Note 173 — E. CONFEDERATION AND CONSTITUTION (continued 2)

Citizenship, in practice, comes by birth or by admission by a court of record under authority of a law of Congress. Two classes of people are citizens by birth: (1) according to the Fourteenth Amendment, all who are born within the limits of the United States (except children of official representatives of foreign states, of a foreign army occupying part of our territory); (2) according to a law of Congress, all who are born of parents who are American citizens but who were temporarily residing abroad. No one not included in one of the above classes can become a citizen except by (1) a special Act of Congress, or (2) by admission by a court of record under authority of the general law passed by Congress. That law has varied from time to time (cf. index, for some of the more important variations); but the usual period of residence required for an alien, previous to admission, has been five years,—which is also the present requirement (1913). The present law (passed in 1906) requires also a two years' previous "notice of intention," and excludes all who cannot "speak" English (unless homesteaders), all polygamists, and all who disbelieve in "organized government." Some States, however, permit aliens to vote after receiving their "first papers,"—i.e., after making the preliminary "declaration of intention," before a clerk of court. The final admission rests with a judge,—who may make his examination of the applicant rigid or a mere matter of form. The power has been sometimes abused for political purposes, both in excluding and in admitting unfit aliens.