THE RIGHT TO EMIGRATE
Nevertheless, all countries have in some measure practically recognized the right of the human individual to emigrate, though there have persisted laws and decrees expressing the attempt to retain legal jurisdiction and allegiance. The strength of these efforts depends largely upon whether the basic theory of citizenship has its roots in the Jus Sanguinis or the Jus Solis. For it may be said generally that the nations of the world are divided roughly in this regard by their adherence to the one theory or the other, though we look almost in vain for a pure example of either; in some countries there are interwoven lines of both, and in many it is almost impossible to determine which prevails. For practical purposes, and subject to such modifications as may be made in the era of readjustment upon which the World War has launched us, we may depend upon the following general classification:
The Jus Sanguinis dominates in Austria, China, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Japan, Monaco, Norway, Persia, Rumania, Serbia.
The Jus Solis prevails in the canton of Geneva, Switzerland, and in Argentina.
The Jus Sanguinis combined with the Jus Solis is found in Belgium, Greece, Italy, Luxemburg, Russia, Spain, Turkey.
The Jus Solis modified by the Jus Sanguinis prevails in most of the states of the Americas, and in Bulgaria, Denmark, Egypt, Great Britain, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland.
THE SUBJECT VS. THE ACTIVE MEMBER
In thought and writing on the subject of citizenship, two concepts of the word “citizen” persist, and usually are treated as to such an extent interchangeable as to produce a fatal confusion. For they are not interchangeable. They differ in essence, and it is of the utmost importance that they should be clearly distinguished. In the distinction lies all the difference between Liberty and Autocracy. Something, if not all, of this difference lies in the distinction between the Law of the Blood and the Law of the Soil.
The first and commonest of these concepts is that which must have colored the thought of the feudal lord as he looked upon “his” people, belonging to him because they belonged to the soil which his sword controlled. This concept contemplates the citizen or subject as invested with the character of a national body politic, bound by an obligatory allegiance to it and its political institutions because he is there, born there, or led there by the circumstances of his life.
The other concept, which we like to think constitutes the basis of what we call “America,” for it is of the essence of anything worthy of the name of Democracy, contemplates the citizen as a participant in the fact of sovereignty, one who owns an undivided and indivisible share in the community title, and whose right and duty it is to take a definite part and acknowledge a definite responsibility in the business of government. In this study of naturalization and political life of the foreign-born citizen it is with this second concept that we have most to do.