No. 4.
Mr. Lee to
Mr. Bayard.
Legation of
the United States,
Vienna, July 1, 1886.
(Received July 17.)
No. 193.]Sir: I have the honor to forward for the action of
the Department of State a petition for passport addressed to this legation
by Mr. Albert Landau.
Mr. Landau applied to me for a passport some time since, claiming to be a
naturalized citizen of the United States, formerly a subject of
Austria-Hungary.
When asked to produce his certificate of naturalization, he gave me the
account of its loss.
I told him he must obtain a certified copy, which he endeavored to do, but
subsequently told me he had written to a friend in Philadelphia, where he
claims to have been naturalized, but that his friends were unable to find
any record.
He left the United States with a passport issued by the Department of State
which was lost at the same time as his certificate of naturalization.
Having obtained, however, from Mr. Carroll Spence a new passport, he
continued to reside in the Levant, made money, and returned about eighteen
years ago to his native land, to enjoy it.
He lives in Vienna, where he owns an independent property and has raised a
family of six children.
He belongs to that class of naturalized citizens who only remain in the
United States long enough to become naturalized, and, avoiding all duties to
the land of their adoption, seek to remain in their original home avoiding
also all responsibility to its Government.
The object of the present effort to obtain a passport is, I have reason to
believe, to secure his three sons from the necessity of performing military
duty.
The Department may have some record of the issuing of his original passport
in 1854, with the date of the certificate of naturalization and the title of
the court by which it was issued; if so and the Department considers it a
proper case for renewal, the reference might be sent to me in order that Mr.
Landau may obtain a certified copy.
I have, &c.,
To the Hon. James Fenner
Lee,
United States Chargé d’Affaires ad
interim, Vienna, Austria:
Your petitioner, Albert Landau, residing in the city of Vienna, Empire of
Austria, respectfully represents that he is a naturalized American
citizen, and that he obtained his certificate of naturalization in one
of the courts of record of the city of Philadel phia, State of
Pennsylvania, during the year 1854, in accordance with the act of
Congress in such case made and provided, and after he, your petitioner,
had resided more than five years uninterruptedly in the United
States.
That during the said year, 1854, a passport was duly issued to your
petitioner, by the Department of State at Washington, your petitioner
presenting then and there the proofs of his citizenship, which fact must
now appear of record at said Department of State.
That during the same year your petitioner returned to Europe, and that
while in the Crimea during the year 1855 his said passport, as well as
other papers and property of your petitioner, were stolen from him,
together with his said certificate of naturalization.
[Page 11]
That subsequently, to wit, on the 18th day of October, A. D. 1855,
another passport was issued to your petitioner by the then minister
resident at Constantinople, which passport is hereunto annexed and
marked Exhibit A, and the petitioner herewith begs leave to make the
same a part of this petition.
That in lieu of this last-named passport a third passport was issued to
this petitioner during the year 1863 by the United States consul-general
at Alexandria, Egypt; and the passport hereunto annexed was canceled, as
will appear from an examination of the same.
And your petitioner further represents that he has lost the said third
passport issued to him by the said United States consul-general at
Alexandria, Egypt, and that after a diligent search he is unable to find
and can therefore not produce the same.
And your petitioner further avers and charges the fact and the truth to
be that he has ever since said naturalization regarded and conducted
himself as an American citizen, that he has not forfeited his American
citizenship in any manner, and has not assumed the duties or claimed the
privileges of a subject or citizen of any other country whatever, and
that he claims, although temporarily residing in a foreign country, the
rights and privileges of an American citizen, and believes himself to be
entitled to recognition and protection as such citizen by the Government
of the United States.
Your petitioner therefore prays that a passport may be issued to him as a
citizen of the United States, in accordance with the provisions of law,
on due proof of the identity of your petitioner. As your petitioner will
ever pray.
United States Consulate-General
at Vienna, Austria, ss.
Albert Landau, the above-named petitioner, being duly sworn, upon his
oath saith that he has read the foregoing petition and knows the
contents thereof, and that the same is true of his own knowledge in
substance and in fact.
Sworn to and subscribed before me this 25th day of
June, A. D. 1886.
[
seal.]
EDMUND
JÜSSEN,
United States
Consul-General.
