Dear Uncle Sam,

Maybe July 4th isn’t the right time to ask you for this small favor, but then again perhaps it is.

I think very few Americans are aware that it is far easier for a terrorist to get US citizenship than it is for an ally. For instance, I am a British citizen who has lived in the United States for 21 years, been married to an American wife for 20 years, and has three American children. I support the United States and the war in Iraq but I cannot become a US citizen as a matter of conscience, simply because the citizenship oath requires me to renounce my own country and I will not do that. Here is the relevant passage: “I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen . . .”

A few months ago, the US airports stopped asking people if they were carrying bombs because they realized that the terrorists would say “no.” The situation with the citizenship oath is very similar. A terrorist will have no problem whatsoever reciting this oath, nor will any other sociopath. It is an oath that only presents problems for people with consciences. The passage is outdated and unnecessary and discriminates unfairly against non-sociopaths, America’s allies and non-terrorists. In short, an oath that discriminates against your allies in favor of your enemies seems to me to represent a rather extreme form of Idiotarianism. Moreover, it is unfair because the British Government requires no similar oath of Americans who want to become British citizens.

It is still legal in America to discriminate against individuals because of their citizenship status. It is illegal to discriminate based on “country of origin,” but that is quite distinct from discrimination based upon country of citizenship. For instance, I have witnessed with my own eyes and ears several cases where non-citizens were denied credit purely because of their lack of US citizenship.

Now I ask you, dearest uncle, on this Independence Day: How would you act if you married a person from Britain, Kuwait, France, or wherever, and went to live in that country for twenty years, and were told that in order to acquire citizenship of that country you first had to “absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to the United States of America”? Would you do it? Would you renounce America? What if your car loan or your mortgage depended on it? Please answer honestly.

I hope that your answer was that you would never renounce America, no matter what, because then, uncle, you might be able to understand where I'm coming from.

Uncle Sam, please realize that King George is dead and he’s not coming back. Why not formally allow US allies to avoid having to say the offending part of the pledge? Why not give ordinary patriotic folks an equal footing with the terrorists, the scroungers, and the sociopaths when it comes to acquiring US citizenship?

We did give you Monty Python and the Beatles after all.

Your affectionate nephew,

Graham


P.S. A Simple Solution (added July 8th)

In its earliest years, the United States contained individuals who had fought for liberation from the British Empire, individuals who had fought to remain within the Empire, and individuals who had been uncommitted during the Revolutionary War. The first American citizens were a mixture of all these groups. I don’t know that there was ever any major effort to exclude those who had supported the King from citizenship after independence, although additional oaths may have been required of those who wanted to hold certain public offices.

Today, there are already thousands of American citizens who hold dual citizenship and who have not taken the Oath of Citizenship. Who are they? They are people who were born US citizens and later added citizenship from other countries. Yet to arrive at the same destination by the reverse path of adding US citizenship to one’s original citizenship is somehow unlawful unless the individual renounces his or her land of birth.

I don’t dispute that there are many millions of people worldwide who would be only to eager to denounce their own mothers in exchange for US citizenship: “Just tell me who to denounce and where to pick up my check.” But I think America deserves better.

A very simple solution is available: replace the Citizenship Oath with the Pledge of Allegiance.

To conclude I again ask Americans to put themselves in my position. Would you ever pledge to “absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to the United States of America”? Is it necessary, is it fair, that spouses of Americans be required to make such a declaration against their own mother countries before they can become US citizens?

comments about this topic can be left at my main blog, just scroll down to July 4th

Commentary from GrahamLester.com that you might have missed:
At Last: An Article to Offend Everyone
Vive La France
Ridiculous Limits: a Dialogue with Myself
What’s Really Wrong with the EU and the UN
Justifying Saddam’s Overthrow Without WMDs Being Found
A Nonbeliever’s Defense of Religion

Satire from GrahamLester.com that you might have missed:
Scientists Discover New Letter
Canada Declared a Hoax
Demonstrators Protest Use of Sleep Numbers in College Admissions

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