Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1916-03-03
Americans in The Trenches
By Frederic ]. Haskin.


and naturalized American citizens are
fighting in the European armies Re
liable estimates place their number at
about ten thousand. These ten thou
sand men are giving rise to all sorts of
| legal and diplomatic complications.
The question of their status in the
i United States, if they get through the
| war alive and return home. is bothering
| good many Of them. The State De-
partment is getting stream Of inquiries
| wanting to know il an American who
enlists in a foreign army loses his citi-
zenship, or if such an enlistment is a
| breach of his duty as citizen. To
| which the department replies that it all
depends.
Our law sets forth that any American
citizen who takes an oath, of allegiance
to a foreign state has expatria ted him.
self. Some of the European armies re-
quire an oath of allegiance from the re-
cruit. while others do not. Any Ameri-
can who has taken such an oath is no
longer an American citizen. The ques-
ton OF his restoration to citizenship
should he desire it, will probably have to
be settled in American courts.
AS to the duties of American citizen
| ship. the State Department says. in it's
d j gnified
Americans Must way that
Become Citizens Again. not un
dertake to prescribe the duty of an in
| dividual with regard to his citizenship,
but it is. nevertheless, of the opinion
Ar,pa
American citizens to keep out Of the
actual fighting. That is just the way
| number of the fighting Americans in
Europe feel about it.
They belong to the class of natural
their native countries when the war
broke out The home government
promptly snapped them up, presented
them with nice new uniforms. rifles
| off to the front Most of the complaints
along this line are coming from Italy.
Italian law holds that naturalization of
an italian subject in a foreign country
| ment does not make him less liable to
military service. The United States
has no treaty with Italy defining the
status of former Italian subjects who
a former Italian subject who visits
| Italy is liable to arrest and enforced
military service if he is between six :,
teen and thirty-two years old. A good
many OF the Americans on the Austro-
Italian front belong to this class
The French government is not very
willing to give up its claim on men OF
military age. To get a release from
Inability to serve, special permit has
| to be secured from the minister Of JUS
| tice by the eX-Frenchman who has nat
uraliZed himself in another land Be
| sides the trouble involved, such per-
m
Very few Frenchmen who became
| American citizens took the trouble to
arrange the
Frenchmen Were formalities
Forced Into the Army. u ov,n IN
| their names from the list of men avail
| able for active service. Hence a good
| many of them are now up to their
knees in mud, shooting at Germans
along the line that runs from Switzer-
| land to the sea.
Where such service on their part is
unwillingly rendered the State Depart
ment is doing it's best to get them out
but each individual case means an i'm
mense amount of cor. espondence and
Washington can compel the release OF
naturaliZed citizen from his home
land when there is no naturalizat ton
treaty between the two nations.
The British army has been getting its
share Of Americans. chiefly in the Ca
madam contingent. Numerous youths
from the border states have enlisted,
many of them under the age Of legal
majority. The American government
has succeeded in arranging for condi-
tons of release for such recruits. AL
though they enlisted voluntarily, some
Of them found that war is a bigger
contract than they had bargained for
and the parents of others came for
ward with various and vehement OBJ
1ections. The British government has
agreed that when convincing proof Is
| brought forward to show that an Amer
ican citizen was minor at the time
of his enlistment in the British army
| he will be discharged without pay
| wherever he may happen to be when
his discharge goes into effect.
| In consequence he may find himself
stranded. without money to live on or
| to pay his pas
Stranded Far From sage home. Per-
American Homes. from, ,ss p suu
ish service are not allowed to wear the
British uniform thereafter: SO the erst-
while soldier may not even have a
coat to his back. The State Depart
ment has no funds appropriated for the
care of cases such as these, and there
post big enough to take care Of the
idischarged recruit and nay his massage