87-663: Afroyim v. Rusk , 387 U.S. 253 (1967), was a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States , which ruled that citizens of the United States may not be deprived of their citizenship involuntarily. The U.S. government had attempted to revoke the citizenship of Beys Afroyim, a man born in Poland , because he had cast a vote in an Israeli election after becoming a naturalized U.S. citizen. The Supreme Court decided that Afroyim's right to retain his citizenship
174-701: A U.S. citizen. He studied at the Art Institute of Chicago , as well as the National Academy of Design in New York City, and he was commissioned to paint portraits of George Bernard Shaw , Theodore Dreiser , and Arnold Schoenberg . In 1949, Afroyim left the United States and settled in Israel, together with his wife and former student Soshana (an Austrian artist). In 1960, following the breakdown of his marriage, Afroyim decided to return to
261-566: A certified copy of the Thirteenth Amendment from the Colorado State Archives which was published in 1861. As included in that compilation, the Thirteenth Amendment would strip an individual of United States citizenship if they accept any title of nobility or honor. However, this is not the Thirteenth Amendment. The correct Thirteenth Amendment prohibits slavery. Although some people claim that state publication of
348-463: A citizen of the United States, and shall be incapable of holding any office of trust or profit under them, or either of them. This proposed amendment would amplify both Article I, Section 9, Clause 8 , which prohibits the federal government from issuing titles of nobility or honor, and Section 10, Clause 1 , which prohibits the states from issuing them. One theory for why the Congress proposed
435-452: A classification so broad that it encompasses conduct that fails to show a voluntary abandonment of American citizenship." Two Supreme Court decisions after Perez called into question the principle that loss of citizenship could occur even without the affected individual's intent. In Kennedy v. Mendoza-Martinez (1963), the Court struck down a law revoking citizenship for remaining outside
522-704: A complex conspiracy by an illegal monopoly, the American Bar Association , which resulted in a take-over of the judicial systems of this country, both federal and state, by the ABA and its related entities, including the Alabama State Bar Association and Alabama's Unified Court System. It is then alleged that the ABA-controlled system is illegal and in violation of what is referred to as the "missing Thirteenth Amendment", to
609-477: A conceivably rational basis for wanting to do so." While Warren was willing to allow for loss of citizenship as a result of foreign naturalization or other actions "by which [an American] manifests allegiance to a foreign state [which] may be so inconsistent with the retention of [U.S.] citizenship as to result in loss of that status", he wrote that "In specifying that any act of voting in a foreign political election results in loss of citizenship, Congress has employed
696-514: A congressional forcible destruction of his citizenship, whatever his creed, color, or race. Our holding does no more than to give to this citizen that which is his own, a constitutional right to remain a citizen in a free country unless he voluntarily relinquishes that citizenship. The minority—in a dissent written by Associate Justice John Marshall Harlan II and joined by Associate Justices Tom C. Clark , Potter Stewart , and Byron White —argued that Perez had been correctly decided, that nothing in
783-478: A five-volume set titled Laws of the United States . On page 74 of the first volume, the proposed amendment was printed as "Article 13" along with the authentic Eleventh and Twelfth amendments. There was no indication on the page that Article 13 had not yet passed into law; however, earlier in the volume, on page ix of the Introduction, the editors said: There has been some difficulty in ascertaining whether
870-659: A foreign country, without the consent of Congress, would "cease to be a citizen of the United States"; however, this amendment was never ratified by a sufficient number of state legislatures and, as a result, never became a part of the Constitution. In the Expatriation Act of 1868 , Congress declared that individuals born in the United States had an inherent right to expatriation (giving up of citizenship), it has historically been accepted that certain actions could result in loss of citizenship. The possibility of this
957-539: A man without a country. Citizenship in this Nation is a part of a cooperative affair. Its citizenry is the country, and the country is its citizenry. The very nature of our free government makes it completely incongruous to have a rule of law under which a group of citizens temporarily in office can deprive another group of citizens of their citizenship. We hold that the Fourteenth Amendment was designed to, and does, protect every citizen of this Nation against
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#17327733646401044-529: A matter of practice, it is now virtually impossible to lose American citizenship without formally and expressly renouncing it." While acknowledging that "American citizenship enjoys strong protection against loss under Afroyim and Terrazas ", retired journalist Henry S. Matteo suggested, "It would have been more equitable ... had the Supreme Court relied on the Eighth Amendment , which adds
1131-515: A minimum period of U.S. residence that Bellei had failed to satisfy—was repealed by Congress in 1978. As a consequence of revised policies adopted in 1990 by the United States Department of State , it is now (in the words of one expert) "virtually impossible to lose American citizenship without formally and expressly renouncing it." Citizenship in the United States has historically been acquired in one of three ways: by birth in
1218-511: A moral tone as well as a firmer constitutional basis, than the Fourteenth." Matteo also said, "Under Afroyim there is a lack of balance between rights and protections on one hand, and obligations and responsibilities on the other, all four elements of which have been an integral part of the concept of citizenship, as history shows." Political scientist P. Allan Dionisopoulos wrote that "it is doubtful that any [Supreme Court decision] created
1305-496: A more complex problem for the United States than Afroyim v. Rusk ", a decision which he believed had "since become a source of embarrassment for the United States in its relationships with the Arab world" because of the way it facilitated dual U.S.–Israeli citizenship and participation by Americans in Israel's armed forces. After his Supreme Court victory, Afroyim divided his time between West Brighton ( Staten Island , New York ) and
1392-433: A naturalized citizen of another country. In a 1980 case, however— Vance v. Terrazas —the Supreme Court ruled that intent to relinquish citizenship needed to be proved by itself, and not simply inferred from an individual's having voluntarily performed an action designated by Congress as being incompatible with an intent to keep one's citizenship. The concept of dual citizenship, which previously had been strongly opposed by
1479-446: A reflection if not an expression of its policy.... It follows that such activity is regulable by Congress under its power to deal with foreign affairs. In a dissenting opinion, Chief Justice Earl Warren argued that "Citizenship is man's basic right, for it is nothing less than the right to have rights" and that "a government of the people cannot take away their citizenship simply because one branch of that government can be said to have
1566-487: Is a proposed and still-pending amendment to the United States Constitution . The 11th Congress passed it on May 1, 1810, and submitted to the state legislatures for ratification. It would strip United States citizenship from any citizen who accepted a title of nobility from an " emperor , king , prince or foreign power". On two occasions between 1812 and 1816, it was within two states of
1653-460: Is recorded to have said, when voting on the amendment, that "he considered the vote on this question as deciding whether or not we were to have members of the Legion of Honor in this country." The purpose of this Amendment was to prevent those holding foreign titles, and thus the allegiance demanded by those titles, from being able to run for an office of government in the newly created Republic. This
1740-463: Is that his mother actually desired a title of nobility for herself and, indeed, she is referred to as the "Duchess of Baltimore" in many texts written about the amendment (not to be confused with Baron Baltimore , a British-Irish title with the city of Baltimore named after the 2nd baron). The marriage had been annulled in 1805 – well before the amendment's proposal by the 11th Congress . Nonetheless, Representative Nathaniel Macon of North Carolina
1827-474: Is yoked with another misconception – that a lawyer's use of the word or abbreviation of " Esquire " is a title of nobility acquired from a foreign power – and so some litigants and others have tried to assert that lawyers have lost their citizenship or are disqualified from public office. The error arose in 1815 when the Philadelphia printing house of Bioren and Duane published, under a government contract,
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#17327733646401914-494: The Corwin Amendment , which if adopted would have prevented any federal legislation, including a future proposed amendment to the Constitution, that would have interfered with or abolished slavery. It is significant that, although this proposal was already titled as the Thirteenth Amendment, no one claimed that there already was an adopted Thirteenth Amendment. On February 1, 1865, the 38th Congress passed and sent to
2001-441: The Supreme Court . United States courts of appeals may also make such decisions, particularly if the Supreme Court chooses not to review the case. Although many cases from state supreme courts are significant in developing the law of that state, only a few are so revolutionary that they announce standards that many other state courts then choose to follow. Titles of Nobility Amendment The Titles of Nobility Amendment
2088-402: The "true" Thirteenth Amendment to argue that various individuals are not citizens. This version of the Thirteenth Amendment allegedly states that individuals who accept titles of nobility must renounce their United States citizenship. ... The Court interprets Belt's claim of a noble title and another nationality as further indications of his attempt to renounce his citizenship and therefore contest
2175-460: The Bioren and Duane series of laws was replaced by an entirely new series, United States Statutes at Large , which printed the Constitution with only 12 amendments in volume 1 and put the unadopted Titles of Nobility Amendment among congressional resolutions in volume 2. In 1833, Associate Justice Joseph Story of the U.S. Supreme Court published the text of the Constitution in his Commentaries on
2262-665: The Citizenship Clause, Black wrote: All persons born or naturalized in the United States ... are citizens of the United States...." There is no indication in these words of a fleeting citizenship, good at the moment it is acquired but subject to destruction by the Government at any time. Rather the Amendment can most reasonably be read as defining a citizenship which a citizen keeps unless he voluntarily relinquishes it. Once acquired, this Fourteenth Amendment citizenship
2349-496: The Constitution . That publication included twelve amendments and a clear statement (in § 959) that there were only twelve amendments adopted. The text also included a statement (in § 1346) that the Titles of Nobility Amendment had not been adopted "probably from a growing sense that it is wholly unnecessary". In 1847, Associate Justice Levi Woodbury mentioned in a dissenting opinion that there "were only twelve amendments ever made to"
2436-470: The Constitution and not remembering, or having skipped, the caveat in the Introduction, mistakenly included the Titles of Nobility Amendment as if it had been adopted as the Thirteenth Amendment. This error came to the attention of the U.S. House of Representatives in December 1817. At that time, the publisher of a pocket edition of the Constitution, printed under government contract, included the amendment as
2523-477: The Constitution deprived Congress of the power to revoke a person's citizenship for good cause, and that Congress was within its rights to decide that allowing Americans to vote in foreign elections ran contrary to the foreign policy interests of the nation and ought to result in loss of citizenship. Harlan wrote: First, the Court fails almost entirely to dispute the reasoning in Perez ; it is essentially content with
2610-413: The Constitution. In Dillon v. Gloss (1921), the Supreme Court explicitly described the Titles of Nobility Amendment as not having been adopted. In Coleman v. Miller (1939), the two dissenting Justices similarly described the Titles of Nobility Amendment as unadopted. In Afroyim v. Rusk (1967), the majority and dissenting opinions described it as unadopted. On March 2, 1861, the Congress proposed
2697-577: The Court distinguished a 1971 case, Rogers v. Bellei , holding in this newer case that individuals who had acquired citizenship via jus sanguinis , through birth outside the United States to an American parent or parents, could still risk loss of citizenship in various ways, since their citizenship (unlike Afroyim's citizenship) was the result of federal statutes rather than the Citizenship Clause. The statutory provision whereby Bellei lost his citizenship—a U.S. residency requirement which he had failed to satisfy in his youth—was repealed by Congress in 1978;
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2784-489: The Court declares that its result is bottomed upon the "language and the purpose" of the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment; in explanation, the Court offers only the terms of the clause itself, the contention that any other result would be "completely incongruous," and the essentially arcane observation that the "citizenry is the country and the country is its citizenry." I can find nothing in this extraordinary series of circumventions which permits, still less compels,
2871-568: The Government's ability to keep him imprisoned. In a 2001 decision by the Wisconsin Court of Appeals , the court rejected a defendant's attempt to use the Titles of Nobility Amendment to deny the trial court's authority to put him on trial: [The Defendant] also appears to argue that licensing lawyers violates the original Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution by equating licensure with accepting
2958-704: The Israeli city of Safed until his death on May 19, 1984, in West Brighton. List of landmark court decisions in the United States The following landmark court decisions in the United States contains landmark court decisions which changed the interpretation of existing law in the United States . Such a decision may settle the law in more than one way: In the United States, landmark court decisions come most frequently from
3045-530: The State Department adopted new guidelines for evaluating potential loss-of-citizenship cases, under which the government now assumes in almost all situations that Americans do not in fact intend to give up their citizenship unless they explicitly indicate to U.S. officials that this is their intention. As explained by Peter J. Spiro, "In the long run, Afroyim' s vision of an absolute right to retain citizenship has been largely, if quietly, vindicated. As
3132-442: The Supreme Court affirmed that Wong had not done anything to result in the loss of United States citizenship, therefore acknowledging that there were actions that could result in the loss of citizenship. The Nationality Act of 1940 provided for loss of citizenship based on foreign military or government service, when coupled with citizenship in that foreign country. This statute also mandated loss of citizenship for desertion from
3219-474: The Supreme Court in the attorneys' briefs or the written record of the case—and much of the remaining questioning from the justices involved criticism of Gordon for confusing matters through the last-minute introduction of this new material. Afroyim's earlier stipulation that he had voted in the 1951 Israeli election—together with an accompanying concession by the government that this was the sole ground upon which it had acted to revoke Afroyim's citizenship—allowed
3306-658: The Thirteenth Amendment, at which time the House requested that the President ascertain and report on the true status of the proposed amendment. Notwithstanding the official conclusion that the amendment had not been adopted, the erroneous printing of the proposed amendment as if adopted occasionally occurred (using the Americanized spelling and punctuation of Bioren and Duane, and omitting any ratification information just like Bioren and Duane) until some time after 1845. In 1845,
3393-425: The U.S. armed forces, remaining outside the United States in order to evade military service during wartime, or voting in a foreign election. The provision calling for loss of citizenship for foreign military service was held by the Supreme Court not to be enforceable without proof that said service had been voluntary, in a 1958 case ( Nishikawa v. Dulles ), and revocation of citizenship as a punishment for desertion
3480-621: The U.S. government was Dean Rusk , the Secretary of State during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations (1961–1969). The legal brief laying out Afroyim's arguments was written by Nanette Dembitz, general counsel of the New York Civil Liberties Union ; the government's brief was written by United States Solicitor General (and future Supreme Court Associate Justice) Thurgood Marshall . The oral arguments in
3567-508: The U.S. government, has become more accepted in the years since Afroyim . In 1980, the administration of President Jimmy Carter concluded that the Bancroft Treaties —a series of bilateral agreements, formulated between 1868 and 1937, which provided for automatic loss of citizenship upon foreign naturalization of a U.S. citizen—were no longer enforceable, due in part to Afroyim , and gave notice terminating these treaties. In 1990,
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3654-534: The United States ( jus soli , "right of the soil"); by birth outside the United States to an American parent ( jus sanguinis , "right of the blood"); or by immigration to the United States followed by naturalization . In 1857, the Supreme Court held in Dred Scott v. Sandford that African slaves , former slaves, and their descendants were not eligible to be citizens. After the Civil War (1861–65) and
3741-404: The United States Constitution, which stated that any person who accepts a title of nobility forfeits his United States citizenship and which amendment was ratified but subsequently hidden or excised from the law. Since lawyers and judges accept the titles "Esquire"/"The Honorable", it is argued, they are not citizens and the entire judicial system is illegal. Furthermore, these documents contend that
3828-577: The United States in order to avoid conscription into the armed forces. Associate Justice William J. Brennan (who had been in the majority in Perez ) wrote a separate opinion concurring with the majority in Mendoza-Martinez and expressing reservations about Perez . In Schneider v. Rusk (1964), where the Court invalidated a provision revoking the citizenship of naturalized citizens who returned to live permanently in their countries of origin, Brennan recused himself and did not participate in
3915-617: The United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States". The Fourteenth Amendment—including the Citizenship Clause—was ratified by state legislatures and became a part of the Constitution in 1868. The Constitution does not specifically deal with loss of citizenship. An amendment proposed by Congress in 1810—the Titles of Nobility Amendment —would, if ratified, have provided that any citizen who accepted any "present, pension, office or emolument" from
4002-591: The United States, but the State Department refused to renew his U.S. passport, ruling that because Afroyim had voted in the 1951 Israeli legislative election , he had lost his citizenship under the provisions of the Nationality Act of 1940. A letter certifying Afroyim's loss of citizenship was issued by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) on January 13, 1961. Afroyim challenged
4089-442: The United States. In the few instances in which courts have been confronted with the assertion that it was, those claims have been dismissed. In Campion v. Towns , a tax protester raised it in his defenses against a charge of tax evasion. The court replied that it would "correct any misunderstanding Plaintiff has concerning the text of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution": In his Complaint, Plaintiff includes
4176-520: The amendment is that it was in response to the 1803 marriage of Napoleon Bonaparte's younger brother, Jerome , and Betsy Patterson of Baltimore, Maryland , who gave birth to a boy for whom she wanted aristocratic recognition from France. The child, named Jérôme Napoléon Bonaparte , was not born in the United States, but in the United Kingdom on July 7, 1805 – nevertheless, he would have held U.S. citizenship through his mother. Another theory
4263-492: The amendment process into the hands of the Secretary of State , where it remained until 1950. Some people (known as "Thirteenthers") have claimed that the Titles of Nobility Amendment actually became part of the Constitution. It in fact was mistakenly included as the "Thirteenth Amendment" in some early 19th century printings of the Constitution. Between 1819 and 1867 the statutory law code of Virginia included it as well. This misconception has become significant because it
4350-467: The amendment proposed, which is stated as the thirteenth, has or has not been adopted by a sufficient number of the state legislatures. ... It has been considered best, however, to publish the proposed amendment in its proper place, as if it had been adopted, with this explanation, to prevent misconception. It appears that the Bioren and Duane set of federal laws being widely distributed as a standard reference, some compilers of other books copied its text of
4437-399: The author of the opinion of the Court (supported by a 5–4 majority), wrote that: ... the activities of the citizens of one nation when in another country can easily cause serious embarrassments to the government of their own country as well as to their fellow citizens. We cannot deny to Congress the reasonable belief that these difficulties might well become acute, to the point of jeopardizing
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#17327733646404524-704: The case were presented by attorneys Edward Ennis —chairman of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)—for Afroyim, and Charles Gordon—general counsel for the INS—for the government. Afroyim was in New York City at this time, having been granted a visitor's visa in 1965 while his case went through the courts. Before heading the ACLU, Ennis had served as general counsel for the INS. In his oral argument supporting Afroyim, Ennis asserted that Congress lacked
4611-434: The charge of conviction in this case, capital murder of a police officer acting in the line of duty, is unconstitutional because it bestows upon police officers special rights or a special designation of the worth of life in contravention of the "missing Thirteenth Amendment". The documents then explain that these are reasons that Sibley and his wife refused appointed counsel on appeal and refused to pursue matters any further in
4698-403: The conclusory and quite unsubstantiated assertion that Congress is without "any general power, express or implied," to expatriate a citizen "without his assent." Next, the Court embarks upon a lengthy, albeit incomplete, survey of the historical background of the congressional power at stake here, and yet, at the end, concedes that the history is susceptible of "conflicting inferences." ... Finally,
4785-409: The court system and that only Congress can give them relief. The Sibley court dismissed the appeal, concluding in part that the defendant was simply not seeking relief through the courts. Sibley v. Culliver was cited by a court in describing a prison inmate's attempt to use the Titles of Nobility Amendment to claim immunity from jurisdiction: Some plaintiffs have relied on what they have called
4872-627: The decision of the case. Beys Afroyim (born Ephraim Bernstein, 1893–1984) was an artist and active communist . Various sources state that he was born in either 1893 or 1898, and either in Poland generally, specifically in the Polish town of Ryki , or in Riga , Latvia (then part of the Russian Empire ). In 1912, Afroyim immigrated to the United States, and on June 14, 1926, he was naturalized as
4959-471: The erroneous Thirteenth Amendment makes it valid, Article V of the Constitution does not so provide. In a 2004 case, Sibley v. Culliver , a federal district court found that the defendant's invocation of this amendment worked to his detriment. The court took note of documents produced by the defendant, a convicted murderer who submitted documents in support of his appeal claiming that it rendered his conviction invalid: These documents allege in great detail
5046-411: The exercise of the implied power to regulate foreign affairs or in the exercise of any specifically granted power. [...] Citizenship is no light trifle to be jeopardized any moment Congress decides to do so under the name of one of its general or implied grants of power. In some instances, loss of citizenship can mean that a man is left without the protection of citizenship in any country in the world -- as
5133-401: The foreign voting provision, already without effect since Afroyim , was repealed at the same time. Although Afroyim appeared to rule out any involuntary revocation of a person's citizenship, the government continued for the most part to pursue loss-of-citizenship cases when an American had acted in a way believed to imply an intent to give up citizenship—especially when an American had become
5220-522: The idea that foreign naturalization might legitimately lead to loss of citizenship (a concept which Warren had been willing to accept in his Perez dissent). Nevertheless, the Court's Afroyim ruling went beyond even Warren's earlier position—holding instead that "The very nature of our government makes it completely incongruous to have a rule of law under which a group of citizens temporarily in office can deprive another group of citizens of their citizenship." In sum Justice Black concluded: In our country
5307-527: The imposition of this constitutional constraint upon the authority of Congress. Responding to the assertion that Congress did not have power to revoke a person's citizenship without his or her assent, Harlan predicted that "Until the Court indicates with greater precision what it means by 'assent', today's opinion will surely cause still greater confusion in this area of the law." The Afroyim decision stated that no one with United States citizenship could be involuntarily deprived of that citizenship. Nevertheless,
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#17327733646405394-479: The number needed to become part of the Constitution. Congress did not set a time limit for its ratification, so the amendment is still pending before the states. If any citizen of the United States shall accept, claim, receive or retain, any title of nobility or honour, or shall, without the consent of Congress, accept and retain any present, pension, office or emolument of any kind whatever, from any emperor, king, prince or foreign power, such person shall cease to be
5481-466: The passage of the Fourteenth Amendment, Congress did not believe that it had the power to revoke anyone's citizenship. The Court further noted that a proposed 1818 act of Congress would have provided a way for citizens to voluntarily relinquish their citizenship, but opponents had argued that Congress had no authority to provide for expatriation. Afroyim's counsel had addressed only the foreign voting question and had carefully avoided any direct challenge to
5568-450: The people are sovereign and the Government cannot sever its relationship to the people by taking away their citizenship. Our Constitution governs us and we must never forget that our Constitution limits the Government to those powers specifically granted or those that are necessary and proper to carry out the specifically granted ones. The Constitution, of course, grants Congress no express power to strip people of their citizenship, whether, in
5655-484: The potential issue of diluted allegiance through dual citizenship to be sidestepped. Indeed, in 1951 there was no Israeli nationality law ; eligibility to vote in the election that year had been based on residence rather than any concept of citizenship. Although Afroyim had later acquired Israeli citizenship and voted in at least two other elections in his new country, his lawyers were able to avoid discussing this matter and instead focus entirely on whether foreign voting
5742-524: The power to prescribe forfeiture of citizenship, and he sharply criticized the foreign-relations argument under which the Perez court had upheld loss of citizenship for voting in a foreign election—pointing out, for example, that when a referendum was held in 1935 on the status of the Saar (a region of Germany occupied after World War I by the United Kingdom and France), Americans had participated in
5829-438: The proposed amendment was submitted to the states, ratification by 13 states was required for it to become part of the Constitution; 11 had done so by early 1812. On February 27, 1818, President James Monroe communicated to Congress the record shown above. He and Congress were both satisfied that the required number of ratifications had not been reached. A law, passed April 20, 1818, placed official responsibility for overseeing
5916-553: The question of this law's validity had been settled by the Supreme Court's 1958 Perez decision. Afroyim appealed the district court's ruling against him to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals , which upheld the lower court's reasoning and decision on May 24, 1966. Two of the three judges who heard Afroyim's appeal found the district court's analysis and affirmation of Perez to be "exhaustive and most penetrating". The third judge expressed serious reservations regarding
6003-490: The reasoning Warren had used nine years earlier in his Perez dissent. The court's majority now held that "Congress has no power under the Constitution to divest a person of his United States citizenship absent his voluntary renunciation thereof." Specifically repudiating Perez , the majority of the justices rejected the claim that Congress had any power to revoke citizenship and said that "no such power can be sustained as an implied attribute of sovereignty". Instead, quoting from
6090-542: The resulting abolition of slavery in the United States, steps were taken to grant citizenship to the freed slaves. Congress first enacted the Civil Rights Act of 1866 , which included a clause declaring "all persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power" to be citizens. Even as the Civil Rights Act was being debated in Congress, its opponents argued that the citizenship provision
6177-440: The revocation of his citizenship. Initially, he claimed that he had not in fact voted in Israel's 1951 election, but had entered the polling place solely in order to draw sketches of voters casting their ballots. Afroyim's initial challenge was rejected in administrative proceedings in 1965. He then sued in federal district court , with his lawyer agreeing to a stipulation that Afroyim had in fact voted in Israel, but arguing that
6264-572: The states for ratification a proposed amendment that would become the Thirteenth Amendment , which abolished slavery. As with the Corwin Amendment, when what is now the Thirteenth Amendment was proposed and adopted, no one claimed that there already was an adopted Thirteenth Amendment. The assertion that the Titles of Nobility Amendment has been ratified by the required number of states has never been upheld by any court in
6351-584: The statute under which this action had resulted in his losing his citizenship was unconstitutional. A federal judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York rejected Afroyim's claim on February 25, 1966, concluding that "in the opinion of Congress voting in a foreign political election could import 'allegiance to another country' in some measure 'inconsistent with American citizenship'" and that
6438-427: The successful conduct of international relations, when a citizen of one country chooses to participate in the political or governmental affairs of another country. The citizen may by his action unwittingly promote or encourage a course of conduct contrary to the interests of his own government; moreover, the people or government of the foreign country may regard his action to be the action of his government, or at least as
6525-506: The viability of Perez and suggested that Afroyim might have obtained a different result if he had framed his case differently, but decided to concur (albeit reluctantly) in the majority's ruling. After losing his appeal to the Second Circuit, Afroyim asked the Supreme Court to overrule the precedent it had established in Perez , strike down the foreign voting provision of the Nationality Act as unconstitutional, and decide that he
6612-483: The voting without raising any concerns within the State Department at the time. Gordon did not make a good showing in the Afroyim oral arguments despite his skill and experience in the field of immigration law, according to a 2005 article on the Afroyim case by law professor Peter J. Spiro . Gordon mentioned Israeli elections in 1955 and 1959 in which Afroyim had voted—facts which had not previously been presented to
6699-484: The way for a wider acceptance of dual (or multiple) citizenship in United States law. The Bancroft Treaties —a series of agreements between the United States and other nations which had sought to limit dual citizenship following naturalization—were eventually abandoned after the Carter administration concluded that Afroyim and other Supreme Court decisions had rendered them unenforceable. The impact of Afroyim v. Rusk
6786-511: Was unconstitutional . In light of this concern, as well as to protect the new grant of citizenship for former slaves from being repealed by a later Congress, the drafters of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution included a Citizenship Clause , which would entrench in the Constitution (and thereby set beyond the future reach of Congress or the courts) a guarantee of citizenship stating that "All persons born or naturalized in
6873-519: Was a sufficient cause for loss of one's U.S. citizenship. The Supreme Court ruled in Afroyim's favor in a 5–4 decision issued on May 29, 1967. The opinion of the Court—written by Associate Justice Hugo Black , and joined by Chief Justice Warren and Associate Justices William O. Douglas and Abe Fortas —as well as Associate Justice Brennan, who had been part of the majority in Perez —was grounded in
6960-487: Was guaranteed by the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution . In so doing, the Court struck down a federal law mandating loss of U.S. citizenship for voting in a foreign election—thereby overruling one of its own precedents , Perez v. Brownell (1958), in which it had upheld loss of citizenship under similar circumstances less than a decade earlier. The Afroyim decision opened
7047-480: Was narrowed by a later case, Rogers v. Bellei (1971), in which the Court determined that the Fourteenth Amendment safeguarded citizenship only when a person was born or naturalized in the United States, and that Congress retained authority to regulate the citizenship status of a person who was born outside the United States to an American parent. However, the specific law at issue in Rogers v. Bellei —a requirement for
7134-530: Was not to be shifted, canceled, or diluted at the will of the Federal Government, the States, or any other governmental unit. The Court found support for its position in the history of the unratified Titles of Nobility Amendment . The fact that this 1810 proposal had been framed as a constitutional amendment, rather than an ordinary act of Congress, was seen by the majority as showing that, even before
7221-517: Was noted by the Supreme Court in United States v. Wong Kim Ark , an 1898 case involving the citizenship of a man born in the United States to Chinese parents who were legally domiciled in the country. After ruling in this case that Wong was born a U.S. citizen despite his Chinese ancestry, the Court went on to state that his birthright citizenship "[had] not been lost or taken away by anything happening since his birth." By making this statement,
7308-522: Was out of fear that the foreign powers bestowing those titles would use them as markers to call in favors to either pass or impede the passing of unfavorable laws. The Titles of Nobility Amendment was introduced in the Senate by Democratic–Republican Senator Philip Reed of Maryland , was passed on April 27, 1810, by a vote of 19–5 and sent to the House of Representatives for its consideration. It
7395-453: Was passed by the House on May 1, 1810, by a vote of 87–3. Having been approved by Congress, the proposed amendment was sent to the state legislatures for ratification and was ratified by the following states: The amendment was rejected by Virginia (February 14, 1811), New York (March 12, 1812), Connecticut (May 13, 1813), and Rhode Island (September 15, 1814). No other state legislature has completed ratification action on it. When
7482-533: Was still a United States citizen. Afroyim's counsel argued that since "neither the Fourteenth Amendment nor any other provision of the Constitution expressly grants Congress the power to take away [U.S.] citizenship once it has been acquired ... the only way [Afroyim] could lose his citizenship was by his own voluntary renunciation of it." The Supreme Court agreed to consider Afroyim's case on October 24, 1966 and held oral arguments on February 20, 1967. The official respondent (defendant) in Afroyim's case on behalf of
7569-496: Was struck down that same year in another case ( Trop v. Dulles ). However, in yet another 1958 case ( Perez v. Brownell ), the Supreme Court affirmed the provision revoking the citizenship of any American who had voted in an election in a foreign country, as a legitimate exercise (under the Constitution's Necessary and Proper Clause ) of Congress' authority to regulate foreign affairs and avoid potentially embarrassing diplomatic situations. Associate Justice Felix Frankfurter ,
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