No. 98.
Mr. Hunter
to Mr. Logan.
Washington, October 7, 1879.
Sir: Your dispatch No. 22, of the 20th of August last,* in relation to the abuse of the claim to American protection abroad, and especially in the States of Central America, has been received and read with interest.
The evils to which you draw attention are only too familiar to this Department, through the almost unvarying experience of many years. The remedies, however, are not so easy to seek, and to make them effective a careful scheme of Congressional legislation would be needed. This is especially true of your suggestions with regard to expatriation. Congress, by resolution, has declared its understanding that the right of voluntary expatriation exists, but does not define it.
On general principles, a person expatriates himself by legally assuming the responsibilities of citizenship in a foreign land, and, per contra, the act of expatriation might be held not to be performed in the absence of an alien naturalization. Such is, in fact, the fundamental law concerning expatriation as established in certain foreign countries. Under these circumstances, a sweeping declaration of the penalty of expatriation because of continued residence of native Americans abroad would be, in the absence of competent legislation, impracticable.
The case of aliens naturalized here and returning to the land of their original allegiance is different, inasmuch as the laws of their native country may not expatriate them in the event of naturalization elsewhere, and therefore, by returning to their native land and assuming’ duties or performing acts there compatible with their original allegiance and as such incompatible with their American naturalization, they may be held to have absolved this government from the necessity to protect them.
Your announced intention to exercise the most careful scrutiny in such cases as come under your notice is approved.
The case of Maassen, which you cite, is a peculiar one. In virtue of the existing naturalization treaty with Germany, his appeal for German protection after naturalization in the United States was a manifest fraud, his American citizenship being guaranteed by that convention. He is presumably an American citizen. * * * If called upon to protect him in the exercise of his legal rights as an American citizen, you should satisfy yourself of his identity with the Anton Joseph Maassen naturalized in California in March, 1874. The certificate of naturalization you transmit is a certified copy of the original record, filled up and signed in the usual way by the clerk of the county court, and, as such, is sufficient evidence of the fact of naturalization, but not of identity.
I am, &c.,
Acting Secretary.
- Printed in Foreign Relations, 1879, page 143.↩