Expatriation
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
the act or state of banishment from one's native country; also the voluntary renunciation of the rights and liabilities of citizenship in one citizens country to become the citizen or subject of another. In the early part of the 19th century, the United States was almost the only nation that claimed for individuals the right of expatriation without the consent of the government of which they were citizens or subjects. The European nations, as a rule, maintained that the permission of the sovereign was necessary; and the enforcement by England of this claim was one of the causes of the War of 1812. It must be said, however, that notwithstanding the position of the United States in regard to citizens or subjects of foreign powers, the right of voluntary renunciation of allegiance to the United States by one of our citizens was unsettled, so far as legislation was concerned, till the act of Congress of July 27, 1868, asserted that expatriation "is a natural and inherent right of all people," but the action of the Department of State had previously seemed practically to admit the right. As far as foreign States are concerned, however, the United States has steadily maintained its original position. The first formal recognition of its claims was secured in an expatriation treaty with the North German Confederation, signed Feb. 22, 1868. England first recognized the right of voluntary expatriation by act of Parliament in 1870, and immediately concluded an ex patriation treaty with the United States. All the leading nations of Europe now recognize the right, including besides those just mentioned, France, Austria, Russia, Italy, and Spain.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
When Collier's wrote this in 1921 the fight was over whether a state could refuse to let its subjects go; that argument is settled, with the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights affirming that no one may be arbitrarily denied the right to change nationality. The newer question is the reverse one -- whether a government can strip citizenship from someone who does not want to lose it. Congress long did exactly that, notably under the Expatriation Act of 1907, which cost American women their citizenship if they married foreigners (undone in stages by the Cable Act of 1922 and later laws), until the Supreme Court held in Afroyim v. Rusk (1967) that citizenship cannot be taken away without the citizen's own intent to give it up. Dual nationality, treated in 1921 as an anomaly to be resolved by treaty, is now routinely tolerated, and Americans who do renounce face a formal consular oath and, since 2008, a possible exit tax.
Written for this edition, 2026.