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Citizenship and Immigration Obj. 31A, B. Jen, Brandy, and Jenna. Citizenship. A person can become a citizen either by birth or by naturalization 90% of Americans are citizens because they were born in the U.S. Citizenship by birth is determined by either jus soli or jus sanguinis. Jus soli.
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Citizenship and ImmigrationObj. 31A, B Jen, Brandy, and Jenna
Citizenship • A person can become a citizen either by birth or by naturalization • 90% of Americans are citizens because they were born in the U.S. • Citizenship by birth is determined by either jus soli or jus sanguinis
Jus soli • Jus soli is the law of the soil, or where one was born. • The 14th Amendment confers citizenship according to the location of a persons birth.
The United States includes: (for citizenship purposes) • The 50 states • The District of Columbia • Puerto Rico • Guam • The Virgin Islands • The Northern Mariana Islands • All other American embassies and American public vessels all over the world
Jus Sanguinis • Jus Sanguinis is the law of blood, or to whom one is born • This means that someone can be born abroad and still be an American citizen if both parents are American citizens Or one parent is an American citizen who has lived in the U.S. for at least 10 years 5 of them after the age of 14 and the child has lived in U.S. continuously for at least 5 years between the ages of 14 and 28.
Naturalization • Naturalization is the legal process by which a person becomes a citizen of another country at sometime after birth. • More than 800,000 aliens become naturalized citizens each year • An alien is a citizen or national of a foreign state living in this country.
To become a naturalized citizen a person must: • Be, in most cases, at least 18 years old • Have entered the country legally, lived in the US for at least 5 years (for husbands or wives of citizen, 3 years) • File a petition for naturalization with the clerk of a Federal district court of a State court of record • Be literate in the English language • Be “of good moral character” and “well disposed to the good order and happiness of the US • Have a knowledge and understanding of the fundamentals of history, and the principles and form of government, of the US • Take an oath or affirmation in which he or she absolutely renounces any allegiance to a foreign power and promises to “support and defend the Constitution and laws of the US against all enemies, foreign and domestic”
Collective naturalization is when entire groups have been naturalized en masse- this usually happens when the US acquires new territory • Every American citizen has the right to renounce his or her citizenship • Expatriation- the legal process by which a loss of citizenship occurs • Naturalized citizens can lose their citizenship involuntarily by a process called denaturalization • Denaturalization can occur only by court order and only after it has been shown that the person became a citizen by fraud or deception • A person can neither gain nor lose American citizenship by marriage, it can only shorten the time required to naturalization
Immigration • About 70 million immigrants have come here since 1820, when figures were first recorded. • Congress has the exclusive power to regulate immigration • Congress has the power in deciding who may be allowed into the US and under what conditions
By 1890 immigration was no longer encouraged because the jobs were running out • Congress placed the first major restrictions on immigration with the passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882 • Congress began to add quantitative and qualitative restrictions because an average of more that a million people came to the US each year • After the US gained its independence immigration was encouraged because workers were needed
The Immigration Acts and the National Origins Act of 1929 assigned each country in Europe a quota of how many people they could send to the US • In 1952 Congress passed another law, the Immigration and Nationality Act, which modified the quota system to cover every country outside the Western Hemisphere.
Today • The Immigration Act of 1990 governs the admissions of aliens to the US • This law provided for a substantial increase in the number of immigrants who may enter the US each year • Only aliens who can qualify for citizenship can be admitted as immigrants • The ones that aren’t permitted are: criminals, persons with communicable diseases, drug abusers or addicts, illiterates, and mentally disturbed people that might pose a threat to the safety of others
