Expatriation

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EXPATRIATION

EXPATRIATION is the right of a citizen or subject to transfer allegiance from one political state to another. Under English rule, this right could be exercised only with the government's consent, but in 1868 the U.S. Congress recognized that all persons possessed this right. Later legislation set conditions under which expatriation would occur, some of which called for loss of citizenship against the wishes of the individual citizen. The Supreme Court in the 1950s and 1960s declared unconstitutional a number of such provisions, so that expatriation is now basically voluntary and cannot be imposed against a citizen's wishes, particularly as punishment, although naturalization can be canceled for fraud.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Roche, John P. "The Expatriation Decisions: A Study in Constitutional Improvisation and the Uses of History." American Political Science Review (1964).

Paul C.Bartholomew

ChristopherWells

See alsoCitizenship ; Naturalization .

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