The Law: Approving Dual Citizenship

Under a law passed in 1940, Polish-born Painter Beys Afroyim forfeited his U.S. citizenship by voting in a 1951 Israeli election. Not so, argued Afroyim all the way up to the Supreme Court. Last week the court upheld him—and thereby made it possible, in effect, for Americans to hold dual citizenship.

Until recently, Americans could lose citizenship for anything from treason to revolution to serving in a foreign army or government. In 1963, on procedural grounds, the Supreme Court threw out a provision withdrawing citizenship from those who flee the country in wartime to escape the draft. In 1964 it exempted naturalized Americans who return to their native countries for three or more years.

In 1958 the court upheld the law against foreign voting as a reasonable exercise of Congress's power over foreign affairs. But last week the court changed its mind, thus taking the rare step of overruling itself and voiding an act of Congress in the same decision. "Our Constitution," wrote Justice Hugo Black, "limits the Government to those powers specifically granted or those that are necessary and proper to carry out the specifically granted ones." The 14th Amendment "citizenship clause" says only that all native-born or naturalized Americans are U.S. citizens—period. "The Government is without power to rob a citizen of his citizenship," ruled Black. Therefore, even if an American joins the North Viet Nam army, he apparently retains U.S. citizenship—unless he specifically and voluntarily renounces it.