The Dominion FRIDAY, JUNE 13, 1913. BRITISH CITIZENSHIP.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1775, 13 June 1913, Page 4

The Dominion FRIDAY, JUNE 13, 1913. BRITISH CITIZENSHIP.

It is genorally reoogniscd by statesmen throughout tho Empire that our naturalisation laws aro at present incomplete and unsfttiufuctory from tho Imperial point of view. The cjuestion has beon discussed from time to time, but so far very little has been actually done to improve matters. It appears, however, from a cablegram which wo publish in another column, that the British Government now havo tho question under consideration, and that a Bill dealing with Empire naturalisation will be introduced at an early date. At the beginning of tho previous session of tho British Parliament legislation was foreshadowed "to give effect to tho unanimous recommendation of the last Imperial Conference for the amondmont and consolidation _ of the law relating to British nationality,"' but no Bill was introduced. The British law in regard to citizenship is in some respects quite unique. This was pointed out recently by Mr. J. W. Salmond in a lecture at University College, London. He stated that it is characterised by two remarkable rules which would have appeared to a Roman lawyer as sheer absurdity. The first is that every person born in, British territory, no matter what his raoe or nationality may be, is a $ritish subject; whereas it would never' havo faccurred to a Roman that the rights of citizenship should depend upon territory—it was an inheritable right. The_ practical effect of this British rule is to transform into British subjects practically the whole population of the Empire with each succeeding generation. . The rule is that when new territory is acquired all its inhabitants become automatically British subjects. The conquered peoples of the Roman Empire remained aliens, the source of Roman citizenship being nationality, not allegiance. These fundamental principles of British and Roman law, however, have but a very indirect bearing upon the aspects of citizenship underlying tho legislation now under consideration by . tho British Government, and which were discussed at the Imperial Conference of 1911 on the following resolution, 1 moved by Mr. Batohelor (Australia): —

That this conference is in favour of the creation of a system which, while not limiting the right of a Dominion to legislate with regard to local naturalisation, will permit the issuo to porsons fulfilling prescribed conditions of certificates ot naturalisation effective throughout tho Empire. Tho existing state of affairs was summed up in a very clear and interesting manner by Sir Wilfrid Lauiuer, who pointed out that the power of naturalisation is one of the incidental powers of sovereignty which the British Government delegated to the Dominions in granting their constitutions. They have all availed themselves of this right of issuing letters of naturalisation to aliens, but thero is nothing'like uniformity regarding the prescribed conditions of citizensnip. The power of each Dominion in this matter is limited to its own territory, and if a man from Denmark, for instance, is naturalised in Canada he •is a British subject only as long as he remains in that country, but the moment he goes out of Canada he becomes a Dane once more. There is at present no such thing as a uniform and world-wide status of British citizenship. The problem before the conference was to establish a system of Imperial naturalisation without trespassing upon the rights and privileges of any of the selfgoverning Dominions. All the speakers were agreed that there must be no over-riding of the powers of the local Parliaments, _ and Mr. Churchill made it quite clear that the British Government has no desire to reach out into any self-gov-erning part of the Empire and interfere with the existing conditions of naturalisation. Nor is it proposed to interfere with the immigration laws of the different States, such as those which deal with the exclusion of aliens or even naturalborn British subjects. This statement of the position made it comparatively easy for the Conference to como to a satisfactory agreement. It was recognised that two standards of naturalisation would be necessary—the local and th« Imperial—and eventually tho following outlin® of si schema of citizenship was assented to: —

,(1) Imporial nationality thould b» worldwids and uniform, each Dominion boing left fr»i> to grant local nationality on Biich terms at its Legislature thinks flt. (2) Th» .Mother Country finds it neceansry to maintain five years as a qualifying period. This is a safeguard to tho Dominions as well as to Britain, but five years anywhere in the Empire should be ar, good .is five years in the United Iving(3) Tho grant of Imperial nationality is in every case discretionary, and this discretion should be exercised by tho=o responsible in the area in which the appellant has spent tho last twelve months. (•t) Th<! Imperial Act should be -o framed an to uualilo oacli eelf-goYcralujf Dominion to ftdoot it.

(5) Nothing now proposed would nffect tho validity and efloctirencss of local Jaw regulating immigration and tho liko, or differentiating between classes or British subjects.

The Bill which is to bo introduced into tho British Parliament will no doubt bo bused on tho above principles, and if it becomes law a muchneeded reform will be secured without infringing any of the rights of the DoinlnioiiH—legislative or administrative. It will make_ lfritish oilJz<ti)sliip a iiifife real tiling than it iH at present, it will lessen the possibilities of friction, and will l.mil ti» strengthen I,lie ties which bind lufii'lber the component parts of tlie ro %