HttpTrimCharacters);

            // First, check for correctly formed multi-line value
            // Second, check for absenece of CTL characters
            int crlf = 0;
            for (int i = 0; i < name.Length; ++i)
            {
                char c = (char)(0x000000ff & (uint)name[i]);
                switch (crlf)
                {
                    case 0:
                        if (c == '\r')
                        {
                            crlf = 1;
                        }
                        else if (c == '\n')
                        {
                            // Technically this is bad HTTP.  But it would be a breaking change to throw here.
                            // Is there an exploit?
                            crlf = 2;
                        }
                        else if (c == 127 || (c < ' ' && c != '\t'))
                        {
                            throw new ArgumentException(SR.GetString(SR.WebHeaderInvalidControlChars), "value");
                        }

                        break;

                    case 1:
                        if (c == '\n')
                        {
                            crlf = 2;
                            break;
                        }

                        throw new ArgumentException(SR.GetString(SR.WebHeaderInvalidCRLFChars), "value");

                    case 2:
                        if (c == ' ' || c == '\t')
                        {
                            crlf = 0;
                            break;
                        }

                        throw new ArgumentException(SR.GetString(SR.WebHeaderInvalidCRLFChars), "value");
                }
            }

            if (crlf != 0)
            {
                throw new ArgumentException(SR.GetString(SR.WebHeaderInvalidCRLFChars), "value");
            }
        }
        else
        {
            // NAME check
            // First, check for absence of separators and spaces
            if (name.IndexOfAny(InvalidParamChars) != -1)
            {
                throw new ArgumentException(SR.GetString(SR.WebHeaderInvalidHeaderChars), "name");
            }

            // Second, check for non CTL ASCII-7 characters (32-126)
            if (ContainsNonAsciiChars(name))
            {
                throw new ArgumentException(SR.GetString(SR.WebHeaderInvalidNonAsciiChars), "name");
            }
        }

        return name;
    }

      

        
        
        
      

    

Interests a little:

char c = (char)(0x000000ff & (uint)name[i]);