IV NATURALISATION IN ESPECIAL
Vattel, I. § 214—Hall, §§ 71-71*—Westlake, § I. pp. 225-230—Lawrence, §§ 95-96—Phillimore, I. §§ 325-332—Halleck, I. pp. 403-410—Taylor, §§ 181-182—Walker, § 19—Wharton, II. §§ 173-183—Moore, III. §§ 377-380—Wheaton, § 85—Bluntschli, §§ 371-372—Ullmann, §§ 110-111—Pradier-Fodéré, III. Nos. 1656-1659—Calvo, II. §§ 581-646—Martens, II. §§ 47-48—Stoicesco, "Étude sur la naturalisation" (1875)—Folleville, "Traité de la naturalisation" (1880)—Cogordan, "La nationalité, &c." (2nd ed. 1890), pp. 117-284, 307-316—Delécaille, "De la naturalisation" (1893)—Henriques, "The Law of Aliens, &c." (1906), pp. 91-121—Piggott, "Nationality and Naturalisation, &c." 2 vols. (new ed. 1907)—Hart, in the Journal of the Society of Comparative Legislation, new series, vol. II. (1900), pp. 11-26.
Conception and Importance of Naturalisation.
§ 303. Naturalisation in the narrower sense of the term—in contradistinction to naturalisation ipso facto through marriage, legitimation, option, domicile, and Government office (see above, § [299])—must be defined as reception of an alien into the citizenship of a State through a formal act on application of the favoured individual. International Law does not provide any such rules for such reception, but it recognises the natural competence of every State as a Sovereign to increase its population through naturalisation, although a State might by its Municipal Law be prevented from making use of this natural competence.[625] In spite, however, of the fact that naturalisation is a domestic affair of the different States, it is nevertheless of special importance to the theory and practice of the Law of Nations. This is the case because naturalisation is effected through a special grant of the naturalising State, and regularly involves either a change or a multiplication of nationality, facts which can be and have been the source of grave international conflicts. In the face of the fact that millions of citizens emigrate every year from their home countries with the intention of settling permanently in foreign countries, where the majority of them become sooner or later naturalised, the international importance of naturalisation cannot be denied.
[625] But there is, as far as I know, no civilised State in existence which abstains altogether from naturalising foreigners.
Object of Naturalisation.
§ 304. The object of naturalisation is always an alien. Some States will naturalise such aliens only as are stateless because they never have been citizens of another State or because they have renounced, or have been released from or deprived of, the citizenship of their home State. But other States, as Great Britain, naturalise also such aliens as are and remain subjects of their home State. Most States naturalise such person only as has taken his domicile in their country, has been residing there for some length of time, and intends permanently to remain in their country. And according to the Municipal Law of many States, naturalisation of a married individual includes that of his wife and children under age. But although every alien may be naturalised, no alien has, according to the Municipal Law of most States, a claim to become naturalised, naturalisation being a matter of discretion of the Government, which can refuse it without giving any reasons.
Conditions of Naturalisation.
§ 305. If granted, naturalisation makes an alien a citizen. But it is left to the discretion of the naturalising State to grant naturalisation under any conditions it likes. Thus, for example, Great Britain grants naturalisation on the sole condition that the naturalised alien shall not be deemed to be a British subject when within the limits of the foreign State of which he has been a subject previously to his naturalisation, unless at the time of naturalisation he has ceased to be a subject of that State. And it must be specially mentioned that naturalisation need not give an alien absolutely the same rights as are possessed by natural-born citizens. Thus according to article 2 of the Constitution of the United States of America a naturalised alien can never be elected President.[626]
[626] A foreigner naturalised in Great Britain by Letters of Denization does not acquire the same rights as a natural-born British subject. See Hall, "Foreign Powers and Jurisdiction" (1894), § 22.