Speech #440056258

The destruction of American citizenship by two years residence abroad and nonregistration is an innovation upon the spirit of the Constitution that now seeks in this centennial yeartoerect itself into a monument of American degeneracy. The German treaty of 1868 was bad enonghb. but this bill embraces all citizens and hastens to abandon them as soon as they go abroad. by furnishing numerous odious requirements. noncompliance with which converts thhim against their will into aliens. The treaty of 1868. by which naturalized citizens of German birth who return for any purpose to their native country and remain there two years are surreidered to the German Empire and deprived of their American character. was an utter abandonment of the American doctrine. always announced and upheld at every cost by tle democratic party. that when a naturalized citizen revisited his native country he entered it as an American citizen entitled to the same protection from the United States as if he were a nativeborn citizen. The treaty made an illegal and disparaging distinction between the naturalized citizen of German birth and the naturalized citizens of other origin. or the nativeborn citizen. We have no better class of citizens than those of German birth. Their honest. laborious. nntiring industry has cut clown the forests. bridged the streams. cultivated the wilderness. and carried peaceful and prosperous settlements. blessed with law. order. and abundance. from the eastern slopes away over the mountains and across the valleys to the westernnsost boundaries of our vast domains.