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Constitutional Law-Expatriation-Criminal Due Process As Prerequisite To Expatriation When Imposed As Punishment, John W. Erickson

Michigan Law Review

Respondents, native-born Americans, in two separate cases sought declaratory judgments confirming their status as United States citizens. One wanted to return to this country, and the other sought to avoid deportation as an alien. The Government claimed that respondents had lost their citizenship by operation of section 401(j) of the Nationality Act of 1940 and its successor, section 349(a)(10) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, which automatically divest an American of his citizenship for "departing from or remaining outside the jurisdiction of the United States in time of war or . . . national emergency for the purpose …