UDS, the OED lists the following definitions of issue as a verb:
1 Supply or distribute something for use or sale
1.1 Supply someone with something
1.2 Formally send out or make known
2 Come, go, or flow out from
2.1 Result or be derived from
The most intuitive use of the word issue as it applies to a diploma in the OP is 1 or 1.1, both of which require the “was” or “is”. The examples given for 1 are “licenses were issued” and “Christmas stamps to be issued”.
The examples for 1.2 pertain to statements, orders, regulations e.g., “I want the Prime Minister to issue”
The examples for 2 pertain to things like springs and water flow, eroding sand, gravel and clay. So yes, one could strain the meaning of issue in the OP to say the diploma “came from” Poland, but I don’t think many native English speakers would do so.
2.1 is similarly irrelevant.
Therefore, the sentence in the OP is incorrect if it is intended to be a proper English sentence. Tolerable if it is intended to be beurocratese, as originally pointed out by Wolfman.
My copy of the OED - the full one, not the Concise or the Shorter - offers 23 distinct definitions for the verb issue (and another 34 definitions for the noun) a couple of which I have quoted above. There are certainly appropriate definitions of the intransitive verb which the sentence quoted in the OP can be read as employing. We can only conjecture whether the author intended to employ them, or intended to employ a transitive sense and then chose to omit the auxiliary “was”. I think the most we can say is that the sentence is complete and grammatical as it stands; it doesn’t require the reader to supply an auxiliary “was”, but if that is supplied then it is still complete and grammatical.
A question we may be overlooking is whether the sentence quoted in the OP is in fact a translation from the Polish. If so, and if we knew the original Polish text, and if we spoke Polish, we might recognise the Polish verb employed as one which only has the intransitive sense that I think is invoked here, or only has the intransitive sense that you think is invoked or, like issue, is capable of bearing either sense. But, at the moment, that’s even more conjectural.
That’s not so. It is an entirely correct, complete and natural English sentence as UDS has amply demonstrated with numerous and relevant real-world examples.
I sat in a meeting yesterday morning in which a senior manager used the word in this way (active intransitive verb) twice in 5 minutes, viz.:
“The recommendation issued from the JIC on Friday evening.” and
“The document will issue later today or tomorrow.”
Well, I’m not sure I would consider the usage of a manager (even a senior manager) as he definitive word on English grammar!
I’ll have to take a look at my copy of the OED (Like UDS I have one. The full one too! Not the concise or the shorter.) But what I’m curious about is the nuance of whether one document can “issue” rather than “be issued”.
The examples that UDS provided are either not directly relevant to current English usage (Jefferson/Hamilton) or imply a sense of flow as in definition 2 that I cited above. One diploma cannot flow from Poland.
The closest citation to the current situation is the one about the papal bulls: “Documents issuing from the papal chancery bore . . . “ But that speaks to the flow of documents from the chancery, not the fact that one given document was issued.
The Crump citation – again, you have that sense of coins flowing from the treasury rather than a given coin
The Hogan citation – same thing – speaks of documents in general not a document in particular
I am pleased to advise the Deputy that a permit issued in this instance on 9th July 2014.
The Rights Commissioner’s Recommendation issued on 2 May 2014. […] As the Recommendation has issued, that concludes the involvement of the Rights Commissioner Service.
From the US FDA:
Once preparation of a guidance document has been initiated, but before the document has issued, staff should not reveal the specifics of the internal draft guidance to the public when issues to be addressed in the guidance are publicly discussed.
You’re the one arguing in the face of facts. If it were natural English, none of us would be having a problem with it. The mere fact that so many of us do not perceive it as natural indicates that it isn’t natural. That’s how language works.
It’s a definition that people had to go pull out the full OED to even find. Dictionaries are abridged by removing the less common definitions. The fact that this definition is removed from most dictionaries means it is not common. And that which is uncommon is not a part of natural English.
The actual facts show that it is an unusual phrasing that is used mostly in certain legalistic contexts. It’s legalese, not natural English.
“Johnson, when did this diploma issue?”
“It issued last year, sir.”
“I see. Why did it issue?”
“This diploma?”
“Yes.”
“This diploma issued to distinguish a graduate.”
“I understand. And where did it issue?”
“This diploma issued in the Republic of Poland.”
It would sound glaringly wrong in a different context, such as a person speaking out loud or in a paragraph describing the passport in a book or magazine rather than on a bureaucratic document though.
