Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, With the Address of the President to Congress December 8, 1914

File No. 151.10/199.

General Instruction No. 263. Consular.

[Untitled]

Department of State,
Washington , January 12, 1914 .

To the American Consular Officers.

Gentlemen: The Department has received a letter dated January 5, 1914, from the Secretary of Labor¹ saying that by a recent decision of the Department of Labor the adopted children of Chinese of American birth can not be permitted to enter the United States unless they are provided with the certificate prescribed by section 6 of the act approved July 5, 1884.

This decision does not affect directly or indirectly the existing practice with regard to the admission of the wives of United States citizens of the Chinese race or the adopted children of members of the exempted classes of Chinese, and admission may occur in these cases as heretofore if the claims advanced are affirmatively and satisfactorily established.

As stated above, however, Chinese persons claiming to be adopted children of Chinese of American birth will need to be provided with a section 6 certificate regularly issued as a prerequisite to admission into the United States.

I am [etc.],

For the Secretary of State:

Wilbur J. Carr

.

1. This letter reads as follows:

   Department of Labor,
   Washington, January 5, 1914.

   Sir: Referring to Department of State letter of February 14, 1908 (file No. 11637/-1), and to a letter written to you by former Secretary of Commerce and Labor Straus on February 24, 1908, I have the honor to inclose a copy of a circular letter of instructions this day issued by the Bureau of Immigration to immigration officials in charge of the enforcement of the Chinese-exclusion laws, advising such officers of a recent decision of this Department to the effect that the adopted children of Chinese of American birth cannot be permitted to enter the United States unless they are provided with the certificate prescribed by section 6 of the act approved July 5, 1884.

   In rendering the decision in question the Department holds that citizenship cannot be acquired by adoption, following the views expressed by Mr. Moore in his International Law Digest, vol. 3, pp. 484–485, and by Mr. Van Dyne in his work on naturalization, pp. 223, 224. In the Department’s judgment, not only has past experience shown that the claim of right to enter the United States as adopted children of citizens has been used for the purpose of defeating the intent of the exclusion laws, but the frequency with which the privilege may be abused is likely to increase in the future. In enforcing the general immigration statute, the Department has always held that adoption of an alien child by a United States citizen does not remove the child from the operation of said law, and there seems to be no good reason why the same practice should not be followed in enforcing the exclusion laws.

   Kindly advise all consular officers having an interest in this matter of the purport of the Department’s decision.

   Respectfully,

   W. B. Wilson, Secretary.