Is there any situation in which you can lose your American citizenship without being notified of it, or without voluntarily renouncing it?
See here:
http://hamilton.usconsulate.gov/mobile//loss_of_citizenship.html
I suppose a couple of those situations could cause you to lose citizenship without you knowing it, particularly when taking foreign employment. Most of those situations though would (I assume) include a time where you are warned that you could lose the status.
ETA: I didn’t see where it said that the person must be “intending to relinquish” your citizenship. I’m thinking that the answer to your question is probably no, then. The closest situation would probably be one where you assume you are a legal citizen and find out you never were.
There certainly used to be. There used to be a law that a naturalized citizen would lose his citizenship if he lived in the country of his earlier citizenship for 3 years or anywhere outside the US for 5. There was also a law that you lost your citizenship if you took an oath of foreign citizenship (but not if it was just conferred on you without oath). The latter was still in effect when my two older children became Canadian citizens in 1985, but didn’t apply to them because they were both older than 18 (which Canada required), but under 21 (which the US required). In fact the law was changed to 18 that year and it mattered what month they took their oath.
Regardless, this was all thrown out in various supreme court decisions that held that there could be no classes of citizenships and that you could not lose your citizenship unless you actively renounced it. I understand that that is now a bit hard to do, although certainly still possible.
You are convicted of treason, but fall into a coma moments before the verdict is announced?
There was the situation that I recall discussed, that once upon a time a Canadian born in the USA to Canadian parents (i.e. nearest hospital was across the border) had to decide by their 18th birthday which country they were a citizen of. I don’t recall the criteria (someone will?) but I suppose if you did the wrong thing unawares you could find yourself with free health care instead of a right to bear arms.
If you are born to an American overseas are you a citizen at birth or do.you have to take active steps to become one. I would think its the later, otherwise you.could have generations of “Americans” who have no links with the US.
It’s the former, but if you were born outside of the US you have to have lived in the US for a certain period of time for your foreign-born children to be citizens.
The main Supreme Court cases on this point were Afroyim v. Rusk (1967) and Vance v. Terrazas (1980). In the latter case, the Supreme Court basically said it would be legal for the government to hold hearings on whether someone’s actions were so inconsistent with maintaining U.S. citizenship that their U.S. citizenship should be revoked. This would be pretty close to an “involuntary loss” of citizenship; the Supreme Court’s main finding was that loss of citizenship can’t be automatic. That said, since 1990 the State Department has very rarely held such hearings as a matter of policy.
I think this is a legend. Growing up, I was told that I had to choose between the US & Canada by my eighteenth birthday (though not how to make that choice). It turned out to be completely untrue.
I’d love to see a cite that it was ever true.
So is there, or has there ever been, a case where a natural-born US citizen could be stripped of citizenship, with or without their knowledge? Even for treason?
I knew a couple who were green-card Australian, green-card Canadian, and had a child while they lived here. The boy technically had triple citizenship but they were certain/insistent that he would have to choose, if not one of the three, then between US and Commonwealth citizenship, at 18. This was ca. 1990. As he was a well-traveled Aussie of some standing (slightly famous downunda), I ass/u/med they knew what they were talking about, but I realize that’s not a cite.
I’ve heard this from many, many different people, and it’s certainly a widely-held belief, but yeah.
It was certainly possible to lose citizenship at one time: my American-born great-grandmother did, and I have no idea if she ever knew (or cared): Expatriation Act of 1907
Wow. Also known as the Women as Chattel Act… it’s easy to forget how long it took laws to become even mostly equal for women.
There were several laws that stripped Americans of their US citizenship if they married “Chinese”. “Chinese” being a euphemism for anyone from East Asia. I don’t if this was automatic or required a court hearing, but I think in practice it was simply a way to discourage miscegenation via discrimination. Personally I don’t think losing citizenship is typically considered when getting married.
These laws weren’t fully repealed until after WWII.
As a native Californian, I am aware of the vicious “yellow peril” laws that seem like something from the Middle Ages and persisted far, far too late into US law. (They applied mostly in the West and predominantly in California, for obvious reasons.) But those bald passages stripping women of citizenship for marrying “an alien” - wink wink nudge nudge - are just appalling even in that context.
I know what you mean, however racism as it we consider it is mostly from the mid to late 18th century onwards.
This used to be the case in many countries, definitely in Britain, France and Germany.
As Lord Feldon already stated, a person born outside US to US citizens are US citizens themselves, in a nutshell. At least in Mexico, IMU.
To use myself as an example: I was born, almost 50 years ago, in Mexico City, Mexico (a month early while parents were vacationing, oops), but I have always been a US citizen from birth. I do not have an American Birth Certificate, per se, but instead a form/letter from US Consulate in Mexico City titled (IIRC) “Proof of birth of US citizen born abroad” with all the pertinent info of my parents, stamps of Consul office, etc. I also still have a passport (long expired) with my baby pic in it. There’s also the ‘unofficial’ Mexican Hospital Certificate that says I was born at that hospital with my footprints included.
Never had a problem using these papers as formal proof of Citizenship at any Govt agency, fwiw, including US Army for security clearance checking and whatnots.
However, my parents told me a couple times that if I chose to live in Mexico, as US citizen, for two years (IIRC) before turning 18 I could apply for dual-citizenship with Mexico and US - but I may be misremembering a bit as it was so long ago. Never went back to Mexico except once on a week-stay at South Padre Island in late teens, so moot point. I may have some of the details forgotten, but I know its pretty close on the dual-citizenship as Dad called Govy-offices several times to double-check as he thought it’d be beneficial to me for some reason.
There is a newly-coined status of “United Stats Person”, which is anyone who can conceivably be construed as havibg a tax liability to the USA. US citizen is one of the subgroups among US Persons, a demographic that is being vigorously expanded by the US government and its tax revenue arm. It may now be even more likely that you will BE considered a US citizen without your knowledge, rather than losing it without your uknowledgee or consent.
a citizen of the United States
an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence
an unincorporated association with a substantial number of members who are citizens of the U.S. or are aliens lawfully admitted for permanent residence
a corporation that is incorporated in the U.S.
a U
I kept hearing that myth about having to make a choice at age 18, but there has been no such principle in my lifetime, AFAIK. My middle child was born in Switzerland but has no claim to either citizenship or residency there. We registered him at the consulate and have a certificate of US citizen born abroad. After he was 18 but before 21 he became a Canadian citizen and is now a dual citizen. Later that year (1985) the US changed the law that caused you to lose your citizenship if you swore an oath to a foreign government after the age of 18, but it didn’t apply because he had done it earlier in that year. Exactly the same thing happened to US born oldest. Later they stopped even trying to take citizenship away in such cases. My youngest is Canadian born and a dual citizen by that alone.
What I am uncertain about is what happens if you don’t get that certificate from the consulate.
In order the claim citizenship for your foreign-born children you or your spouse must have lived in the US for 7 years after the age of 14. Since Obama’s mother was only 19 when he was born, she could not possibly have. But Hawai’i is not Kenya, whatever the Republicans think.