THE SPECIAL COST OF BEING BORN AMERICAN | 2008-06-13
Antonio Fini, in his comment today on my "Mussolini and Perot" thread, made a point I want to address:
"You may be aware Bob that Italy is facing such a population crash of native Italians that a few years back they instituted a right of return program. This permits people like myself, born of Italian grandparents on both sides, to gain Italian citizenship."
When I took my first course in Political Science in 1957, there were a number of ways one could lose his American citizenship, including:
Joining a foreign army. The main test of this was "wearing a foreign uniform."
Voting in a foreign election.
Taking foreign citizenship.
The title of this piece derives from the fact that those restriction make no distinction between whether you were born here, so your ONLY citizenship is US, or were naturalized and had dual citizenship, a is routine for Canadians, Brits and especially Israelis.
Woodrow Wilson backed a law that allowed Americans to join allied forces in World War I and declared strict neutrality. His main platform in 1916 was "He Kept Us Out of War." In 1940 while declaring HIS military neutrality Roosevelt also got in a law that allowed Americans to join the Allies.
Jews today are free to join Israeli armed forces, vote in Israeli elections, and carry Israeli passports, after they were born or naturalized in the US..
This is not a big deal to most Americans, but I wanted Rhodesian citizenship BADLY. I didn't take it because I guessed that what was ignored in the case of Jews would be enforced when it came to ME if it could be used against me later.
In a civilized war, uniforms make the difference whether you go to a POW camp or get hanged. Ask Major Andre. But where I was, in Latin America and especially Africa, I felt no need to wear one. No one on my side went to a POW camp anyway. But the other restrictions were a PAIN.
About 1990 I went to the Law Library and checked the present state of US citizenship law out carefully. Since I've WRITTEN laws, I had a pretty good feel for how law worked, and I was right. The one main provision the courts are still enforcing on non-Jews, at least the ones who don't choose Israel, is banning American BORN citizens like Antonio from taking another citizenship.
So American residents in Mexico and anyone who takes Italy up on their right of return is taking a big risk acquiring citizenship if they have the wrong politics.
And it is hard to imagine anyone whose opinions are "Wronger" than Finis'.