ENGLISH RACE. My aim is to establish the possibility and advocate the policy of instituting a common citizenship for all Englishmen and Americans. My proposal is summarily this: That England and the United States should, by concurrent and appropriate legislation, create such a common citizenship, or, to put the matter in a more concrete and therefore in a more intelligible form, that an act of the Imperial Parliament should make every citizen of the United States, during the continuance of peace between England and America, a British subject, and that simultaneously an act of Congress should make every British subject, during the continuance of such peace, a citizen of the United States. The coming into force of the one act would be made dependent upon the passing and coming into force of the other. Should war at any time break out between the two countries, each act would ipso facto cease to have effect. This is in substance my proposition. It is purposely expressed in the broadest and most general terms. Qualifications and limitations, which must of necessity be inserted in any actual act of Parliament, or of Congress, constituting such common citizenship, or, to employ a useful but pedantic term, "isopolity," are for the sake of clearness omitted. With provisos and exceptions my readers need not for the moment concern themselves. They should, however, note one preliminary observation, the overlooking whereof might lead to misapprehension of my whole plan. Common citizenship, or isopolity, has no necessary connection whatever with national or political unity. My proposal is not designed to limit the complete national independence either of England or of the United States. It would be not only an absurdity, but almost an act of lunacy, to devise or defend a scheme for turning England and America into one State. It is as impossible, as, were it possible, it would be undesirable, that Washington should be ruled by a government in London, or that London should be ruled by a gov- even involve a permanent alliance, de- day that Beust passed from the service The idea of a common citizenship for the whole English people is novel. My proposal, therefore, must of necessity sound startling. My purpose is to establish, first, that my plan is practicable; secondly, that the immediate effects of common citizenship would be extremely small, but, as far as they went, wholly good; thirdly, that the indirect and moral, and, ultimately, the political results of common citizenship might be great and extremely beneficial; and, lastly, that the time is opportune for aiming at, or at any rate contemplating, the extension of common civil and political rights throughout the whole of the English-speaking people. First, the plan is practicable. My scheme is technically, so to speak, feasible. As far as England is concerned, it could be carried into effect at any moment by an act, and that a short act, of Parliament. As far as the United States are concerned, it might be carried into effect by an act of Congress. There would, for the foundation of a common citizenship, be no need for any revolution even of a legal kind in the Constitution either of England or of the United States. No doubt, as already intimated, the necessary legislation on the part either of the Imperial Parliament or of Congress would involve the consideration of several provisos or limitations, each of which might raise difficult and debatable questions. Thus, for example, with a view to the peculiar status of American Indians, who are inhabitants, but are not citizens, of the United States, care would have to be taken that the enactment of common citizenship did not confer on Canadian Indians, who are British subjects, greater rights, when passing into the United States, than are possessed there by American Indians. It would, again, need to be considered how far, if at all, the extension of civil and political rights should involve the extension of criminal liability. But these and other matters of detail, however important in themselves, do not, for our present purpose, require careful consideration; they constitute just the kind of objections which naturally enough are taken hold of and exaggerated by opponents who deprecate the very attempt to unite more closely the two branches of the English people. But they are objec 1 Or by such other legislation, if any, as the Constitution of the United States may require. An act of Congress would, however, apparently be sufficient. (See "Constitution of the United States," art. i. s. 8, clause 3, and " Kent, Comm." ii., pp. 64-66.) But a treaty which should provide for the passing of the necessary acts would prac. tically be a necessity. tions which will never weigh for much with those who eagerly embrace or cordially acquiesce in the idea of isopolity. The plan proposed is then technically feasible; its real practicability depends on the existence of a widespread feeling in its favor on both sides the Atlantic. Unless a desire for a closer union exist, any attempt to establish a common citizenship must, on the very face of the matter, be futile, not to say absurd. Throughout this article I as sume that the desire for some sort of unity does exist, and my contention is that, given such a wish, there is no legal difficulty in giving effect to it. If the objection be made, as it possibly may be made with truth, that a strong wish for common citizenship has not yet arisen, my reply is simple. Neither men nor nations desire an end until it has been definitely set before them as an object of attainment. One main reason for propounding my scheme is to create or stimulate the desire for common citizenship. Thus much is certain: if the desire exist there is no legal difficulty in giving it satisfaction. Secondly: The immediate and practical effects of common citizenship would be small. My proposal sounds revolutionary, but in truth the most plausible objection to it is that its results would be practically insignificant. As things now stand a foreigner when in England loses but little in point of civil rights, from the fact that he is not a British subject. Aliens, it is true, were at one time excluded as such from a certain number of civil rights; they could not, for example, inherit land, but, at any rate, since 1870 an alien belonging to a country such as France, which is at peace with Great Britain, has possessed, certainly in the United Kingdom, and probably in every part of the British Empire, if not all yet nearly ali, the civil rights of a British subject. He can own land in England, he can trade in England, he enjoys in England as much personal liberty and as much freedom of speech or of writing as an ordinary Englishman. There is no power on the part of the govern common citizenship he became an American citizen, he could avail himself any more easily than at present of the facility with which a divorce can be obtained in the state of Illinois. As things now stand an Englishman who chooses really and bonâ fide to settle or become domiciled in Illinois, may obtain a divorce there which would be held valid in England, and this he may accomplish whilst remaining a British subject. A British subject, and for that matter an American citizen, who is really or bonâ fide settled or domiciled in England, may possibly, if he takes the proper steps, get a divorce in Illinois, but that divorce will have no validity in England, and will not save him in England from conviction for bigamy should he, whilst his English wife is living, marry another wife in Illinois. The ordinary principle of English, as of American, law is that civil status and civil rights depend upon permanent residence or domicile, not upon nationality. ment to expel him from the country. glishman imagine that if in virtue of a In some few instances, but they are very few, he may find to his surprise that he lacks some right possessed by a British subject. An alien, for example, cannot be owner of a British ship, but this restriction, and it is a very exceptional one, is rather nominal than real, for there is nothing to prevent an alien from being a shareholder in a British company which owns ships. A foreigner, again, who wishes to execute a will may find, on consulting his lawyer, that a particular form of will, which would be valid if executed by a British subject, is invalid if the testator be an alien, and I doubt not that industrious research might discover one or two other trifling points in respect of which an alien's civil rights are in England affected by his alienage. But these matters are the merest trifles. A foreigner enjoys, in substance, in England all the ordinary civil rights of a native. The result is that an American citizen who should, by act of Parliament, be transformed into a British subject, would in England, at least, hardly feel that, as regards the affairs of every-day life, his position was in any way changed. In some English colonies the case may be different, and aliens may there still labor under some of the disabilitiese.g., as to the inheritance of land-imposed by the common law, and it is possible that the institution of a common citizenship might slightly increase even the mere civil rights of American citizens throughout the British Colonial Empire. Still, if you look at the matter broadly, it remains strictly true that an American becoming a British subject would find that, as regards the affairs of every-day life, he had undergone no perceptible change of status. Let me add further, in order to obviate a common and natural error, that the institution of a citizenship common to Englishmen and Americans would have no effect whatever upon the operation of the marriage laws or the divorce laws prevailing in different parts of the British Empire, or in the different states of the American Union. Let no En The position of aliens in the United States is still, it would appear, in theory at least, somewhat inferior to the position in the United Kingdom. Their rights to hold and to inherit real estate is still governed partly by common law, partly by the statutes of the several states. It is, therefore, possible that an interchange of citizenship would confer rather greater advantages upon Englishmen residing in the United States than upon Americans residing in England. But state legislation has tended to modify, in favor of aliens, the harshness of the common law, and there is no reason to suppose that the change I am advocating would materially affect the civil position of an Englishman settled in America. In all the ordinary transactions of life which lie outside the sphere of politics, an Englishman, resident in or visiting New York or Illinois, has already pretty much the same rights as a citizen of that state.1 1 As to the position of aliens in the United States see 2 Kent, Comm." 12th ed. pp. 53-73, especially Holmes's Note on Rights of Aliens, p. 70. When Community of citizenship would affect not civil, but political rights. If the acts creating isopolity were passed, a citizen of the United States would stand, when in England, in the same position as an English colonist. Mr. Phelps or Mr. Bayard would possess the same political rights as Mr. Blake or Mr. Rhodes. The political status, in short, of an American citizen would be exactly the same as that of his grandfather, who, before 1776, was an inhabitant of Massachusetts, but a subject of the British Crown. He would, on the necessary conditions being fulfilled, be able to vote for a member of Parliament, to sit in Parliament, and, if fortune favored, become a Cabinet minister or a premier. He might aspire, did his ambition lead in that direction, to the House of Lords. So on the other hand, a British subject, to whom American citizenship had been extended, might, on the necessary conditions being fulfilled, vote for a member of Congress, become a member of the House of Representatives, or even a senator. To one glory, it must be admitted, he could not attain; he must forego any hope of the presidentship, for none but a natural born citizen can become President of the United States.1 We must leave it for American jurists to decide whether under the constituwe consider that "many of the States of the Union have done away with all disabilities of aliens to hold landed property, and all are believed to have much qualified the common law" (2 "Kent," p 70, note 1), it may be assumed that the position of aliens in the United States would be but slightly changed by the extension of common citizenship. In order that Englishmen might not suffer by what was intended to be a gain, it should be made clear that they preserved the right given to citizens of different States and to citizens of the foreign States of suing and being sued in the Federal Courts. See Constitution of U. S., art. ii. s. 2. 1 U. S. Constitution, art. iii. s. 1. It is worth notice that some American citizens even after the acknowledgment by Great Britain of American independence, considered themselves to be both American citizens and British subjects. See the unpublished memoir of J. C Dyer, containing an expression of this view, which is very noteworthy as representing the sentiment of loyalty to England retained by a loyal citizen of the American Republic. tion the child of British subjects, who had themselves obtained American citizenship, might not, as a natural born citizen, hope to gain the supreme object of American ambition. The plain truth is that if every American settled in any part of the British dominions were suddenly by an act of Parliament transformed into a British subject, he might for a long time not realize his change of legal status. The alteration would certainly not attract the attention of his neighbors. There are scores of Americans living in England as to whom even an intimate friend does not know whether they have or have not taken out certificates of naturalization. It would be a bold prediction to assert that by a given date, say January 1, 1901, every American citizen would become a British subject, and ten or twelve American citizens would have obtained seats in the House of Commons, but though the prophecy would excite amazement, and would possibly enough not obtain fulfilment, there is no reason why it should excite alarm. The common citizenship which already prevails throughout the British empire has brought, and has most rightly brought, into Parliament men who by race, language, and religion are far less closely connected with us than are the citizens of Massachusetts or of Illinois, and Englishmen may see not only with calmness but with satisfaction, natives of India take their seats at Westminster; but they surely may see with just as much calmness, and just as much satisfaction, a citizen of Vermont or Connecticut seated side by side with a Parsee or a Hindoo. Recent legislation, moreover, enables any foreigner who is really resident in the United Kingdom to acquire British nationality. This extension of the rights of citizenship is as politic and reasonable as it is liberal and generous, but it forbids the maintenance of the principle that the public life of England shall be open to none but natural born Englishmen. No one wishes to exclude naturalized aliens from the full citizenship, but without being a victim to insular prejudice, a liberal-minded Englishman may confess that he would as soon have seen seated at Westminster, Mr. Lowell or Mr. Phelps, or Mr. Bayard, or any one of the eminent citizens who have represented the United States in England, as a gentleman, who, however keen an advocate of the doctrine of England for the English, owes his seat in Parliament to a certificate of naturalization on which the ink was scarcely dry at the day of his election. The direct effects of isopolity would be no greater in the United States than England. From some points of view they might be even less, since the rights and liabilities of an American often arise rather from his being a citizen of the particular state than from his being a citizen of the United States. However this may be, an Englishman who became an American citizen would, when in the United States, find that his civil rights were but slightly if at all increased, and that though his political status would be altered, this alteration would hardly affect the position of a man who did not wish to take an active part in public life. It must further be remembered that under the law of the United States naturalization, as things now stand, is easy, and that a naturalized American citizen has almost all the rights of a natural born American citizen. There certainly has at least been one case, and no doubt persons well acquainted with American politics might point to many more, in which a naturalized alien has played a very prominent and it must be added a very beneficial part in the public life of America. In the United States, therefore, as in England, the practical change produced by common citizenship would be small, but the change would, from one point of view, be of more importance in the United States than in the United Kingdom. The reason of this difference is that the number of Americans settling in England, or even in the British Empire, is small and insignificant, whilst the number of British subjects who settle in the United States is large and important. The naturaliza tion laws, moreover, of the United States, though they are very liberal, secure, nominally at least, that no foreigner shall obtain American citizenship who is not a person of respectable character, and has not resided in the United States for a period of five years. The suggestion, therefore, is plausible that legislation which made every British subject ipso facto an American citizen would break down some of the few checks on the tendency which every wise American deplores, of a mass of emigrants who have no real connection with the United States, and of whom some are by no means desirable citizens, to swamp and outnumber native-born Americans. But when the matter is carefully considered, the most plausible objection from an American point of view to my proposal turns out to be in reality a reason of some force in its favor. This assertion sounds paradoxical, but admits of easy justification. American checks on naturalization are not real, but nominal. Any emigrant who does not stickle at a little formal perjury, and can obtain a friend or two no more scrupulous than himself, can, it is pretty well understood, gain admission to American citizenship, even though his character be indifferent, and though he may not have resided many weeks in America. A good number of emigrants, indeed, if left to themselves, might, it is possible, not go through the formalities (we might say the farce), by which they are transformed into American citizens. But emigrants are not left to themselves; they are taken in hand by the agents of political parties, and having been duly drilled, go through the necessary forms as lightheartedly as some fifty years ago respectable undergraduates signed on their matriculation those thirty-nine articles of which they neither understood nor, in many cases, knew the contents. No doubt, however, there is to be found a residue of respectable persons who hesitate to claim by means of false declarations a 1 See 2" Kent, Comm." 12th ed. pp. 64, 65. |