Actually a fairly simply question:
If an American (by which I mean a U.S. Citizen) cardinal is elected pope by his fellow cardinals, can he lose his U.S. citizenship by becoming the monarch of a recognized foreign country?
Zev Steinhardt
Why would he? Where does it say a US citizen cannot be the head of another state?
BTW, wasn’t a recent president of the Czech Republic a US citizen? In any case, I do not think the Pope is considered the head of a country as much as the head of a religion.
I’m not entirely certain the Pope has any real influence on the day-to-day administration of Vatican City.
Nope. Vatican City is an independent country and is ruled by the elected Pope.
Zev Steinhardt
does the vatican have ‘citizens’ other than the administrators of itself.?
The Vatican (from the CIA World Factbook) has a population of 900, but I think pretty much the entire population works for the Vatican (or when applicable, is a family member of one of the employees of the Vatican).
Well, maybe. According to 8 USC §1481 (4),
- (a) A person who is a national of the United States whether by birth or naturalization, shall lose his nationality by voluntarily performing any of the following acts with the intention of relinquishing United States nationality–
(4) (A) accepting, serving in, or performing the duties of any office, post, or employment under the government of a foreign state or a political subdivision thereof, after attaining the age of eighteen years if he has or acquires the nationality of such foreign state; or (B) accepting, serving in, or performing the duties of any office, post, or employment under the government of a foreign state or a political subdivision thereof, after attaining the age of eighteen years for which office, post, or employment an oath, affirmation, or declaration of allegiance is required; or *
Although I doubt the US would want to press the issue should one of our Cardinals get the nod. There’s also a question of intent – the Holy Father would have to intend to lose his American citizenship by accepting the civil service job in the Vatican.
I suppose technically someone could raise the question. Though every discussion we have seen here on loss of citizenship, dual citizenship, parallel citizenship, whatever, seems to point that there is no such thing as “automatic” de-patriation of a US citizen. As Frankd6 says, your actions have to be found indicative of an intention to ditch the condition of “American”
Does the Pope swear loyalty to Vatican City? It may well be that the legal reality of V-city is such that the soverign NEED NOT be a “citizen-of-Vatican-City” – the law says that you must not take an oath to another state, but it’s been settled that a mere oath to carry out the duties of an office is not automatically disqualifying. OTOH, the holding of head-of-stateship or some high “policymaking” position is recognized as more than mere employment.
Generally the US does not “recognize” dual citizenship but sort of looks the other way as long as there is no conflict. Any legal or constitutional considerations about this scenario would slam hard into the very practical consideration of tens of millions of American Catholic registered voters. You could expect the State Department to look the other way, and were third parties to seek to force the issue you could expect Congress to pass an Act making an exception with lightning speed.
jrd
I very much doubt there is anyone who has vatican citizenship as their primary citizenship. They may have Vatican passports for business but I bet, even the Pope, when he travels abroad and goes through Immigration control, presents his Polish Passport. Having a Vatican passport is probably like having a UN passport: a business thing.
The Constitution prohibits American citizens from “swearing allegiance to a foreign prince” – but AFAIK it does not prohibit them from becoming one.
The question is interesting for quite another reason – at least two of the pretenders to Eastern European thrones are American citizens; what would happen if those countries decided to reinstitute a constitutional monarchy?
Milan Panic, an American citizen, served for a year or so as the president of Yugoslavia (Serbia). I believe Congress passed a resolution allowing him to serve in that capacity while retaining his American citizenship.
If an American became Pope, I’m sure that Congress or the State Department would ask for something similar.
And I don’t think the Pope goes through passport control when he visits another country. There have been threads on this before, but heads of state don’t do such things.
I know. Life ain’t fair. Either we are equal or we are not equal. I guess we aren’t equal. I want to be the Pope when I grow up.
How well-enforced is this? I have met American citizens who have served in the Israeli army. Maybe that’s allowed, since the US and Israel are allies?
Sailor, we’ll need to see how you look in a pointy hat first. 
(Yeah, I know the pointy hat is called a miter, but “pointy hat” is funnier.)
That would be either Jan Stasky or Vaclav Havel, neither US citizens AFAIK. Must be the Serbian guy you’re thinking of.
Interestingly, though, Madaleine Albright is thinking of running for Czech President.
It was definitely Milan Panic.
This hard to read Voice of America script
http://www.hri.org/news/usa/voa/97-01-10.voa.html
says that it was actually the State Department that allowed Panic to take over that job. He has since returned to the US and resumed his job, which apparently involves being really, really rich.
This was the thread on heads of state and passports.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=63097&highlight=head+state+passports
There was no definitive solution. But I would assume that most of the formalities are handled behind the scenes.
Now that I think more on the matter, wasn’t Meir Kahane stripped of his U.S. citizenship when he became a member of the Kenesset? I would imagine that if becoming a legislator in another country would get you booted from U.S. citizenship that actually becoming the ruler of another country would do that as well.
Zev Steinhardt
I think you could lose your citizenship unless the State Department grants you a waiver.
I don’t think the State Department was going to bend the rules for Kahane, but a Pope would likely get a break.
Although I could imagine that Jack Chick would get quite upset.
I doubt a Pope would be very worried about losing his US citizenship…It’s not like he’s at some risk of losing his new job and having to apply for another one…