The Road to Citizenship: What Naturalization Means for Immigrants and the United States 9780813569550

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The Road to Citizenship

The Road to Citizenship What Naturalization Means for Immigrants and the United States

SOFYA APTEKAR

RUTGERS UNIVERSITY PRESS NEW BRUNSWICK, NEW JERSEY, AND LONDON

Library of Congress Cataloging-­in-­P ublication Data Aptekar, Sofya, 1979–­ The road to citizenship : what naturalization means for immigrants and the United States / Sofya Aptekar. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978–­0–­8135–­6954–­3 (hardcover : alk. paper) —­ ISBN 978–­0–­8135–­6953–­6 (pbk. : alk. paper) —­ISBN 978–­0–­8135–­6955–­0 (e-­book) 1.  Citizenship—­United States. 2. Naturalization—­United States. 3. Immigrants—­ United States. I. Title. JK1759.A58 2015 323.6'230973—­dc23

2014021723

A British Cataloging-­in-­P ublication record for this book is available from the British Library. Copyright © 2015 by Sofya Aptekar All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. Please contact Rutgers University Press, 106 Somerset Street, New Brunswick, NJ 08901. The only exception to this prohibition is “fair use” as defined by U.S. copyright law. Visit our website: http://rutgerspress.rutgers.edu Manufactured in the United States of America

To Ruslan Yuki

CONTENTS

List of Figures

ix

List of Tables

xi

Acknowledgments

xiii

Introduction 1 1

The Roads to Citizenship

13

2

Citizenship and Inequality

46

3

Voices of Immigrants

61

4

Citizenship Ceremonies

83

5

Welcoming and Defining

106

6

Naturalization in Theory and Practice

130

Appendix

141

Notes

145

References

153

Index

165

vii

FIGURES

Figure 2.1

Number of immigrants naturalized in the United Stastes from 1970 to 2010 47

Figure 2.2

Percentage naturalized among foreign born, 1970 to 2010 48

Figure 2.3

Percentage naturalized among immigrants by level of education

Figure 2.4

50

Percentage naturalized by year and level of education, excluding immigrants from Mexico and Central America

Figure 2.5

52

Percentage naturalized among immigrants in the United States by detailed level of education, 2011 54

Figure 2.6

Percentage naturalized by income

55

Figure 2.7

Race/ethnicity and percentage naturalized

56

Figure 2.8

Percentage naturalized by major country of origin

58

ix

TABLES

Table 1.1

Question bank for civics and history exam administered at citizenship interviews by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services

27

Table 3.1

Respondent characteristics

68

Table 3.2

Reasons for naturalizing

74

Table A.1

Selected results of logistic regressions predicting citizenship status of immigrants

xi

141

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The idea for this book was born out of conversations with my dear friend and colleague, Sharon Bzostek, who first suggested that I investigate immigrant naturalization after hearing the account of my own experiences acquiring American citizenship. Many kind and thoughtful individuals helped my research and writing along the way. But there would be no book without the dozens of immigrants who graciously answered my questions at what was undoubtedly an exhausting and nerve-­racking point in their lives. I am thankful for their help in understanding the naturalization process, as well as for the help of Shawn Saucier, formerly of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, who opened door after door during my fieldwork. The Sociology Department at Princeton University served as my intellectual home while I collected and analyzed data for this book. I am deeply thankful to Robert Wuthnow for providing frequent feedback on both research and early writing, as well as for his unfailing kindness and support. Doug Massey’s trust in my insights and interests as a sociologist gave me confidence to pursue this project in the way I wanted to, even though it was not initially obvious that my approaches would pay off. I was extremely fortunate to have the help of Irene Bloemraad at UC Berkeley, the foremost expert on citizenship. Irene provided brilliantly insightful comments at every stage of research, writing, and publication. I must thank Paul DiMaggio for first sparking my interest in the sociology of culture and to Patricia Fernandez-­Kelly for her loyal support and astute and broad-­ranging observations. While at Princeton, my work was funded by the Sociology Department, the Office of Population Research, the University Center for Human Values, the Program in American Studies, the Center for Canadian Studies, the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies, the Center for Migration and Development, and the McGraw Center for Teaching and Learning. I greatly benefited from the administrative support provided by Melanie Adams and Nancy Cannuli. The initial daily grind of analysis and writing took place in the warm company of my wonderful colleagues at Princeton. Pierre Kremp and Cristina Mora served as an ever-­present sounding board whose presence I sorely miss now that

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x i v A cknowledgments

the three of us are scattered across the globe. In pushing me and pointing out what was too obvious and what was not obvious enough, they have helped build the foundations of this book. My analysis also benefited from many conversations with Leslie Hinkson and Rania Salem. In the later stages of writing, I could not have done without the help of Shannon Gleason and Helen Marrow. I finished the book while working as a research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, which was a tremendous opportunity to gain a global perspective on immigration and diversity and to learn about citizenship regimes across the world. I am grateful to Steve Vertovec for his support and the opportunity to access the stimulating international environment of migration scholars at the Institute. I must also thank the brilliant migration scholars at the City University of New York Graduate Center, who pushed me to elaborate my arguments and consider the big picture during my stint as a visiting researcher. Some results of the research presented in this manuscript have appeared as “Naturalization Ceremonies and the Role of Immigrants in the American Nation,” Citizenship Studies 16(7) (2012): 937–­952; and “Citizenship Status and Patterns of Inequality in the United States and Canada,” Social Science Quarterly 95(2) (2014): 343–­359. The manuscript benefited greatly from the comments of two anonymous reviewers and a reader, as well as the generous guidance of Rutgers University Press editor Peter Mickulas. Much of what makes sense about the book is due to them, and the responsibility for what does not is entirely mine. I would like to underscore my debt to Luis Plascencia for his close reading of several versions of this manuscript, his encyclopedic knowledge of the history of American citizenship, and especially his generosity in supporting the work of a junior colleague. Lastly but most importantly, I have to thank my family for their support of this project and my career. Thanks to Yuki and EJ for being great kids. Thanks to my siblings, Bella Aptekar and Mike Aptekar, for the logistical help that made my work possible. Mike fixed and refixed cars that took me to field sites and laptops that I used for writing and analysis, while Bella read multiple drafts and contributed countless hours of babysitting. Adam Wilson read and edited more than anyone else, but it is his love and friendship for which I am most grateful.

The Road to Citizenship

Introduction This boundary between lawful immigrants and citizens is the line of greatest intimacy but also of most pointed exclusion between outsider and insider. What the United States does with this line tells us most about what it means to be a nation of immigrants. —­Hiroshi Motomura, Americans in Waiting

A Story of Naturalization In April 2000, I became an American citizen. I sat in my assigned seat in the center of a large auditorium in downtown Brooklyn, in a crowd of about four hundred other immigrants. Together, we followed directions to stand and sit, recite the words of the Oath of Allegiance, and sing the national anthem. The letter from the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) specified business clothing, and I had borrowed a blazer for the occasion. Outside, it was a chilly overcast morning, but inside there were no windows and the yellow lights were dim. The speakers on stage paced around with a tinny microphone, trying to elicit enthusiasm from the audience. A female immigration official, feeling that our reaction to her “Good morning” was inadequate, shouted “I can’t hear you!” and the crowd of immigrants thundered with a louder response. A Middle Eastern man next to me appeared thrilled, and kept turning toward his neighbors with a happy grin. Soon it was over, and immigration agents fanned out to distribute naturalization certificates, the proof of our new American citizenship. Mine is buried deep in my filing cabinet at home. It is slightly larger than a standard piece of paper, and has been folded into uneven thirds. An unflattering picture of my teenage self looks to the side in three-­quarters profile, surrounded by an ornate black-­and-­white border. The Great Seal of the United States, with a bald eagle clutching arrows and an olive branch, is at the center in light green. Over the

1

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eagle are words stating that I have been admitted as a citizen. Above my picture are my date of birth, sex, height, marital status, and country of former nationality. A few years after receiving it, I sent my naturalization certificate to the State Department. It came back in the mail along with a crisp blue American passport, whose blank pages seemed instantaneously to inspire wanderlust. Like many other child immigrants, I would have become an American citizen automatically when my parents naturalized. But in the years during which their applications were being processed, I turned eighteen and had to reapply on my own. Trying to remember what motivated me all these years later, I recall thinking about the upcoming presidential elections in which I could now participate and about the countries to which I could travel without a visa. I did not experience a sense of loss, being essentially stateless: my original country of citizenship, the Soviet Union, was no longer on the map. Neither did I feel that this was a momentous occasion, as some would I argue I should have felt. In my mind, I was already American; naturalization simply made it official. The four hundred of us immigrants who became citizens in that ceremony were a drop in the ocean of the 886,000 who became citizens in the United States that year through the process of naturalization. This number has fluctuated over the past two decades, from a low of 240,000 in 1992 to over a million in 1996 and again in 2008 (USDHS 2013). This book is about these people, about the process of becoming a citizen, what it means for immigrants, and what it means for the United States. I argue that naturalization is more important than ever, and that we must change the way it works to ensure a more equal and democratic society.

Why Citizenship Matters Citizenship acquisition among immigrants is a matter of urgency for immigrants themselves and the nation that hosts them. A constellation of recent policies has eroded the rights of immigrants who are not citizens.1 The number of immigrants deported each year has grown from 165,000 in 2002 to close to 400,000 in 2011, aided by deportation goals and agency quotas under the Obama administration (USDHS 2011).2 Among the deported are not only undocumented immigrants3 and violent criminals, but also those whose legal status is stripped because of minor brushes with the law decades prior. The latest upsurge of harsh state and local measures that began with California’s Proposition 187 in 1993 turned into a groundswell ten years later, creating a hostile environment for immigrants across the country. We are in the midst of what some observers have termed the War on Immigrants. For immigrants, acquisition of citizenship status provides a measure of security from this encroachment on their rights. Given the escalation of harsh policies and attitudes, the gulf between citizens

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and everyone else is widening, and it is becoming ever more urgent for immigrants to have access to citizenship. Citizenship protects immigrants against deportation.4 But more generally, naturalization also inducts immigrants into the full protection of civil liberties available to citizens, making them more or less equal to native-­born citizens. Although they cannot become president or vice president, they can vote and run for other political offices. In fact, naturalized citizens have served in very high political posts, including secretary of state (Madeleine Albright and Henry Kissinger) and governor (Arnold Schwarzenegger in California). Aside from being able to vote and the ability to run for office, naturalization improves access to federal civil service jobs, state and municipal positions such as police officer, and government contracts.5 College students and researchers find that some grants and scholarships are open to citizens only. American citizenship greatly eases international travel, not least by making reentry into the country less arduous. There are no travel restrictions on length of time spent outside the United States, as there are for noncitizens, and citizens are able to travel to many countries without visas. For those immigrants who want to help family members migrate to the United States, naturalization improves their ability to serve as sponsors and shortens the waiting period. This can be a matter of urgency for those wanting to reunite with elderly parents or children. After 1996, there is an additional benefit of becoming a citizen: access to means-­tested benefits. The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, commonly known as the Welfare Reform Act, limited the access of legal permanent residents to public services, such as food stamps and Supplemental Security Income. Thus, naturalization results in improved access to the American social safety net. Citizenship status certainly makes a difference in the lives of many immigrants and their families. However, it also affects immigrant and nonimmigrant groups, especially when it comes to their political clout. For example, Latinos comprise 16 percent of the American population, recently surpassing African Americans (Ennis, Rio-­ Vargas, and Albert 2011). But Latino citizens are only 12 percent of the American population. In other words, over a quarter of Latinos cannot vote or run for political office, and they are not protected from deportation (Pew Hispanic Center 2012). Some of these Latino immigrants are undocumented and are not eligible for citizenship, but most have permanent residency and can apply for citizenship immediately or in the near future. The large number of noncitizen Latinos has two negative implications. First, the influence of Latinos in the political sphere is diminished because of the prevalence of nonvoters among them. It is true that nonvoters can, and do, engage in politics by making their voices heard in other ways: the young activists of the DREAMers movement6 have demonstrated this poignantly, staging

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public events and demonstrations and petitioning government officials to create a pathway to legalization for undocumented youth. And in 2006, millions of people, many of them noncitizens, joined immigrant rights marches in reaction to pending federal legislation. But noncitizens engaging in such political actions are vulnerable, and politicians are ultimately concerned with winning votes. In fact, there is evidence that the mass immigration marches increased local anti-­immigrant organizing in some places (Bloemraad, Voss, and Lee 2011). The second negative implication of the large number of noncitizen Latinos is that the immigrant portions of ethnic groups have to rely on naturalized citizens and the second and higher generations to represent their interests and concerns, instead of being able to lobby for them directly. Lack of citizenship affects Asian Americans and other groups in similar ways. Citizenship matters for immigrants, their families, and ethnic and racial groups. In addition, there are some issues that are particular to immigrants as immigrants, such as translation services, preservation and passing on of home languages, discrimination, connections with home countries, and reuniting with family members. Although a few exceptions exist, voting rights are currently tightly coupled with citizenship status even at the most local level. As a result, if more immigrants had citizenship, they would have more influence locally and nationally to act on their concerns. For instance, immigrant citizens could be more effective in getting local school districts to provide language and cultural instruction, or make provisions for religious holidays, customs, and extended visits to home countries. They could even run for school board elections and have enough fellow immigrant citizens to help them get elected. As citizens, immigrants could better pressure local police and sheriff’s departments, social services, zoning boards, and so on. On the national level, they could attempt to influence federal policy that affects immigrants, such as rules about family reunification, the financial costs of green card and citizenship applications, immigrant surveillance systems, and other issues. Not to be forgotten is jury duty: just like citizens born in the United States, naturalized citizens are obligated to serve on juries. Although many find jury duty onerous, it upholds the right to a trial by a group of peers. To uphold the right to a trial by peers in the context of a growing proportion of foreign-­born, juries must include immigrants.7 Finally, immigrant citizens might end up changing policies about voting access to extend, and in many cases restore, voting rights to permanent residents in local, state, and even federal elections (Hayduk 2006). Naturalization is more important than ever for the American nation, simply due to the sheer number of immigrants living in the United States today. Since the 1970s, the number of foreign-­born people residing in the United States has been increasing rapidly, resulting in the highest number ever of immigrants living in the country. The nearly forty million immigrants comprise 12.9 percent

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of the total American population, a share that is nearly as high as it was during the mass immigration of the turn of the twentieth century (Patten 2012). To realize the promise of the American democracy, these people must be incorporated into the political process through full citizenship, rather than remaining disenfranchised and vulnerable. This democratic imperative concerns the millions of immigrants with legal status as much as the smaller number who are undocumented, but who are more likely to draw media attention. The number of noncitizens is a thermometer of the health of American democracy. This book is premised on the idea that citizenship matters: for immigrants and their families, for ethnic, racial, and immigrant groups, and for the American nation. But I also argue that the debates about immigration should be broadened from their narrow focus on borders and undocumented immigrants to the big questions that define our nation. The process of turning foreigners into American citizens is currently on autopilot, with naturalization procedures taken largely for granted, which obscures the vital question of who should become an official member of the American nation through naturalization. What values and definitions of what it means to be an American are reflected in the way naturalization takes place? Should the barriers to citizenship be higher or lower? What are the implications of keeping the process the same or changing it for the meaning of citizenship and the content of nationalism? In unpacking the philosophical, moral, and cultural underpinnings of citizenship acquisition in America, I argue that naturalization works as a mechanism of exclusion and privilege, reproducing larger processes of social and economic polarization. High levels of immigration, combined with the War on Immigrants, give urgency to naturalization. Unfortunately, the ranks of American citizenship remain elusive for many immigrants. The proportion of immigrants who have citizenship has been declining for decades and remains below 50 percent, down from 80 percent in 1950 (Bloemraad 2006). This abysmal rate is dramatically lower than in other immigration countries, such as Canada and Australia, even though they have higher levels of immigration. In fact, a comparison of Canada and the United States by the sociologist Irene Bloemraad (2006) revealed that these low rates are not explained by high levels of immigration. At face value, that would be the most likely explanation: the high levels of citizenship uptake in mid-­twentieth century may simply be due to the fact that most of the foreign-­born within the United States had arrived decades prior, and had more time to naturalize. In other words, when there are a great number of new immigrants, naturalization rates lag because the recently arrived people have not had a chance to naturalize. Yet Bloemraad shows that what accounts for low naturalization rates is rather an unfavorable institutional context, especially lack of government support for the naturalization process, and an overemphasis of the individual choice to naturalize that hides structural barriers.

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The strikingly low uptake of citizenship in the United States is mitigated by a slight improvement in naturalization rates in recent years: from a low of 37 percent in the 1990s to 44 percent in 2009 (Nielsen and Batalova 2011). There is evidence that this increase is in part due to defensive naturalization: immigrants are reacting to the hostile political and social context by seeking the relative shelter of citizenship (Bloemraad 2006; Gilbertson and Singer 2003; Massey and Bartley 2005; Ong 1999). If we are to assign any weight to citizenship status as a category of membership, a set of rights, participation in society, even a sense of belonging, evidence that people are seeking it out of fear is troublesome. Defensive naturalization signals just how pervasive and dominant the confluent criminalizations of immigrants, people of color, and the poor are in American society in the twenty-­first century. At least twenty million people live, work, and raise their families in the United States without the right to vote and run for political office or access to other benefits of citizenship. The plight of most of these people is not as dire as that of the undocumented immigrants because they are at least technically eligible for naturalization.8 But together these immigrant groups comprise the expanding disenfranchised segment of population, along with others, such as native-­born felons, most of whom are deprived of the right to vote. This creates what the legal scholar Linda Bosniak (2006) refers to as internal boundaries, where populations within a country are excluded from full membership. This book takes up Bosniak’s call to address explicitly the processes through which people become full members of the nation. Millions of noncitizens and defensive naturalization are two of the problems with the way citizenship acquisition works in the United States today. My research uncovers a third: the way citizenship is distributed among immigrants exacerbates existing inequalities. Successfully completing the naturalization process requires time, effort, and considerable material and educational resources. Immigrants with more resources at their disposal acquire citizenship at higher levels. Meanwhile, immigrants with the lowest levels of education are the least likely to become citizens. In recent decades, this socioeconomic gradient of citizenship has been growing. Thus, the most disadvantaged members of society are increasingly marginalized through low citizenship rates. This is also true when we look at the countries of origin of those who are least likely to naturalize: for the most part, Hispanic immigrants are less likely to be citizens. In this way, the distribution of citizenship feeds into and reinforces existing systems of inequality in the American society. Despite unequal distribution of citizenship, low uptake rates, and defensive naturalization, the process of naturalization is often taken for granted. It is undocumented immigration that occupies center stage in divisive and contentious debates about immigration policy. Naturalization is viewed as the

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happier, less problematic side of immigration policy, with footage of citizenship ceremonies serving as heartwarming filler on slow news days. When we do hear about citizenship among immigrants, it is in calls for a path to citizenship for the undocumented immigrants, particularly for those who were brought here as young children by their parents. But what exactly is the path to citizenship? This book explains the multiple ways in which hundreds of thousands of immigrants become citizens each year. These new American citizens acquire rights, responsibilities, and benefits that affect their economic, social, and political trajectories. An influx of new voters changes the political calculus on the local, state, and national level. The induction of millions of people into official membership in the nation raises questions about defining belonging and sustaining democracy. I investigate what appears to be an uncomplicated and cheerful process, and lay open the thorny practical, political, and cultural issues it raises.

Naturalization Process In light of the low and unequal uptake of citizenship among immigrants in the United States, naturalization matters for immigrants and the American nation more than ever before. Naturalization refers to the acquisition of legal membership in the American nation, with its attendant rights and responsibilities. Not every immigrant can become a citizen. Those who do not have proper documentation to live in the United States permanently are not eligible to apply for citizenship. Eligibility for citizenship is reserved for immigrants who have established legal and permanent residence.9 These are the immigrants in possession of a green card, a document proving permanent residence. To acquire citizenship, applicants file an application with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), along with biometric information and a hefty fee. After their application is processed, they are interviewed by immigration officials. If they demonstrate sufficient knowledge of English and the history of the United States, and are deemed fit for citizenship along moral dimensions, the applicants are promoted to the final stage of naturalization, the citizenship ceremony. The phrase “path to citizenship” is thrown around a lot in immigration debates. This book explains this path (or rather, multiple paths) in all its complexity. It starts with the well-­established premise that the dichotomy between documented and undocumented immigrants is often blurred, as many immigrants move back and forth between legal statuses. It then proceeds to describe the different naturalization scenarios, including the more unusual paths to citizenship, such as immediate eligibility for members of the armed forces during times of conflict. I present the voices of immigrants who are completing the naturalization process, as they reflect on their own paths to citizenship and the

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change it will bring in their lives. Listening to new citizens is a good start in figuring out how to reform naturalization. The naturalization process culminates in the citizenship ceremony. Citizenship ceremonies are a lot like graduations, full of rituals and symbols that usher immigrants into formal membership in the American nation. New citizens hear speeches that explain the significance of the occasion and what it means to become an American. They often watch videos made by the government, and sing along to the national anthem. The legal act that makes them citizens is the recitation of the lengthy Oath of Allegiance. Citizenship ceremonies, especially the speeches made to new citizens, are a rich source of information for social scientists interested in naturalization and immigration more broadly. This book devotes substantial attention to this event, which is attended by millions of new citizens and countless more family and friends. It takes the reader beyond the snippets of immigrants taking the oath on the evening news to a front-­row seat at these fascinating events, and examines what they show about immigration in America over time. It turns out that citizenship ceremonies reveal some powerful ideas about the place of immigration in the United States. By critically assessing these ideas and their relationship to other stories about the American nation, we begin to find a way toward a more equitable immigration system.

History of American Naturalization Policy The naturalization process dates back to the birth of the American nation. Naturalization was one of the grievances cited by the rebelling colonists in the Declaration of Independence. In colonial times, local naturalization was made easily accessible in order to attract settlers, but the more lucrative subjecthood in the British Empire was tightly controlled by England. Shortly before the American Revolution, colonial naturalization was banned outright. Article 1 of the Constitution granted Congress the power “to establish a uniform Rule of Naturalization.”10 By 1802, immigrants could naturalize after five years of residence upon reciting an oath and renouncing allegiance to other countries, just like immigrants today (Plascencia 2012). The most dramatic changes in naturalization policies came in the evolving set of racial restrictions. The first naturalization laws limited naturalization to free white people. It was not until 1870 that black immigrants could become naturalized. But that was not, unfortunately, the end of racially based naturalization exclusions. The 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act prohibited Chinese immigrants from becoming citizens. Subsequent measures led to almost complete naturalization bans for Filipinos and Asian Indians, which were not lifted until mid-­twentieth century (Ngai 2004). Most Native Americans were excluded from American citizenship until the Indian Citizenship Act was passed in 1924. Only

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with the McCarran-­Walter Act of 1952 were racial and national origin criteria for citizenship eliminated. The exigencies of the Cold War pushed the American government to allow citizenship for immigrants who came from allied countries (Motomura 2006; Plascencia 2012; Schneider 2011). Women, too, faced exclusion and discrimination when it came to citizenship and naturalization. Until 1922, their citizenship status was dependent on the status of their spouses or fathers. After 1855, married immigrant women automatically became citizens upon the naturalization of their husbands, or upon marriage to an American citizen. Of course, given racial exclusions, this derivative process of naturalization covered only certain women and their husbands. The same 1855 statute deprived mothers of the ability to confer citizenship on their minor children upon naturalization. Additionally, between 1907 and 1922, naturalized or American-­born women actually lost their citizenship when they married foreigners (Bredbenner 1998; Gardner 2005; Zolberg 2006). Long after 1922, nonwhite immigrant women continued to face steep barriers to naturalization due to racial restrictions. The Naturalization Act of 1906 is a significant historical marker in the history of citizenship among immigrants. Until that time, naturalization procedures varied greatly from place to place, with local courts and judges exercising much latitude and at times engaging in corrupt practices. For example, local courts ran what were termed “citizenship mills” by handing out citizenship to immigrants in exchange for votes or monetary gain (Plascencia 2012).11 In reaction to the widespread corruption and fraud in the administration of naturalization, the 1906 act established a national agency to oversee a more standardized process. In addition to five years of residence, swearing to uphold the Constitution, and renouncing allegiance to other countries, immigrants applying for citizenship now had to demonstrate knowledge of U.S. history and civics and a basic ability to speak and understand the English language. At the same time, there continued to be flexibility and variation in how the new law was administered (Schneider 2011). In 1952, an additional requirement to read and write a simple sentence in English was added. This remains the case today. Similarly, the mid-­twentieth century saw the institutionalization of citizenship ceremonies. Although such ceremonies took place as early as the eighteenth century, World War II and the subsequent Cold War led to an emphasis on the citizenship ceremony as the properly solemn culmination of the naturalization process (Miller 1942). With immigrant loyalty under question in the paranoid environment of the Red Scare in the 1950s, it was thought especially important to impress new citizens with the significance of the new status bestowed upon them. Through economic cycles and major changes in immigration legislation in the subsequent years, much of American naturalization policy remained the

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same. In 1965, the United States finally rejected its long-­running reliance on national quotas that for decades gave preference to immigrants from northern and western Europe, while severely limiting immigration from most other places.12 In the civil rights era, these quotas regulating immigration were now deemed discriminatory. The new system relied on a mixture of family reunification policies, which allowed existing immigrants to petition for the migration of their close relatives, and provisions for the immigration of highly skilled immigrants. By the 1980s, the new immigration policy, along with growing integration with Mexico and a refugee crisis in Vietnam, led to a dramatic increase of immigration to the United States, increasingly originating in Latin America and Asia (Massey, Durand, and Malone 2002). Immigration continued to increase through the 1990s and 2000s. There were drives to naturalize the new immigrants, particularly in connection with get out the vote campaigns. Some of these, including the Citizenship USA campaign in 1995, ended amid allegations that it was launched in order to get more votes for Bill Clinton in 1996 (Castles and Davidson 2000). Another change was the increase in fees that immigrants paid in order to naturalize (Gelatt and McHugh 2007). The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, led to a reorganization of the federal agencies dealing with naturalization, creating the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security in 2003. By 2005, the new agency developed a campaign to encourage naturalization, this time not in connection with elections. A new test of American history and civics was introduced in 2009, but it continued to draw from a well-­publicized list of one hundred questions and answers as it had for decades prior (USCIS 2007a). The relative constancy of naturalization procedures since at least the mid-­twentieth century, including residency requirements, tests, and oaths, overlays dramatic upheavals in the immigration system controlling both access to the United States in the first place and the access to rights following immigration.

Research Strategy and Book Roadmap This book is based on original research I conducted between 2006 and 2010. My analysis of inequalities in how citizenship is distributed among immigrants uses data from the U.S. Census Bureau. I conducted more than seventy interviews with immigrants in the last stages of the naturalization process. Speaking with them between their successful completion of the citizenship interview and their citizenship ceremony, I asked them about their decision to become citizens and what the transition meant to them. I also examined citizenship ceremonies, the culmination of the naturalization process. My research assistants and I attended thirty-­six ceremonies across the country. In addition, I collected video, audio,

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and written records of forty-­three other ceremonies that took place since 2003. One of my findings is the change over time in what new citizens heard at their citizenship ceremonies. To show the historical transition, I rely on records of nineteen speeches made at citizenship ceremonies conducted in the 1950s and 1960s. I also draw on a wealth of primary and secondary sources on the subject of citizenship, compiling an account of the naturalization process, its significance for immigrants and the nation, and the weighty issues surrounding it. The book begins with a detailed explanation of the naturalization process and the possible paths to citizenship (chapter 1). The first step is establishing eligibility for naturalization, and deconstructing official and commonsense definitions of the term “immigrant.” The population of foreign-­born individuals living in the United States is complex in terms of legal status, rights, and immigration trajectories. Among those who are eligible for naturalization, what are the steps between arriving in the United States and becoming a citizen? Who is excluded from the path to citizenship? I consider common and less common paths to citizenship, as well as the question of dual citizenship. Crucial to the discussion of citizenship as an internal boundary within the American nation and a dimension of inequality are the benefits that accompany naturalization, from political rights to employment options to security from deportation. In chapter 2, I present results of my analysis of Census data from 1970 to 2011, which elaborates on existing research on the low uptake of citizenship in the United States, while pointing to another serious problem: growing inequality in who acquires citizenship. The least educated immigrants and immigrants from Latin America are increasingly less likely to obtain citizenship, a worrisome trend that cannot be explained solely by their overrepresentation among the undocumented. Considering the rights and protections of formal citizenship discussed in chapter 1, its rise as a dimension of stratification is a troubling sign of the entrenchment of internal boundaries and the exacerbation of existing race and class hierarchies. What about those immigrants who do successfully obtain citizenship? In chapter 3, I present the voices of naturalizing immigrants themselves as they explain why they chose to become American citizens. Previous research reveals a mix of models of citizenship—­traditional, transnational, and postnational—­ among immigrants in the United States. I find a mix as well, but go beyond questions about the standard benefits of citizenship (voting, travel, jobs, and sponsoring family migration). My analysis of interviews with these immigrants shows that many view naturalization as a natural and commonsense step tied primarily to permanent settlement in the United States and all the things that accompany it, such as raising a family, going to school, having a job, and participating in the community. They feel American not because they are becoming citizens but because of having built a life in their new country. So it is not

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just that naturalization helps reproduce the American nation by incorporating the immigrant population, but that those who acquire citizenship already have a sense of belonging and attachment. At the same time, however, there is evidence of defensive naturalization, with immigrants viewing naturalization as protecting them against deportation and encroachments on their rights. In chapters 4 and 5, I analyze citizenship ceremonies at which immigrants are sworn in as citizens, providing the first extensive look at this understudied and rich phenomenon. I begin with a history of citizenship ceremonies in the United States in chapter 4. I present results of my analysis of speeches that were made to new citizens in the 1950s and 1960. The Cold War context and suspicion of internal enemies comes through in these speeches, which exhibit as much suspicion of immigrants as celebration of their milestone. In contrast, contemporary ceremonies use naturalization itself as proof of America’s greatness, and they are full of celebratory pronouncements. Drawing on participant observation of contemporary citizenship ceremonies, I examine their ritual aspects, showing how immigration and naturalization help construct the story of the American nation. In chapter 5, I consider the role of immigrants, tracing the change from immigrants as potential traitors in the 1950s and 1960s to immigrants as morally superior redeemers of the nation in the early twenty-­first century. There is a concomitant change in how the American nation itself is defined: from God-­fearing and classless to a nation defined by diversity and immigration. These chapters help us examine the broader questions raised by naturalization: the meaning of citizenship for the American nation and the connection between immigration and American nationalism. In the final chapter, I situate my empirical findings within the broader theoretical, legal, and historical literature on citizenship. I consider how citizenship is predicated on exclusion and concentration of privilege, as well as the ways immigration and naturalization are used as discursive components of nationalism. While explaining all the ways in which naturalization reflects the current state of American society, I explore the possibility of reframing naturalization in a way that spreads change to other components of the immigration system. With this reframing, I advocate concrete policy changes that would increase access to citizenship and reduce inequalities among immigrants.

1 The Roads to Citizenship

Contemporary debates about immigration often focus on undocumented immigrants, or those people who live in the United States without legal documentation. In these conversations, citizenship is held up as the opposite of undocumented status, emphasizing the line between citizens and all noncitizens, legal permanent residents or not (Motomura 2006). One contentious example concerns drivers’ licenses: most states bar undocumented immigrants from obtaining them, causing hardship and public safety concerns. In debates surrounding the license issue, the undocumented are compared to citizens, who are, of course, able to obtain drivers’ licenses (Frosch 2012). Framing citizenship as the opposite of undocumented status is also evident in the discussions about undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as young children: Should there be a pathway to citizenship for them? But the American immigration system is far more complicated than a simple dichotomy between citizens and undocumented immigrants. In fact, most foreign-­born people in the United States are classified by the government as nonimmigrants. The vast majority of nonimmigrants are short-­term temporary visitors; but about 10 percent have long-­term visas for reuniting with family (including those marrying a citizen), for employment reasons, or as refugees (Kretsedemas 2012). For instance, in 2012, there were over fifty million nonimmigrant visitors who filed an I-­94 form primarily used for those arriving by sea or air.1 Over three million were temporary workers and their families and over a million and a half arrived on student visas. By comparison, around one million immigrants were granted permanent residency that year (USDHS 2013). Although not officially considered immigrants, many of these long-­term visitors are planning to settle in the United States and apply for legal permanent residency (Kretsedemas 2012). If we look at recent figures for new legal permanent

13

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residents, more than half were already legally residing in the United States when they became permanent residents (Monger and Yankay 2013). There are many more holders of long-­term temporary visas than are granted permanent status. The rest of these nonimmigrants may return home, overstay their visas to become undocumented, or renew their temporary stays. In other words, the common usage of the term “immigrant” as a person moving and settling in a new country includes millions of people who are classified by the American government as nonimmigrants. Officially enumerated immigrants are only those who are legal permanent residents or citizens. If we define immigrant the way most people, including social scientists, do, we would include undocumented immigrants who may have overstayed their visas or crossed the border without a visa; nonimmigrants on temporary visas who are nonetheless exhibiting many signs of settling in the United States and may later find a way to become official immigrants; legal permanent residents; and naturalized citizens. Although the number of nonimmigrants is difficult to estimate because data is collected on only some entries into the country (Kretsedemas 2012), legal permanent residents comprise a large proportion of immigrants in the United States. In 2012, there were around twelve million undocumented immigrants (Passel, Cohn, and Gonzalez-­Barrera 2013), nineteen million naturalized citizens (Auclair and Batalova 2013a), and thirteen million legal permanent residents (Auclair and Batalova 2013b). Yet legal permanent residents, known colloquially as green card holders, rarely make it into the public conversation on immigration, even though they share many rights with citizens. For instance, even those states that are most restrictive in issuing drivers’ licenses allow legal permanent residents to obtain them. Most proposals to alleviate the plight of the undocumented who arrived as young children would not turn them directly into citizens, but would instead place them in an intermediate status that could eventually result in citizenship. In this chapter, I explain who exactly can be eligible for citizenship and for whom the path to citizenship is blocked. I describe how an immigrant who is eligible for citizenship becomes a citizen, starting with the most common paths and extending to the more rare situations such as service in the military and special laws passed for individuals. Understanding how naturalization works is an important corrective to the reductionist vision that abbreviates the complexity of the American immigration system to two categories: undocumented immigrants and citizens. The multiplicity of statuses and the multiple transitions made by many immigrants between these statuses belie the prevalent images of the “path” or “line” to citizenship. In this book, I focus on the transition immigrants make to citizenship in the United States. Although my discussion is focused on immigrants who have already become eligible to apply for citizenship, we must keep in mind that a vast sorting process occurs prior to that point. The American immigration



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15

system grants the right to settle to only certain foreigners in the first place, based most often on family ties and employment potential. Another complicating factor to consider is multiple citizenships. Although immigrants renounce allegiance to all other countries when they become American citizens, a de facto dual citizenship regime exists. Many immigrants, as well as some native-­born Americans, hold multiple passports. In fact, the practice has become more common as more sending countries have allowed their citizens to hold on to their original citizenships after being sworn in as Americans. No discussion of the path to citizenship would be complete without addressing what happens after naturalization. How does having citizenship affect an immigrant’s life? The best-­known benefits that come with American citizenship are the right to vote and run for elected office. Readers who have traveled abroad will understand the convenience of passing through U.S. customs with an American passport. Citizens are able to apply for jobs that were not open to them before. And they can sponsor their family members to immigrate to the United States more easily. I explain these and other consequences of naturalization in the last section of the chapter.

Eligibility for Citizenship Legal membership in the American nation is based on a combination of two principles of citizenship, jus soli (right of soil) and jus sanguinis (right of blood). Jus soli means that the legal category of citizen is predicated on the place of birth of the individual. Thus, children born on U.S. soil, regardless of the legal status of their parents, are automatically citizens. This is guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, passed in 1868 to override a Supreme Court decision that deprived people of African descent of citizenship by birth.2 Under the jus sanguinis principle, a baby is granted American citizenship if one or both of her parents have American citizenship, regardless of place of birth.3 This book is about people who are neither born in the United States nor born to American citizens. Foreigners who move to the United States can acquire citizenship through the process of naturalization, which dates back to the beginning of the United States (Zolberg 2006). As naturalized American citizens, immigrants have almost the same rights as those who acquired citizenship through the jus soli and jus sanguinis principles. Moreover, their children, regardless of place of birth, will also be American citizens. Other traditional countries of immigration, such as Canada, have similar citizenship laws. Elsewhere, the mix of citizenship principles may be different. Until the 1990s, immigrants to Germany could not become German citizens unless they were ethnically German. It was difficult even for their children and grandchildren to become German citizens (Ersanilli and Koopmans 2010). As is

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the case for most European nations, German laws now allow for naturalization. But in Persian Gulf countries such as Saudi Arabia, it continues to be almost impossible for immigrants to become citizens (Walker 2013). In order to be eligible for citizenship in the United States, an immigrant has to be a legal permanent resident, meaning that he or she has been granted lawful permanent residence in the United States, as proven by the possession of a document referred to as a “green card” (USCIS 2012b). Most immigrants became legal permanent residents because they arrived as close relatives of American citizens, such as spouses, children, parents, or siblings (USDHS 2012). For example, one of the new citizens I interviewed for a later chapter in this volume, a young woman from the Dominican Republic, was brought to the United States by her father. Her father was already an American citizen and living in the United States. He filled out paperwork and paid fees to sponsor the immigration of his daughter, who was then granted a green card. In this way, eligibility for citizenship is often determined by how an immigrant arrived to the United States in the first place. I also interviewed a thirty-­year-­old homemaker from the Czech Republic who told me that she came to the United States on a tourist visa and had not planned on staying. But shortly after arriving, she met her future husband and obtained permanent residency through him. As is the case for many others, this woman transitioned from a temporary immigration status to permanent residency to citizenship. The public imagination has periodically focused on immigrants who obtain a green card through marriage. There are even popular films—­most recently The Proposal (2009), starring Sandra Bullock—­that revolve around fraudulent marriages arranged in order to obtain permanent residency. In fact, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services vigorously screens applicants for green cards obtained through marriage to an American citizen. Couples have to show extensive evidence of shared lives, from wedding albums to joint bank accounts, and answer examiners’ questions the same way when interviewed separately. While conducting my research in the waiting room of one U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services office, I observed many nervous couples clutching photo albums and rehearsing answers with their lawyers. Immigration agencies in some states even conduct “bed checks,” arriving at applicants’ home unannounced to look for evidence of a relationship. Although only a small proportion of applications are denied, these practices have come under criticism for forcing couples to conform to traditional marriage behaviors and patterns (Bernstein 2010). After the Supreme Court declared the Defense of Marriage Act unconsex relationships became eligible for stitutional in 2013, immigrants in same-­ marriage-­based immigration visas and permanent residency (Napolitano 2013). Some immigrants apply for and are granted green cards based on employment-­based preferences built into the American immigration system.



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For instance, some immigrants can become permanent residents after an offer of permanent employment by an American employer. Often, this means that the employer had to demonstrate that there were not enough qualified American workers available to fill the position. Applicants may be living outside of the United States, or they might be living in the United States already, as nonpermanent residents on a visa. I interviewed an engineer from India who arrived as a temporary highly skilled worker (H1B visa) and subsequently received a green card through his employer, who offered him a permanent job. Another common route is for foreign students to seek employment in the United States after graduation, and get permanent residency through their new job. Outstanding highly skilled individuals may apply for a green card without a specific offer of employment. This is also true for certain categories of employment, such as Afghan or Iraqi translators, religious workers, or doctors. Wealthy immigrants whose investment in an American business will create jobs for Americans can also get green cards (USCIS 2013a). After becoming permanent residents, these immigrants eventually become eligible for citizenship. Another large group of immigrants eligible for citizenship arrived in the United States as refugees or asylees. Refugees petitioned for residence in the United States because they were fleeing persecution in their country of origin. They have been granted refugee status by American embassies before they arrived. I spoke to a family from Croatia who had arrived in the United States as refugees from the Yugoslavian conflict in the 1990s, and had applied for citizenship ten years after their arrival. The father, who worked as a factory machinist, spoke of attenuated ties to Croatia due to the circumstances of their departure. Asylees are also fleeing persecution but they did not obtain refugee status prior to entering the United States. Instead, they seek asylum either right at the port of entry or within a year of arriving in the United States. Immigration judges then determine whether there is evidence of a credible threat to the person if they were to return to their country of origin. Refugees and asylees are eligible for services administered through matching grants to nonprofit organizations. These services may include assistance with employment, initial cash allowances, language training, counseling, and medical services, and are not available to other types of immigrants. Such services may eventually be helpful in preparing refugees for the naturalization process (Bloemraad 2006). Around fifty thousand immigrants get green cards through the green card lottery, more formally known as the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program. This program, created by Congress in 1990, is run by the State Department and grants visas leading to permanent residency to people from countries underrepresented among the immigrant population in the United States. In this way, immigrants from countries such as Turkey, Ukraine, or Liberia may win a chance to become permanent residents (A. Newton 2005). The diversity program has educational

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requirements: applicants for the lottery must have a high school education or an equivalent, or two recent years of work experience in an occupation that requires at least two years’ training or experience. In addition, applicants must meet visa requirements, including proving that they will not be a public charge, which can be quite difficult for people coming from poor countries with no existing family connections in the United States. It is possible to apply for the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program while already in the United States with a different status, such as a temporary visitor. Applying for the green card lottery counts as intent to immigrate, and makes it difficult to subsequently obtain or renew tourist, student, and other temporary visas for those who do not win (Wolfsdorf and Bhora 2004). Most immigrants who are currently undocumented are unable to transition to citizenship. Since the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act passed in 1996, the criminal penalties imposed on undocumented immigrants disqualify them from applying for visas or green cards.4 Even those undocumented immigrants who are married to American citizens and have American citizen children have a difficult time regularizing their status. Until recently, they would have had to return to their country of origin and apply for immigration visas from there, with a wait of between three and ten years as a penalty for being in the United States without proper documentation. Faced with the prospect of separation and the uncertainty of obtaining the visas, many chose to remain undocumented and exposed to the risk of deportation (Preston 2013). More than two hundred thousand parents of American-­born children were deported to their countries of origin between 2010 and 2012 (Wessler 2012). In 2013, the Obama administration instituted a policy that aimed to reduce family separation in these cases. The immigrants are still required to travel to their countries of origin to apply for a visa, but their relatives can now also apply for a waiver of the long penalty wait. Waivers are granted on the basis of extreme hardship caused to an American citizen spouse or parent of the undocumented immigrant in the case of separation. The provision does not apply to those with American citizen children. Those who successfully go through this route and obtain immigration visas may later become eligible for permanent residency (a green card). Of course, this provision is unavailable to those who are not married or are children of American citizens; those who are ineligible for other reasons, such as a criminal record; and those who cannot afford to travel back to their countries of origin, hire an immigration attorney, and pay the hefty application fee. Among those who remain ineligible for citizenship are undocumented immigrants who arrived to the United States as children, known as DREAMers after the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act for which many of them advocate. In 2012, administrative changes to immigration rules



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created a program that eased the plight of these immigrants without establishing a path to citizenship. Under certain conditions, they have the possibility of getting a temporary work permit. These permits can lead to more permits but not yet to a green card, so the path to citizenship remains blocked even for undocumented immigrants who grew up in the United States (USCIS 2012c). There is not yet a road to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.5 Barring major changes in the immigration system, they remain ineligible for citizenship. Likewise, those on temporary employment, student, or visitor’s visas who cannot or do not plan to marry an American citizen or cannot get a green card through an employer are also blocked from citizenship.

Becoming a Citizen Residency Requirements It is crucial to remember that legal permanent residents are not obligated to become citizens. In fact, they can live in the United States indefinitely as long as they regularly renew their green cards. At the same time, legal scholar Hiroshi Motomura points out that immigrants who are eligible for naturalization technically have a right to be naturalized (Motomura 2006). The vast majority of legal permanent residents become eligible to apply for citizenship after five years of continuous residence in the United States. If they do decide to naturalize, they have to show that they have lived within the state of their residence for at least three months prior to applying, and that they have not been out of the country for more than half of the previous five years. They cannot leave the country for trips lasting longer than six months or they lose their eligibility for citizenship (USCIS 2012b). Permanent legal residents who are not seeking citizenship are also restricted in the amount of travel they are able to do, or they may lose their green cards (USCIS 2007b). In fact, some immigrants seek citizenship in order to avoid the limits on time spent outside of the United States; in other words, they seek to become American citizens in order to have freedom not to live in the United States as much. Residency requirements for citizenship are a common feature in immigration systems of other countries, signaling an understanding that citizenship is connected to physical residency, even if its acquisition frees one from maintaining such residency. In the United Kingdom and France, most immigrants also have to live in their new countries for at least five years, although in France legal permanent residence is granted through naturalization only (Rallu 2011). In Switzerland, the residency requirement is much higher: twelve years. Meanwhile, in Canada, whose immigration system is more similar to the American one, landed immigrants (Canadian term for permanent residents) have to reside in Canada for three years before applying for citizenship (Bloemraad 2006; Goodman 2010).

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Immigrants who obtained green cards by marrying an American citizen have a waiting period of three years of continuous residence instead of five. Subsequently, they also have to show that they have lived in the United States for more than half of the previous three years and undergo the naturalization interview in all of its components (USCIS 2012b). Below, I describe the process of becoming an American citizen for adults. Immigrant children under eighteen obtain citizenship through their parents, and do not have go through the naturalization process separately. The parents simply fill out an additional form for the children to gain citizenship automatically. For most of American history—­the years between 1795 and 1952—­immigrants filed a declaration of intent to naturalize after three years of residency in the United States. These intent papers in essence gave them the special status of an immigrant in official transition to citizenship. This special status does not exist today. Although it is still possible to file a declaration of intent (several hundred immigrants do so every year), it is no longer a requirement, and has lost its meaning (Motomura 2006).

Filing an Application Reflecting the residency requirements for naturalization, applicants are asked to keep track carefully of all the times they have left the United States. A detailed log of all trips is part of the long and complicated N-­400 form immigrants have to file in order to apply for citizenship. Even trips lasting one day have to be documented. In addition, the form asks applicants to list every place of residence in the past five years, every place of employment and schooling, including addresses, information about prior spouses of the applicant and the applicant’s own spouse, and every organization and group the applicant has been associated with in the United States or elsewhere. Applicants answer over a dozen questions about their moral character and contact with the criminal justice system, and a host of other miscellaneous questions.

The Costs of Applying The fee for filing this application form was $595 in 2013, with an additional $85 for fingerprints. Immigrants who demonstrate extreme economic hardship can apply for a fee waiver. Those whose household income is less than 150 percent of the poverty line ($16,750 for a single person or $22,700 for a household of two in 2012) can get this waiver. Filing fees were not always this high: in 1990, it cost $90 to apply for citizenship. These fees tend to be lower in other countries; in France and Spain, there are no fees at all. In the United States, the high costs are partly due to the fact that user fees, such as fees for aspiring citizens, significantly contribute to the operating budget of the immigration agency (Migration Policy Institute 2007; Sumption and Flamm 2012).



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In reality, the total cost for many aspiring citizens includes professional help in order to correctly fill out the necessary paperwork and figure out which of the long list of documents to send along with the application. An extensive industry has sprung up around all immigration processes, including naturalization. Attorney fees often bring the cost of naturalization to several thousand dollars, which is a prohibitive barrier to application for many immigrants. Nonprofit organizations also assist immigrants, although the demand far exceeds the supply, and there is evidence that it is most helpful to applicants with the simplest cases (Plascencia 2012). Unfortunately, the immigration industry includes unscrupulous outfits that prey on immigrants by providing fraudulent services, from selling the N-­400 form, which is available free of charge, to siphoning thousands from desperate undocumented immigrants by promising them citizenship (Semple and Manrique 2009).

Moral Character Requirements As mentioned, many of the questions on the naturalization form pertain to good moral character. Good moral character, which is to be determined by USCIS officers, is a requirement for becoming a citizen. Criminality is one aspect of moral character that is considered. The fingerprints collected as part of the citizenship application process are used for a criminal background check. Immigrants who have been convicted of murder or aggravated felony cannot become citizens. Laws passed in 1996 greatly expanded the definition of what constitutes an aggravated felony and made deportation mandatory.6 Lesser offenses disqualify immigrants from applying for citizenship for a period of time after the crime, rather than bar them altogether. Applicants have to report even those offenses that have been expunged from their record, those they committed as minors, and those for which the applicant has not been arrested at all (USCIS 2012b). Aggravated felonies result not only in a barrier to naturalization but also in the initiation of deportation proceedings. In a well-­publicized case, Qing Wu, a twenty-­nine-­year-­old Chinese immigrant, applied for citizenship, only to be placed in immigration detention to be deported to China. As a teenager growing up in New York’s Chinatown, he was convicted of robbery. After serving three years in a juvenile detention center, Wu embarked on a stringent path of rehabilitation, culminating in a position as vice president at a national company fifteen years later, when he applied for citizenship. After a campaign by his many supporters, before being sent to China Wu was eventually pardoned by his governor, but many others are not so lucky (Ouyang 2011). Bad moral character can be discerned in far lesser crimes than robbery. Kichul Lee, a Korean immigrant living in Washington State, was barred from citizenship on moral character grounds for getting (and promptly paying) a $153 ticket for collecting too many oysters on a Puget Sound beach (McGrann 2004).

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If applicants are found to have lied on their citizenship application, it is taken as evidence of bad moral character. An already naturalized citizen can have his or her citizenship taken away if they are found to have lied during the application process. They can even be barred from citizenship if it is found that there were irregularities during their application for a green card, even if these irregularities were not noticed at that earlier stage.7 In another publicized case, a small-­town doctor and his wife, with American-­born children and a dozen naturalized relatives, applied for citizenship only to be put in deportation proceedings. It turned out that when their mothers had petitioned for their immigration from the Philippines decades prior, they petitioned for them as single adult children. But the couple had married secretly for personal reasons before their green cards came through. They were deemed to have defrauded the government during the original application for their green cards (Preston 2008). Good moral character requirements exclude immigrants who have violated any controlled substance law in any state of the United States or any foreign country. Additionally, being any of the following disqualifies an applicant for citizenship: a habitual drunkard, a prostitute, a procurer of others for prostitution, a polygamist, and an illegal gambler. Applicants who have helped people to enter the United States illegally and those who have failed to support dependents or pay alimony are also barred. Anyone who has claimed to be an American citizen is disqualified, as is anyone failing to file local, state, or federal taxes or owing any taxes. Interestingly, people who hold titles of nobility in other countries cannot become American citizens without first renouncing them.8 The civic and political history of applicants is deeply scrutinized. In addition to having to list all groups and organizations they ever belonged to in the United States and in other countries, immigrants are asked if they have ever been a member of the Communist Party,9 “any other totalitarian party,” or a terrorist organization. A separate question inquires about advocating (directly or indirectly) to overthrow any government by force or violence. Barred from citizenship is anyone who admits to persecuting people based on their race, religion, national origin, political opinion, or social group. In a remarkable historical holdover, citizenship applicants in the twenty-­first century are asked if they have ever worked or associated in any way, directly or indirectly, with the Nazi government of Germany between 1933 and 1945, any government in any area occupied by, allied with, or established with the help of the Nazis, or any German, Nazi, or S.S. unit. In the post-­9/11 context, terrorist affiliations and threat to national security are especially scrutinized. All applications for naturalization are run through multiple databases of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Prior to 9/11, the applications were run through only the criminal background check. As a result, many applicants are flagged in these FBI databases as posing a threat to national



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security. The criteria are very broad: people can be flagged for traveling or residing in areas of known terrorist activities, essentially singling out immigrants from particular countries of origin. Some applicants are flagged for attending a mosque that was under FBI surveillance, or giving a voluntary interview to the FBI after 9/11, which many Muslim immigrants did. Once the application is flagged, the FBI tells the USCIS whether to deny, approve, or delay the naturalization application, resulting in sometimes indefinite delays in processing applications, during which time the applicant is not informed of the reasons for the delay. Although the threat posed by these immigrants is not high enough to merit timely investigation, arrest, or deportation, their naturalization applications can be in limbo for years. An American Civil Liberties Union investigation revealed that the FBI pressures immigrants into working as informants in order to speed up their naturalization applications (Pasquarella 2013). Good moral character requirements trace back to the very first U.S. naturalization laws passed in 1790. For a hundred and fifty years, there were no explicit guidelines as to what constituted good moral character. In the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, Congress first came up with a list of offenses that would exclude an immigrant from citizenship if they were committed during the five-­ year period before the application. Most of these are on the books today. In 1988, the Anti-­Drug Abuse Act added drug and firearm trafficking to the list of aggravated felonies that made noncitizens deportable. In the 1990s, the massive expansion of the aggravated felony category took place. Equally important, the shift of emphasis to deportation in the first decade of the twenty-­first century highlighted the importance of a catchall provision of the original Immigration and Nationality Act: someone could be found to lack good moral character even if they do not fit into any of the many categories of excludable individuals (Lapp 2012). The discretion allowed immigration officials reviewing naturalization cases and conducting citizenship interviews is a powerful political tool. Admitting to voting or registering to vote as a noncitizen on the application for naturalization is another ground for ineligibility, as well as leading to deportation proceedings. Unfortunately, voting issues can be confusing. Some green card holders are actually registered to vote by poorly trained volunteers during get out the vote campaigns (Plascencia 2012). Others mistakenly believe that green cards make them eligible to register to vote and are eager to demonstrate that they have performed this civic duty (Preston 2008). Complicating the matter further is the fact that noncitizens are allowed to vote in some local elections, such as some school board elections (Hayduk 2006). The moral character requirements reflect an entrenched connection between the idea of citizenship for immigrants and morality, as well as highlighting the emphasis on screening and enforcement in the contemporary naturalization process. In order to cross the boundary into full membership, immigrants

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have to demonstrate that they deserve the privilege through their upstanding character. Especially given the latitude afforded to immigration officials, immigrants are very much supplicants who are laying out evidence in support of their candidacies. The naturalization process becomes a way to screen and exclude immigrants along a wide range of unevenly applied and vague normative criteria. The fact that the category of national membership is guarded in this way indicates that immigrants are viewed predominantly as a threat to the nation, potentially polluting its moral character. This happens even at the crossing into citizenship, after immigrants have already passed many prior screening hurdles, or perhaps because it is the final opportunity to screen and exclude. The screening of potential citizens for moral fitness is symptomatic of the general moralistic construction of the American nation as, for instance, a liberating force fighting for freedom of people around the world. The project of nationalism and the construction of a national identity rely on such fixed moral definitions of the nation-­ state to draw the boundaries of inclusion and exclusion (Hertzfeld 2004). Criminal background checks and good character conditions are part of the naturalization process in many other countries. In some, such as Canada and Germany, there are no stipulations about moral character, simply a criminal background check. In the United Kingdom, good moral character is determined solely through a criminal background check. Of course, there is variation in severity of crimes that would disqualify an immigrant from naturalization. There is also variation in how well defined the rules of exclusion are. American immigration officials have wide discretion under the law, but so do their counterparts in the Netherlands, who may determine that an immigrant is a threat to public order, and in Belgium, if there seem to be “serious facts with respect to the person.” In some countries, the good moral character clause extends beyond a criminal background check even more so than in the United States. For instance, citizenship applicants in Iceland have to submit good character references from two citizens. In Switzerland, immigrants have to be approved by the municipalities in which they live, which sometimes means that local residents vote on individual citizenship applications. In many European countries, there are requirements about employment and economic self-­sufficiency. The United States does not have such requirements at the naturalization stage, although there are economic requirements for entry and sponsoring immigration of family members. Like the United States, the United Kingdom excludes applicants who have been confined to a mental institution (Goodman 2010; Hofhansel 2008).

Attachment to the Constitution In additional to good moral character, applicants for naturalization must demonstrate attachment to the Constitution. Attachment to the United States and the Constitution is demonstrated when the applicant takes the Oath of



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Allegiance. But the N-­ 400 application contains a series of questions about attachment as well. These questions revolve around the lengthy text of the oath, asking whether immigrants support the Constitution and the American form of government, and whether they understand the oath and are willing to take it. Applicants are also asked whether they are willing to bear arms on behalf of their new country; it is possible to answer “no” to this question and still become a citizen if one goes through the process of proving conscientious objector status. In order to qualify for citizenship, applicants have to say they are willing to perform noncombatant services and work of national importance under civilian direction. Males need to have been registered with the Selective Service System if they lived in the United States between ages eighteen and twenty-­five. Anyone who deserted the U.S. armed forces is barred from citizenship.

Citizenship Interview Good moral character and attachment to the United States and its Constitution are tested not only through questions on the N-­400 application. They are taken up again if the applicant successfully passes to the next stage of the naturalization process, the interview with an immigration official. After filing an application with all the associated documents, passport photos, and fees, the aspiring citizen waits six months to two years to receive an appointment letter requesting fingerprints and additional documents.10 After an additional wait, they are turned down or called for an interview. The length of the wait varies across the country, depending on staffing and backlogs in different locations. Those in the West and South often live very far from immigration offices, requiring as much as a ten-­hour drive to attend a naturalization interview (Plascencia 2012). The interview is conducted by immigration officials in the local USCIS field offices. Some states have only one such office (South Dakota, Alabama). Others have as many as seven (New York) or ten (California). The applicant can bring an attorney to the interview, but many arrive alone. Immigration officials ask questions about the applicant’s background and the material in their application. They administer tests to establish that the immigrant can demonstrate a basic understanding of English, including reading, writing, and speaking. Applicants also have to demonstrate knowledge of the history and government of the United States. As a result of agency reorganization of the Immigration and Naturalization Service into the Department of Homeland Security following 9/11, many of the immigration officers conducting citizenship interviews formerly worked in enforcement capacities. In addition to naturalization, Department of Homeland Security also deals with terrorism, smuggling, and immigration enforcement. Immigration officers interviewing applicants for citizenship may have previously worked in such posts as airport customs, which was the case with

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the director of the field office where I conducted interviews. They may have dealt with smuggling or deportations. Many of these officers bring the enforcement mentality to the adjudication of naturalization applications (as well as green card applications). But even those who never worked in enforcement are directed to focus on removal proceedings. In other words, they look at applicants for citizenship with an eye on deportation (Lapp 2012). This seemed to be the case particularly starting in 2010 with the imposition of four hundred thousand yearly quotas for deportation (Hsu and Becker 2010). These quotas are tied to a congressional detention bed mandate that requires Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to fill tens of thousands of detention beds with immigrant detainees (Miroff 2013; Robbins 2013). Interviews for citizenship take place in small offices of immigration officers. Unless the immigrant arrives with an attorney, the conversation takes place between the officer and the applicant, with no other witnesses present. As mentioned earlier, Congress mandates wide discretion to immigration officers, who can decide to bar an applicant for citizenship even when they do not fit into any of the excludable categories. Stories of immigration officers abusing their power abound. Some of these may be myths, but many are documented by researchers, reporters, and advocates (Associated Press 2006; Markon 2006; Plascencia 2012). During my own research, I was told of a local officer who asked applicants if they have ever been members of any terrorist organization, including any environmental organizations, deviating from the protocol to pursue what may have been a personal dislike of environmental activists. In general, there are three possible outcomes of a citizenship interview. Citizenship may be granted, and the immigrant will receive a notice to appear at an oath ceremony. The application may be continued if the applicant fails the English or the civics exams; this is also the case if additional documents are needed. A second interview will be scheduled. The third outcome is denial of application. Rejected applicants have the right to ask for another examiner or for a supervisor. If citizenship is still denied after this hearing, it is possible to petition for review by the U.S. District Court (USCIS 2004). There is evidence that most applicants for U.S. citizenship are not aware of these rights. Nor are immigration officers obligated to inform applicants of their rights.

Civics and History Test During the citizenship interview, immigrants are tested on their knowledge of civics. The test is administered orally, with the immigration officer asking ten questions about American history and form of government. These ten questions are drawn from a list of one hundred that is widely available for immigrants to study. Applicants have to answer six out of ten questions accurately in order



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to pass. These questions are listed in table 1.1. For the most part they are questions requiring one sentence or even one-­word statements about principles of American democracy, system of government, rights and responsibilities of citizens, geography, patriotic symbols, holidays, and American history. Some have criticized the test for the simplistic and often problematic characterization of the American nation and its history (Park 2008; Plascencia 2012); on the other hand, a large proportion of American high school graduates fail the same test (Ho 2012). Debates about the citizenship test center on the ever-­current dilemma of how high the bar to citizenship should be. Is the bar too high? Should

TABLE 1.1.

Question bank for civics and history exam administered at citizenship interviews by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services American Government A: Principles of American Democracy What is the supreme law of the land? What does the Constitution do? The idea of self-­government is in the first three words of the Constitution. What are these words? What is an amendment? What do we call the first ten amendments to the Constitution? What is one right or freedom from the First Amendment?* How many amendments does the Constitution have? What did the Declaration of Independence do? What are two rights in the Declaration of Independence? What is freedom of religion? What is the economic system in the United States?* What is the “rule of law”? B: System of Government Name one branch or part of the government.* What stops one branch of government from becoming too powerful? Who is in charge of the executive branch? Who makes federal laws? What are the two parts of the U.S. Congress?* How many U.S. Senators are there? We elect a U.S. Senator for how many years? (continued)

TABLE 1.1.

Question bank for civics and history exam administered at citizenship interviews by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (continued) American Government B: System of Government Who is one of your state’s U.S. Senators now?* The House of Representatives has how many voting members? We elect a U.S. Representative for how many years? Name your U.S. Representative. Who does a U.S. Senator represent? Why do some states have more Representatives than other states? We elect a President for how many years? In what month do we vote for President?* What is the name of the President of the United States now?* What is the name of the Vice President of the United States now? If the President can no longer serve, who becomes President? If both the President and the Vice President can no longer serve, who becomes President? Who is the Commander in Chief of the military? Who signs bills to become laws? Who vetoes bills? What does the President’s Cabinet do? What are two Cabinet-­level positions? What does the judicial branch do? What is the highest court in the United States? How many justices are on the Supreme Court? Who is the Chief Justice of the United States now? Under our Constitution, some powers belong to the federal government. What is one power of the federal government? Under our Constitution, some powers belong to the states. What is one power of the states? Who is the Governor of your state now? What is the capital of your state?* What are the two major political parties in the United States?* What is the political party of the President now? What is the name of the Speaker of the House of Representatives now? (continued)

28

American Government C: Rights and Responsibilities There are four amendments to the Constitution about who can vote. Describe one of them. What is one responsibility that is only for United States citizens?* Name one right only for United States citizens. What are two rights of everyone living in the United States? What do we show loyalty to when we say the Pledge of Allegiance? What is one promise you make when you become a United States citizen? How old do citizens have to be to vote for President?* What are two ways that Americans can participate in their democracy? When is the last day you can send in federal income tax forms?* When must all men register for the Selective Service? Integrated Civics A: Geography Name one of the two longest rivers in the United States. What ocean is on the West Coast of the United States? What ocean is on the East Coast of the United States? Name one U.S. territory. Name one state that borders Canada. Name one state that borders Mexico. What is the capital of the United States?* Where is the Statue of Liberty?* B: Symbols Why does the flag have 13 stripes? Why does the flag have 50 stars?* What is the name of the national anthem? Name two national U.S. holidays. American History A. Colonial Period and Independence What is one reason colonists came to America? Who lived in America before the Europeans arrived? What group of people was taken to America and sold as slaves? Why did the colonists fight the British? Who wrote the Declaration of Independence? When was the Declaration of Independence adopted? (continued)

29

TABLE 1.1.

Question bank for civics and history exam administered at citizenship interviews by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (continued) American History A. Colonial Period and Independence There were 13 original states. Name three. What happened at the Constitutional Convention? When was the Constitution written? The Federalist Papers supported the passage of the U.S. Constitution. Name one of the writers. What is one thing Benjamin Franklin is famous for? Who is the “Father of Our Country”? Who was the first President?* B: 1800s What territory did the United States buy from France in 1803? Name one war fought by the United States in the 1800s. Name the U.S. war between the North and the South. Name one problem that led to the Civil War. What was one important thing that Abraham Lincoln did?* What did the Emancipation Proclamation do? What did Susan B. Anthony do? C: Recent American History and Other Important Historical Information Name one war fought by the United States in the 1900s.* Who was President during World War I? Who was President during the Great Depression and World War II? Who did the United States fight in World War II? Before he was President, Eisenhower was a general. What war was he in? During the Cold War, what was the main concern of the United States? What movement tried to end racial discrimination? What did Martin Luther King, Jr. do?* What major event happened on September 11, 2001, in the United States? Name one American Indian tribe in the United States. Source: USCIS 2011d. * Questions asked of applicants over sixty who have lived in the United States for more than twenty years.

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immigrants be asked questions most native-­born Americans cannot answer? Is the bar too low and too many immigrants are accepted into membership without a sufficient understanding of their new country? After a decade of planning and testing, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services implemented a new naturalization test in 2009. The new test was developed in response to criticism that the old test was administered inconsistently, did not serve to measure meaningful understanding of American history and government, and did not sufficiently encourage patriotism. It was considered to contain too many trivial questions that immigrants could memorize, such as the colors of the flag, and not enough about the rights and responsibilities of citizenship (USCIS 2007a). It is important to note that the new test was developed in the context of growing anti-­immigrant sentiment reflected in harsh local and state legislation and in unfavorable discursive contrasting of modern era immigrants, Latinos in particular, to European immigrants from the turn of the twentieth century. Despite evidence to the contrary, the latter are often assumed to possess a slew of positive qualities that today’s immigrants lack, including wholehearted determination to speak English, assimilate, and acquire citizenship (Foner 2001). The new test places more emphasis on history and civics, covers more historical ground, and includes questions about Native Americans and women. Many of the new questions, including those on core concepts of American democracy, have multiple correct answers (Migration Policy Institute 2008b; Park 2008). The pass rate for the new test in the first three years of its implementation was 92 percent (USCIS 2012a). This is comparable to pass rates on the old exam (ICF International 2011). The civics and history testing of applicants for citizenship reflects the idea that immigrants must be instilled with patriotism, and the assumption that this patriotism will be strengthened by learning a particular set of facts and ideas. As during the Americanization campaigns of the early twentieth century, there is a belief that immigrants are culturally and morally lacking, and must be taught to appreciate the American form of government and a set of values deemed to define American identity (Zolberg 2006). Through citizenship testing, these efforts are focused on immigrants applying for citizenship rather than immigrants first arriving or settling in the United States. As with moral character, it is at the entry point to full membership—­at the point where immigrants are about to get the full set of privileges that citizenship brings—­that the screening out of those who do not deserve these privileges is sharpened. Moreover, the tests delineate a symbolic boundary around citizenship. This symbolic boundary is most often held up in debates over raising and lowering the citizenship bar, although other aspects of the naturalization process, let alone eligibility for naturalization in the first place, serve as more significant barriers. The tests capture the imagination because they so explicitly list the knowledge required

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to be American. More importantly, they also reflect the idea that immigrants should be trained and screened before being admitted to citizenship. Until recently, civics and history exams for new citizens were relatively rare in other countries. Even Canada did not have standardized citizenship tests until 1995 (Paquet 2012). Since the turn of the twenty-­first century, many European countries have instituted requirements for knowledge of civics and history, often at the same time as adding oath ceremonies or various proclamations of allegiance. In developing these exams and procedures, European policymakers have looked to copy the policies of traditional countries of immigration, particularly Canada. Nevertheless, there are variations in these requirements, which are tested in written exams (as in Canada) in some places, during an interview, or can be satisfied by taking government-­administered coursework (Goodman 2010). The timing of the tests differs as well: in the United Kingdom, immigrants have to pass the citizenship test in order to qualify for applying for citizenship or permanent residency (Paquet 2012).

English-­Language Requirements Language requirements for citizenship are standard practice in most countries, including the United States. In addition to civics, successful applicants for American citizenship must demonstrate an understanding of the English language, including reading, writing, and speaking.11 Speaking and understanding are tested during the course of the citizenship interview when immigration officers ask questions about the immigrant’s application. Applicants have to be able to read one of three written sentences “in a manner suggesting to the USCIS officer that the applicant appears to understand the meaning of the sentence.” Officers are not supposed to disqualify anyone for having an accent. To show their ability to write in English, the applicants have to write one sentence in a way that will be understood by the immigration officer. The sentence is dictated by the immigration officer. It is acceptable to have spelling, capitalization, and punctuation errors that the officer judges to not interfere with the meaning of the sentence. Note the latitude afforded to the immigration officer in evaluating both the reading and the writing portions of the interview. Since 2009, the content of the reading and writing tests is supposed to be civics and history, and key vocabulary words are provided for study. Prior to 2009, these sentences could be on general topics (USCIS 2013b). Just as a service industry surrounds the application for citizenship, there are also multiple services to prepare for the citizenship interview and test. The Office of Citizenship, formed after the reorganization of immigration agencies after 9/11, releases study preparation manuals for the citizenship test free of charge, including a set of flashcards and videos. In addition, the federal government partners with nonprofit agencies that provide citizenship classes to



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immigrants (USCIS 2011c). Some of these citizenship classes are focused primarily on English-­language skills and even literacy, because that is the biggest obstacle to passing the citizenship test for working-­class, less-­schooled students (Plascencia 2012). In addition to materials provided by the government free of charge, aspiring citizens can purchase a range of study aides, including the 360-­page US Citizenship for Dummies. English may not be the official language of the United States on the federal level, but it is the dominant language of the United States. Moreover, many states have passed state-­level laws that make English the official language. The requirement that citizenship applicants demonstrate a mastery of English is predicated not only on the connection between being American and being an English speaker but also on the notion that immigrants are not motivated to learn English unless there are requirements and tests. In fact, much of the anti-­ immigrant sentiment pivots on the erroneous assumption that today’s immigrants to the United States do not want to learn English, in contrast to earlier European-­origin immigrants at the turn of the twentieth century. As the number of immigrants continues to grow, the number of people in the United States who have limited English proficiency is also on the rise. Those who have not acquired citizenship are disproportionately poor immigrants with low levels of education (Whatley and Batalova 2013). But despite the anti-­immigrant rhetoric to the contrary, there is little evidence that immigrants are averse to learning English (Dowling, Ellison, and Leal 2012). Barriers to learning can be high for many immigrants who do not have access to English classes or opportunity to be exposed to meaningful interaction with English speakers. Testing for English mastery at the entry point to citizenship highlights yet another facet of naturalization as a system that screens for deserving immigrants. They are deserving because it is presumed that they chose to learn English and worked hard to do so.12 By corollary, the undeserving immigrants are thought of as making the wrong choices, rather than being embedded in an unequal structural context, and are excluded from full membership.

Accommodations for Age and Disability Some immigrants do not have to take the English test to become citizens. Exemptions are made for those who are older than fifty and have been permanent legal residents for at least twenty years. These immigrants have to answer civics questions, but these can be asked in the language of their choice. The immigrants have to bring their own interpreters. The same is the case for immigrants over fifty-­five who have lived in the United States with a green card for at least fifteen years. Those over sixty-­five who have lived in the United States as permanent residents for at least twenty years are asked civics questions from a much shorter predetermined list of twenty questions (see table 1.1; USCIS 2012b).

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Some applicants are granted a disability exemption for developmental disabilities or mental impairments, as long as these impairments were not caused by illegal drug use. They do not have to be tested for English or civics and can bring an interpreter to the interview (USCIS 2012b). Occasionally, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services interviews for citizenship and administers the oath at the bedside of a sick applicant. For instance, Enriqueta Juarez, an eighty-­three-­year-­old immigrant from Mexico, had her interview in the hospital to which she was confined, with the help of an English-­Spanish interpreter (Garcia 2012). On the other hand, there is also the case of Marin Turcinovic, an immigrant from Croatia who was denied citizenship because he missed appointments for fingerprints; it turned out that he was quadriplegic and unable to leave his home (Preston 2008). The special accommodations for people with disabilities are a complicated issue because immigrants who have been declared legally incompetent or are in a mental institution are not seen as being fit for American citizenship, and are barred from applying. Moreover, medical screening at the point of admission to the United States as a permanent resident keeps out immigrants with a range of diseases and conditions, including those whose illnesses may make them a public charge or pose a danger to American property.13

Rejection Not everyone who applies for citizenship is successful. In 2011, there were eight applicants denied for every one hundred accepted (USDHS 2012). A decade earlier, in 2000, denials peaked, with nearly one denial to two naturalizations granted (USCIS 2002). In line with the decentralized nature of the system, acceptance rates vary by district; in some, as many as half of all applicants are rejected. Although some denials are due to failing English, history, or civics exams, and others result from irregularities discovered in the application, a disqualification based on length of residence or one of the other requirements for eligibility, the numbers miss an important element. They do not reveal the significant number of those who forgo application altogether because of expense, fear of rejection, or the worst-­case scenario of deportation. For many immigrants, applying for citizenship may be too risky, even with the increasing erosion in the rights of permanent legal residents, most importantly their right to remain in the United States. The numbers of denials also do not capture those immigrants whose applications are delayed for years after they are flagged as threats to national security in FBI databases (Pasquarella 2013).



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Oath Ceremony Once applicants for citizenship pass the interview, they are ready for the final step that will make them American citizens: the administration of the oath. In some places, the oath is administered on the same day as the interview. These are smaller citizenship ceremonies that take place in the local field offices. Most immigrants, however, have to return on a different date and often to a different location to participate in a citizenship ceremony and take the oath. It is there that they receive their proof of citizenship. I describe these citizenship ceremonies at length in chapter 3.

Less Common Paths The vast majority of new immigrant citizens naturalized through the process described in the previous section, starting with waiting three or five years, and then going through the application and interview. For some immigrants, however, the road to citizenship takes a different shape. Such is the case for members of the military, U.S. nationals, adopted children, undocumented immigrants who have evaded detection for a long time, immigrants from Cuba, and people naturalized through special laws. In addition, there is the case of the millions of undocumented immigrants who were given a path to citizenship through federal legislation in 1986.

Members of the Military Members of the military are eligible to apply for naturalization after one year of active-­ duty service during peacetime. During periods of hostility, however, they are eligible for naturalization immediately. In July 2002, President George W. Bush designated the period beginning on September 11, 2001, as a period of hostility, to be officially terminated by a future executive order.14 As of the writing of this book, President Barack Obama has not rescinded the period of hostilities. As a result, immigrants are currently eligible to apply for citizenship as soon as they join the armed forces. In some cases, undocumented immigrants in the military have been able to acquire citizenship (under 8 U.S.C. §1440; Plascencia 2009). Members of the military do not gain citizenship automatically, however. Just like civilians, they have to go through English and civics tests and be deemed of good moral character (USCIS 2012b). Whereas only permanent residents in the military are eligible for citizenship during peacetime, these requirements are relaxed in times of hostility. For example, it is possible for a member of the military to become a citizen without having a green card if they were physically present in the United States when they enlisted. Granting citizenship to skilled immigrant soldiers benefits the U.S. military, as citizens can serve in

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officer positions and obtain security clearances (Schafer 2011). In fact, the military actively recruits noncitizens with special skills (McIntosh and Syala 2011). There are other benefits for immigrants enlisted in the military: service members in either peacetime or during hostilities can have their application processed overseas, they do not have to pay fees to submit their applications or have their fingerprints taken, and military spouses and children may also access citizenship after a shorter wait if their soldier is deployed. In the decade after 2001, over fifty thousand members of the military were granted citizenship (USDHS 2012). Noncitizens comprise about 4 percent of the newly enlisted (McIntosh and Syala 2011). In immigrant-­rich areas of the country, such as Los Angeles, a large proportion of enlisting soldiers are the so-­called green card troops. Citizenship benefits are advertised by the military in television commercials, which are broadcast in Spanish as well as English (ABC News 2009). Although noncitizens have served in the U.S. military throughout the history of the nation and many were granted citizenship for that service through sweeping postwar decrees, some of the special citizenship provisions for military personnel were first developed in the mid-­2000s. These were pushed along by outcry about immigrants dying for a country that was not all the way theirs, including one tragic case when a soldier was killed on the way to submit fingerprints (Associated Press 2008b), and the need for special skills such as fluency in languages useful in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. Despite the special provisions for immigrants serving in the military, some veterans have been deported. Members of the military have drastically reduced residency eligibility, but naturalization is not automatic. Some soldiers never complete the process, especially while on active duty. Many veterans of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq suffer from post-­traumatic stress disorder, and are more likely to use drugs and engage in violent behavior. When convicted on charges relating to their PTSD, veterans can be put into deportation proceedings. Immigration courts do not consider service in the military and its effects on the veterans as mitigating factors (Hartsfield 2012; Shagin 2007). Service members who perish on active duty during a period of hostilities can be naturalized posthumously. In fact, three of the first soldiers to die in the war with Iraq in 2003 were noncitizens who were granted citizenship posthumously. Starting in 2003, family members could file a naturalization application for the deceased service member. If such an application is approved, the immigrant is made a citizen retroactively on the day of his or her death. The posthumous citizenship of the veteran entitles his or her family members to survivor benefits. Spouses, children, and parents of these service members can often become eligible for citizenship as well, or receive special consideration if applying for permanent residence. In the case of citizenship, the residence requirements are waived (Amaya 2007; USCIS 2013c).



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There has been an effort by some legislators to provide citizenship for soldiers who died during active duty automatically (Fox News 2003). However, under the current system, some families choose not to file for posthumous citizenship, and, in fact, many families and activists view posthumous citizenship as problematic (Associated Press 2008a; Riley 2005). Some object to the incentive of citizenship dangled in front of vulnerable and disadvantaged young people, or they wonder why the deceased soldiers were not celebrated and honored until after their death. Moreover, the individuals themselves may not have wanted to become citizens. Others object to noncitizens serving in the military in the first place (Wong 2007). Media scholar Hector Amaya analyzed congressional debates and media discourse around posthumous citizenship and showed that voluntary enlistment is often equated with a desire to naturalize, which reproduces dominant narratives about the military, and obscures the socioeconomic and cultural context in which noncitizens enlist (Amaya 2013).

Nationals Another group of immigrants who have a modified path to citizenship are U.S. nationals. All American citizens are also U.S. nationals, but some people are nationals but not citizens. This is the case for residents of American Samoa, an unincorporated American territory in the Pacific Ocean. The fifty-­ five thousand American Samoans owe permanent allegiance to the United States (Central Intelligence Agency 2013). U.S. nationals are eligible to apply for citizenship when they move to the United States without going through the green card stage or residency requirements. They do get tested on their knowledge of civics and the English language. People from other U.S. territories, such as Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, or Guam, have a different status. In addition to being U.S. nationals like the American Samoans, they are also American citizens. They do not get all the benefits of American citizens living in the fifty states, such as the right to vote, but when they move to the United States, they are granted full citizenship rights immediately and do not have to go through the naturalization process (Amaya 2013; Smith 1997).

Adopted Children It is estimated that Americans adopted 234,000 children from other countries between 1999 and 2011 (Bureau of Consular Affairs 2012). After the passage of the Children Citizen Act in 2000, most adopted children become citizens automatically when their adoption becomes final and they come to live with their adopted families in the United States. The act did not cover adoptees who were adults when the bill went into effect. As a result, experts estimate that thousands of adopted children never became citizens because their adoptive parents

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neglected to file for their naturalization. As adults, these adopted children find out that they are not citizens when they attempt to vote or obtain a passport for travel. In fact, adopted children who did not become citizens have been ordered deported if they have committed crimes. In one such instance, a thirty-­ eight-­year-­old woman who was adopted as an infant from Mexico was ordered deported to Mexico because she pleaded guilty to stealing a purse containing two bottles of prescription drugs, which is a drug offense (Archbold 2011). In another, a forty-­seven-­year-­old man with a heroin problem was deported to Japan. His adoptive parents did file for citizenship for him when he was a baby, but the father, a serviceman in the navy, was at sea on the day of the hearing, and citizenship was not granted (Berestein 2005).

Evading Detection American immigration law includes a provision that allows immigrants to apply for a green card, even if they are living in the United States without proper documentation. Currently, immigrants who are eligible for this registry provision have to demonstrate that they have been in the United States continuously since at least 1972. During this time, they would have to have avoided detection. In addition, they cannot have committed a range of crimes or engaged in immoral acts (USCIS 2011b). The Department of Homeland Security does not release detailed data on how many people fall under this provision, but we can estimate that number to be quite low, given the requirement of continued residence with no detection for four decades. Upon receiving a green card through the registry provision, immigrants become eligible for citizenship after three or five years.

Emigration from Cuba Another special route to citizenship is reserved for emigrants from Cuba. Under the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966, the U.S. attorney general has a parole power to admit emigrants from Cuba, granting them full legal status, as long as they reach U.S. soil (Pew Hispanic Center 2006). The Cuban Adjustment Act was passed soon after the beginning of mass migration of Cubans to the United States following the Cuban Missile Crisis. In the context of the Cold War, part of the rationale for creating this special provision for Cuban immigrants was to provide refuge to those who opposed the communist government in Cuba. It is one of the many examples of the American government using immigration policy as part of geopolitical strategy (Hughes and Alum 2010–­2011). Half a century after the act was passed, Cuban immigrants can still apply for a green card after a year of residence, and subsequently become eligible for citizenship (USCIS 2011a). This route to citizenship is open to Cuban immigrants only, but it is not technically unusual, since there are over a million people born in Cuba



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residing in the United States. Cuban immigrants have a high uptake of citizenship (Motel and Patten 2012).

Special Legislation Citizenship can also be conferred outside the jurisdiction of naturalization laws by congressional action. In very rare cases, members of Congress sponsor private bills that grant citizenship to particular individuals or small groups of people. For instance, dozens of private bills in the 1960s waived residency requirements for individual Cuban immigrants who were blocked from practicing their professions because of lack of citizenship. More recently, in the 1990s, such bills have been used to dismiss a criminal conviction from being used to bar an immigrant from citizenship; to naturalize a South Vietnamese helicopter pilot disabled during a heroic rescue of American soldiers; and to retroactively naturalize World War II servicemen so they would be eligible for reparations for Nazi atrocities. In the early twenty-­first century, most private bills deal with granting of permanent residency or stay of deportation, rather than citizenship (Lee 2005). Even rarer is the granting of honorary citizenship, which is considered a great honor, but is symbolic in nature. Mother Teresa received honorary citizenship in 1996 (USCIS 2004). In 2009, New York senators introduced legislation that would grant honorary citizenship to victims of a mass shooting in Binghamton, New York, where a dozen immigrants were killed at an immigrant assistance organization.15 As most such bills, it never came to a vote. A historically important mechanism of naturalization was collective granting of American citizenship to entire populations. For instance, all Puerto Ricans became U.S. citizens whether they wanted to or not through the Jones Act of 1917, two decades after the United States annexed Puerto Rico as a territory (Thomas 2004). Their collective naturalization came after decades of debates over their racial fitness for American citizenship, which was finally resolved by a need for soldiers to fight in World War I. As mentioned above, the citizenship of Puerto Ricans does not entitle them to political participation in the United States, nor are they fully protected by the U.S. Constitution (Amaya 2013). Residents of Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the Northern Mariana Islands received similarly limited American citizenship through annexation (Roman and Simmons 2002; Statham 1998). There are a few other special rules for somewhat esoteric situations, such as reduced residency requirements for applicants who are missionaries, working for the government, or are at sea.

Amnesty Immigrants I conclude this section by describing the road to citizenship of 2.7 million undocumented immigrants who were legalized in 1986 by the passage of Immigration

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Reform and Control Act (IRCA). Despite common perceptions, the United States has had a long history of legalization measures, or amnesties, ever since immigration was first seriously restricted in 1920 (Kerwin 2010). IRCA was the most recent such measure, and one that affected an unprecedented number of people. Legalization meant that qualified undocumented immigrants received temporary lawful status, which could eventually be converted to legal permanent residence if certain conditions were fulfilled. For a large portion of the legalized immigrants, these conditions included English-­language proficiency and knowledge and understanding of civics (Kerwin 2010). The federal government allocated funding to provide classes to help people fulfill these requirements. Of course, English and civics are also necessary to pass the citizenship exam. Thus, IRCA immigrants who were able to receive green cards had a leg up in preparing for naturalization. At the same time, lack of resources and low levels of education among many in this population made these steps difficult (Plascencia 2012). By 2009, over a million IRCA immigrants had become citizens (Baker 2010). The immigration trajectory of this group took them from undocumented migrant to temporary legal status to green card and finally to citizenship. Their process of naturalization itself was standard. But undocumented immigrants who were not legalized in 1986 do not have a path to citizenship unless another legalization program is introduced. Such a program could bring security to millions of immigrants, and put them on a road to full citizenship.

Multiple Citizenships When immigrants take the Oath of Allegiance, they “renounce and abjure” all other allegiances, including citizenship in other countries. Still, it is very much possible to hold multiple citizenships as an American citizen: there are no laws prohibiting multiple citizenships. In fact, the Supreme Court recognized the existence of dual citizenship in a 1952 ruling (U.S. Office of Personnel Management Investigations Service 2001). For immigrants, the ability to have more than one citizenship may depend more on the laws of their home countries. Mexico, for instance, allows emigrants to keep their Mexican citizenship when they become American citizens, and since 2006 they are even able to vote in Mexican elections (Rhodes and Harutyunyan 2010). Emigrants from the People’s Republic of China, on the other hand, automatically lose their Chinese citizenship when they become American citizens (Sejersen 2008). There are cases that fall in between: citizens of India who naturalize in the United States do lose Indian citizenship but can reapply for a special citizenship-­like status (Phulwani 2006). Many countries that send emigrants to the United States have recently amended their laws to allow dual citizenship (Foner 2001).



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For emigrants from countries that do not allow dual citizenship with the United States, naturalization means losing something. Some people may have a psychological attachment to their home country, one that is symbolized by formal citizenship status. For these immigrants, acquisition of American citizenship may be a bittersweet experience because they are losing their other citizenship. In more practical terms, loss of citizenship often comes with limitations on or inability to own property and limitations on conducting business. Most certainly, it prevents people from participating in elections or running for office in their countries of origin. The American government views dual citizenship as problematic. It cautions against the possibility of conflicting obligations to the countries involved, based on contradictory laws. Another issue is the assistance that American government provides its citizens in emergencies abroad. The country where a person is located has a stronger claim on its citizen that the other country of citizenship. This may limit the ability of U.S. government to assist in times of crisis (USCIS 2004). Despite these issues with dual citizenship, the United States continues to have a de facto dual citizenship regime. For many immigrants, this means being able to enjoy the rights of previous citizenship as they become American citizens. In speaking of citizenship regulations in countries outside of the United States, it is important to note that citizenship and nationality often have different meanings in other countries. In the United States, citizenship and nationality are often conflated. This is not the case everywhere. For instance, Mexico, the largest source of immigrants to the United States, grants Mexican nationality at birth, but citizenship is conferred at age eighteen (Plascencia 2012). Among citizens of the multiethnic Russian Federation, nationality has a meaning that is closer to ethnicity in the American context (Simonsen 2005). Although this book is focused primarily on citizenship acquisition in the United States, the variable meanings of citizenship across the globe may shape how immigrants themselves understand naturalization, losing citizenship, or holding multiple citizenships.

After Naturalization Political Rights and Jury Duty What does citizenship actually get you? Immigrants who are eligible to become citizens and who complete the naturalization process culminating in the oath ceremony acquire a range of benefits and obligations. American citizens have a right to vote in local, state, and federal elections. They can also run for office, although naturalized citizens cannot be elected president or vice president. The controversy surrounding President Barack Obama’s birth certificate hinges on

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THE ROAD TO CITIZENSHIP

this rule: if he, as some claim, was really born outside of the United States, his presidency would be illegitimate.16 Along with voting and political office comes an obligation to serve on juries. Naturalized citizens are eligible to be called up for jury duty. The presence of immigrants on juries is important for getting a jury of peers in a country that is 13 percent foreign-­born. As much as individual citizens may chafe at the inconveniences of this privilege, naturalization enhances the justice system.

Welfare Benefits When immigrants become citizens, they become eligible for federal means-­ tested benefits, such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (also known as food stamps) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI). After the welfare reform of 1996, noncitizens are not able to access these benefits. They are also banned from receiving state-­ controlled benefits, such as Medicaid and Temporary Aid for Needy Families (TANF), for the first five years of residence. Some of these benefits have since been restored to children, elderly, and disabled immigrants, and states have picked up some slack in providing benefits to other immigrants. There is little evidence that immigrants naturalize in order to access welfare, nor does welfare use increase after naturalization (Balistreri and Van Hook 2004; Fix, Passel and Sucher 2003).17 Nevertheless, citizenship does provide access to the federal safety net.

Security With acquisition of citizenship also comes permanency, or the right to remain. After the passage of several pieces of legislation starting in 1996, the security of permanent legal residents has been substantially eroded, and the gap between permanent residency and citizenship has widened, especially when it comes to the right to remain. The range of circumstances under which deportation proceedings are initiated has been greatly expanded. In addition, the emphasis on mass deportation of hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants at the end of the 2000s, most of whom do not have criminal records, creates an atmosphere of fear among immigrants, including permanent residents. American citizenship can give immigrants a sense of security and permanency, with protection from deportation. At the same time, naturalized citizens, unlike citizens by birth, can have their citizenship taken away from them.18 As mentioned earlier, it is possible to be stripped of citizenship if it is shown that the immigrant lied during the naturalization process. One of the famous historical cases of this happening is Emma Goldman, the Russian-­born anarchist in the early twentieth century. More recently, in 2004, a Palestinian American imam of a large mosque had his citizenship stripped for lying about affiliation with groups that the U.S.



T he R oads to C itizenship

43

government classifies as terrorist when he had applied for citizenship (Associated Press 2004). A naturalized citizen from Nigeria had his citizenship revoked in 2010 after he was charged with marriage fraud (Raslan 2010). Many immigrants whose citizenship has been taken away in recent decades have been Nazi war criminals whose sordid pasts got uncovered, often when they were quite elderly. Citizenship of naturalized immigrants can be revoked if the new citizen joins a proscribed subversive organization within five years of getting citizenship. All citizens, whether through naturalization or birth, lose their citizenship if they acquire citizenship in another country as an adult, serve in another country’s military or government, or commit treason (Lapp 2012; USCIS 2004).19 Nevertheless, these are isolated cases, and naturalization does protect the vast majority of immigrants from deportation.

Family Benefits New citizens can pass on citizenship to their minor children, and they can sponsor the migration of their relatives more easily. Permanent residents can also petition for their family members to immigrate to the United States, but it often takes years, if not decades, of waiting for the green cards to come through. Citizens, on the other hand, do not have to wait in the same line, which often, but not always, translates into a much shorter waiting period.20 Citizens can also petition for a wider range of relatives. Permanent residents can only petition for green cards for unmarried children and spouses, while citizens can also petition for brothers and sisters, married or single children, and parents. As we saw earlier, the majority of immigrants in the United States arrive through these family reunification provisions. In addition, American citizens can petition for fiancés and minor children of fiancés, who arrive in the United States on fiancé visas.

Travel International travel is easier for American citizens than for permanent residents. For one, there are no restrictions on how much time one can spend in other countries. In some cases, no visa is necessary to travel as a citizen but one would have to obtain one when traveling as a permanent resident. For example, an immigrant from India who has a green card would have to apply for a visa to travel to France, but would not need to do so once she became a citizen. Reentering the United States and going through immigration checkpoints can be easier with an American passport as well. During crises, the State Department sometimes assists American citizens by arranging a safe departure. This was the case, for instance, in 2006, when the government evacuated fifteen thousand American citizens from Lebanon (U.S. Government Accountability Office 2007). American citizenship can provide a measure of security abroad.

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THE ROAD TO CITIZENSHIP

Jobs American citizenship creates employment opportunities for immigrants. Most federal government jobs are for citizens only, including competitive civil service jobs and jobs requiring a security clearance. Many highly skilled people seek citizenship in order to be eligible to work on prestigious government contracts or receive federal grants and scholarships. But even people with lower levels of education are affected, such as construction workers whose employers want a contract with the government (Sumption and Flamm 2012). Historically, state-­ level statutes limited a wide range of professions to citizens, and a few of these restrictions remain (Plascencia, Freeman, and Setzler 2003). Some licensed professions require citizenship: police officers and state troopers in most places have to be American citizens (Bureau of Labor Statistics 2002, 346). In interviews with new citizens, I spoke to a few who were specifically interested in careers in law enforcement. The issue became news after the bombing during the 2013 Boston Marathon. Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the older brother implicated in the bombings, had been a promising boxer until he was excluded from competition by the newly imposed citizenship rules of the Golden Gloves of America in 2010 (Sontag, Herszenhorn, and Kovaleski 2013). Partly due to the connection between citizenship and employment opportunities, one consequence of naturalization appears to be higher earnings. Studies that compare earnings of noncitizen permanent residents and naturalized citizens show that naturalized citizens fare better. They are also less likely to be unemployed and are more resilient during economic crises. Most of these advantages are due to differences between who naturalizes and who does not: naturalized immigrants have higher levels of education, better language skills, more work experience, and longer residence in the United States than noncitizens. All of these characteristics also make them more likely to earn more. However, research shows that there is probably a wage premium for citizenship of about 5 percent, even when these other factors are held constant. This wage premium is comparable to that in other developed countries (Pastor and Scoggins 2012; Sumption and Flamm 2012). Aside from gaining access to certain jobs reserved for citizens, naturalized immigrants may also be preferred over noncitizens by employers, who are legally allowed to discriminate when choosing between citizens and permanent residents.21 The status of citizenship brings political rights, access to the social safety net, significant security, much improved ability to reunite with family, ease of travel, and expanded job opportunities. Even if a particular immigrant is not interested or does not benefit from every one of these, they are still an extraordinary set of rights and benefits. In this way, naturalization is a mechanism that produces inequalities between those who have citizenship and those immigrants who do not. Significantly, it is the most disadvantaged immigrants who



T he R oads to C itizenship

45

benefit the most from citizenship and also face the highest hurdles to acquiring it. The process of becoming an American citizen involves time, money, knowledge of the immigration system, the ability to speak, write, and understand English, and familiarity with American history and civics. Depending on the resources available to immigrants, citizenship can be extremely difficult or impossible to attain, or an easily attainable, if irritating, bureaucratic process. The outcome has profound consequences not only for individuals and families but for immigrant communities and their political efficacy and access to resources. The recent emphasis on deportation in the immigration system trickles up to the naturalization process, which becomes an opportunity for enforcement. In some cases, people who applied for citizenship with confidence that they would get it ended up in deportation proceedings. Many other components of the naturalization process, including checks for good moral character and knowledge of civics, history, and English, also reflect the screening and enforcement functions of naturalization. In this chapter, I have outlined the process of becoming a citizen of the United States and discussed the implications of the current system on the definitions of the American nation, conceptualization of American identity, and the meaning of American citizenship. The intricacies and inequalities that we have seen built into the naturalization process result in the increasingly unequal distribution of citizenship status among immigrants, which I discuss in the next chapter. Subsequently, I present immigrants’ own understandings of the meaning of becoming a citizen and examine the ceremonies where naturalization officially takes place. Although the book has its focus elsewhere, it is important to note that the rigors and pitfalls of the naturalization process are not available to the vast majority of undocumented immigrants, for whom roads to citizenship are closed. In the current immigration system, they have little hope of one day being able to vote, run for office, travel without restrictions, bring their children or spouses or parents to the United States, or get government jobs. Perhaps most important, inability to obtain either permanent residency or citizenship means they cannot gain security, stability, and permanence in the United States. Immigrants on various student and work visas are in the United States with proper documentation, but they also cannot apply for citizenship. They have to first figure out a way to become permanent residents before they can hope to enjoy the benefits of citizenship. The pathways to citizenship and its benefits result in a distinct American landscape of privilege distributed unevenly along multiple axes of inequality.

2 Citizenship and Inequality

The road to citizenship presents immigrants with obstacles, requiring resources that are within reach for some but not for many others. Financial assets, the ability to speak English, knowledge of the immigration system, and access to immigration attorneys or advocates are not randomly distributed. In this chapter, I investigate how the distribution of citizenship intersects with such powerful axes of inequality as class and race. Does citizenship exacerbate existing inequalities or does it ameliorate their effects? Are the most disadvantaged immigrants further fettered by lack of formal citizenship? Do educated elites enjoy unlimited access to citizenship? Does the distribution of citizenship aggravate the American racial hierarchy? The distribution of citizenship status among immigrants matters because multiple rights and privileges are apportioned unequally between citizens and noncitizens. An overlap between the citizen/noncitizen line and other axes of stratification, such as socioeconomic status, compounds social inequality and limits the political representation and collective mobility of immigrant groups (Portes and Curtis 1987). In fact, the central finding of this chapter is evidence of a growing socioeconomic gradient of citizenship between 1970 and 2000, with the least educated immigrants falling increasingly behind everyone else in obtaining citizenship. An interesting pattern also exists at the top of the distribution, with the most educated immigrants not necessarily having the highest uptake of citizenship. I also consider how citizenship status intersects with income, race, and country of origin. The starting point for any discussion of naturalization trends in the United States is the woefully low proportion of immigrants who hold American citizenship: around 40 percent. People who at least in theory have a choice to obtain full membership have not done so. The assumption is often that immigrants do not want to naturalize, feeding into the general disparagement of immigrants’ 46



C itizenship and I nequality

47

moral character and loyalty. However, the paths to citizenship are complex and riddled with obstacles, and many immigrants are likely deterred from acquiring citizenship by the difficulties and costs. Of course, others are not eligible to apply at all. Whatever the reasons, when large numbers of immigrants are not applying for citizenship, the legitimacy of the nation is undermined. Their failure to actively seek out formal citizenship status casts doubt on the desirability of that status and the greatness of the United States as a nation. Yet with elements of the naturalization process coalescing into a screening mechanism that reveals fundamental ambivalence about immigrants’ fitness for membership, the public debate swirls around the appropriate stringency of boundaries to citizenship. The low uptake of citizenship goes largely unacknowledged.

Recent Trends in Naturalization Since the 1980s, the United States has experienced a dramatic increase in the number of immigrants. By 2011, there were over forty million foreign-­born individuals living in the country, comprising about 13 percent of the total population. This was a far cry from the 1970s, the lowest point of immigration in the twentieth century, when there were only about ten million immigrants, or 5 percent of the total population (Britz and Batalova 2013). If the upward trend continues, the proportion of immigrants in the United States may soon exceed the highs reached in the early twentieth century. While the number and the proportion of immigrants are increasing, there has been a corresponding increase in the total number of immigrants getting citizenship. Figure 2.1 shows a multifold increase in new citizens in the 1990s

FIGURE 2.1  Number of immigrants naturalized in the United States from 1970 to 2010

Source: USDHS (2012) Yearbook of Immigration Statistics 2011, table 20–­1.

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THE ROAD TO CITIZENSHIP

and 2000s. In the 2000s alone, over seven million immigrants became American citizens. The upward trend in naturalization numbers is not surprising given the increasing number of immigrants: there are simply more immigrants in the country to apply for and obtain citizenship today than there were thirty years ago. Although the number of new citizens is increasing, the share of naturalized among the foreign-­born population is actually on the decline.1 In other words, the chances that any given immigrant holds American citizenship were higher in the 1970s than today. According to Census data presented in figure 2.2, only about 40 percent of immigrants were citizens in the 1990s and 2000s, while more than 60 percent were naturalized in the 1970s. Perhaps this can be explained by low levels of immigration in the 1970s. If few new immigrants were arriving, and the immigrants that were already in the United States had lived there for a long time, they would have had more time to gain citizenship. By contrast, in the 1990s and 2000s the high numbers of new arrivals resulted in a pool of immigrants who have not been in the country for a long time, and thus may not have had the opportunity to become citizens yet. The decade of arrival is a good predictor of naturalization, with the most recently arrived immigrants exhibiting the lowest levels of citizenship. However, the influx of a large number of new immigrants in the late twentieth century is only part of the explanation for the falling proportion of the naturalized among immigrants. In her book Becoming a Citizen, the sociologist Irene Bloemraad explores the declining naturalization rates, contrasting them to the much higher figures in Canada, and finds that this development cannot be explained by the massive influx of new immigrants alone. She calculates that

FIGURE 2.2  Percentage naturalized among foreign born, 1970 to 2010

Source: 1 percent Public Use Microdata Samples (PUMS) of the U.S. Census 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000; American Community Survey 1-­Year Estimate 2010.



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49

only a third of the decline in naturalization up to 1990 is due to the influx of new immigrants after 1965 (Bloemraad 2006, 28). In fact, from 1970 to 1990 there was a decrease in the rate of naturalization and a decline in naturalization for every origin group, even when disaggregated by their time of arrival. After 1990, the decline in the proportion of immigrants who were citizens leveled off, and there was even a slight reversal in the downward trend between 2000 and 2011. One explanation for the increased uptake of citizenship in the 2000s is immigrants’ reaction to the passage of 1996 legislation that made deportation easier and limited access to welfare benefits, as well as to the many local and state measures that created a hostile environment for immigrant residents. Although there is little evidence that immigrants applied for citizenship in order to hold on to welfare benefits, it does seem that they may have reacted to a punitive turn in immigration policy by seeking more secure rights (Balistreri and Van Hook 2004; Cort 2012; Van Hook, Brown, and Bean 2006). Many were also newly presented with the option to apply for citizenship when a mandatory program to replace green cards was instituted in 1996. The renewal of permanent residency cost nearly as much as applying for citizenship (Barreto, Ramirez, and Woods 2005). The slight upturn in citizenship between 1990 and 2011 notwithstanding, immigrants are naturalizing less now than in the 1970s and 1980s. Bloemraad (2006) blames the institutional system that organizes citizenship acquisition and does little to encourage, promote, or aid naturalization. The proportion naturalized among American immigrants is lower than in comparable countries of immigration, such as Canada (86%) and Australia (74%) (Statistics Canada 2013). It is also lower than in some European countries with very different immigration systems, including the Netherlands (73%), Sweden (73%), the United Kingdom (71%), France (62%), and Germany (59%) (Vink, Prokic-­ Breuer, and Dronkers 2013). I take not just the low proportion naturalized in the United States but also its decline as a troubling departure point, and turn my attention to how citizenship is distributed among immigrants. In the following section, I consider the growing disadvantage of the least educated immigrants in acquiring citizenship. The results point to alarming trends in inequality.

The Growing Disadvantage of the Least Educated Citizenship comes at a cost: to become a citizen, one spends a considerable amount of money and time. Although it might seem that the costs of citizenship are the same for everyone, they are more prohibitive for some than others. For instance, paying the current naturalization fee of $680 (before any fees to attorneys) can be out of reach for those employed in poorly paid, unskilled jobs. And as we saw in chapter 1, this cost has risen dramatically since the late

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THE ROAD TO CITIZENSHIP

1990s. In addition, the tests in civics, history, and English, while remaining largely unchanged, present a hurdle for those with low levels of education. So it is not entirely surprising to find, as figure 2.3 shows, that immigrants with the lowest levels of education (less than a high school degree) are the least likely to become citizens in recent decades. The lag of the least educated is in place despite the post-­1996 contingency of welfare benefits on citizenship, providing further evidence that immigrants do not seek citizenship in order to become eligible for these benefits (Balistreri and Van Hook 2004; Van Hook, Brown, and Bean 2006). There is no evidence of higher citizenship rates among the most disadvantaged after 1996. Figure 2.3 shows the percentage of foreign born in the U.S. Census who were citizens in 1970, 1980, 1990, and 2000, and an estimate of the same using the American Community Survey (ACS) in 2011. The figure does not show all foreign-­born residents of the United States. I exclude those immigrants who arrived as children, as naturalization decisions are likely to be quite different for immigrants who arrive at a young age, and many will get citizenship through their parents.2 I also exclude those who were younger than twenty-­ five at the time of the Census (or the ACS) to limit the number of people who acquire college education in the United States, and whose decisions about naturalization might differ as well. Finally, because the U.S. Census Bureau

FIGURE 2.3  Percentage naturalized among immigrants by level of education

Source: 1 percent Public Use Microdata Samples (PUMS) of the US Census from 1970, 1980, 1990, and 2000; 1 percent PUMS of the 2011 American Community Survey. Note: The sample is limited to immigrants who are aged at least twenty-­five and arrived in the United States between five and fifteen years prior to the census at age eighteen or higher.



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51

does not collect data on the timing of naturalization, I limit the data to immigrants who arrived in the United States between five and fifteen years prior to the Census (or the ACS). Unless they are married to citizens, immigrants are not eligible for citizenship until five years have passed. By limiting ourselves to recent residents (less than fifteen years in the country), we again minimize the risk of education being acquired after citizenship. If that were the case for a significant number of cases, it would be difficult to draw conclusions about the effect of the level of education on citizenship, since it could be that citizenship acquisition led to acquiring additional education instead.3 Having carefully considered these qualifications, we see that not only do the least educated immigrants lag behind in citizenship but the gap between this group and all other immigrants has grown drastically. If in 1970, immigrants with less than high school education were less than 5 percentage points behind immigrants with higher levels of education, the gap widened to 10 points in 1980. By 2011, the gap between different levels of education was at its largest yet. The least educated immigrants were 13 percentage points behind those with high school diplomas, and almost 25 percentage points behind people with some college education or above. In other words, the incidence of citizenship has become more unequally distributed over time. This happened despite the fact that millions of undocumented immigrants who had become legal residents as part of the 1986 IRCA amnesty started to swell the ranks of those applying for citizenship in the 1990s (Massey and Bartley 2005). Many of these immigrants had very low levels of education, and thus we might have seen an increase in citizenship among the least educated, especially because programs were established to assist them in learning English and American history and civics. Figure 2.3 presents only bivariate results, or the relationship between level of education and the proportion naturalized in five separate years. I also conducted a more complex set of analyses, simultaneously considering a large number of variables. The results of these analyses can be found by interested readers in the appendix. Here, I will simply summarize the findings. I find that, controlling for factors such as age, time in the United States, sex, and marital status, having less than a high school education is associated with a reduction in the odds of citizenship of 35 percent compared to high school graduates. The biggest drop in odds of citizenship occurred between the 1970 and 1980 Census waves (see also Aptekar 2014). A shortcoming of the Census data is the inability to identify and exclude undocumented immigrants, who are not eligible for citizenship. Thus, it is possible that the increasingly low proportion of citizens among those with less than high school education, both in absolute terms and relative to other groups, is due to the presence of this disproportionately unskilled population.

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It is estimated that over half of undocumented migrants in the United States come from Mexico. Another large source of undocumented immigrants is Central America (Passel 2006). Figure 2.4 is a replica of figure 2.3, except I have taken out immigrants from Mexico and Central America to explore the possibility that my results are affected by the presence of the undocumented in the Census data. One notable difference apparent in figure 2.4 is that the citizenship penalty experienced by those who lack high school education decreased between 1990 and 2011 after immigrants most likely to be undocumented were excluded. This indicates that the undocumented could very well have been depressing the odds of citizenship for the unskilled in that time period. On the other hand, the population of undocumented migrants grew most rapidly in the 1990s and was much smaller in the 1970s and 1980s (Passel 2006). Yet the dramatic declines in the proportion naturalized happened in the 1970s and the 1980s, and not when the undocumented population mushroomed in the 1990s. Therefore, the inclusion of the undocumented in the Census cannot be the entire explanation for the declining odds of citizenship among immigrants with the lowest levels of education. Although the gap between the least educated immigrants and other immigrants can be partially attributed to the presence of undocumented immigrants who are

FIGURE 2.4  Percentage naturalized by year and level of education, excluding immigrants from Mexico and Central America

Source: 1 percent Public Use Microdata Samples (PUMS) of the U.S. Census from 1970, 1980, 1990, and 2000; 1 percent PUMS of the 2011 American Community Survey. Note: The sample is limited to immigrants who are aged at least twenty-­five and arrived in the United States between five and fifteen years prior to the census at age eighteen or higher.



C itizenship and I nequality

53

not eligible for citizenship, there is nevertheless strong evidence of an increasing citizenship disadvantage among those with lower levels of schooling. The overall low incidence of citizenship among American immigrants hides additional patterns of inequality that map onto the existing system of stratification. The already disadvantaged unskilled immigrants are increasingly less likely to be American citizens, suffering lack of access to the rights, representation, security, and job and educational opportunities that citizenship brings. Granted, many American citizens, immigrant and native-­born, face crippling poverty, social and political marginalization, and limited opportunities. Nevertheless, being an American citizen at least holds the potential of inclusion, and it does provide a measure of legal protections that represent a more secure position in the United States. The process of naturalization works to consolidate advantage along a class-­based gradient that more widely characterizes the distribution of privilege in American society.

Citizenship among the Highly Educated While the least educated immigrants are falling increasingly behind in becoming citizens, interesting patterns have emerged for those at the top of the distribution. In figure 2.3, the college educated have either almost the same proportion of naturalized among them as those with some college education, or actually lower, with the exception of one year, 1980. While there is an increasing penalty in citizenship acquisition for the least educated immigrants, completed college education does not carry much of a premium. In other words, citizenship and level of education intersect unevenly. This is puzzling for several reasons. Immigrants with college education face lower barriers to citizenship than immigrants with less education, since they are more likely to speak better English, know how to negotiate the complex immigration system, and have more resources for filing applications and completing the necessary requirements. In fact, a positive relationship between socioeconomic status—­of which education is one component—­and citizenship has been amply documented.4 More educated immigrants are also in a better position to take advantage of an American passport by traveling internationally for business or pleasure. Results of multivariate analysis presented in the appendix indicate that, controlling for a range of factors, the premium for a completed college education is lower than that for some college education. In fact, a college education is associated with only 7 percent higher odds of being a citizen than a high school education. Figure 2.5 shows the percentage naturalized by detailed level of education among the foreign born in the 2011. Unlike figure 2.3, this allows us to distinguish between bachelor’s degrees, master’s degrees, professional degrees such as MD and MBA, and doctoral degrees. As before, the figure includes only recent

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THE ROAD TO CITIZENSHIP

FIGURE 2.5  Percentage naturalized among immigrants in the United States by

detailed level of education, 2011 Source: 2011 American Community Survey. Note: The sample is limited to immigrants who are aged at least twenty-­five and arrived in the United States between five and fifteen years prior at age eighteen or higher.

immigrants who immigrated as adults. Those with bachelor’s degrees have the highest proportion naturalized at 45 percent, closely followed by immigrants with professional degrees, at 43 percent. Immigrants with master’s degrees have somewhat lower levels of naturalization at 39 percent. Only a quarter of immigrants with the highest level of education, PhD, have naturalized, which is less than high school graduates.5 Thus, it seems that the relationship between level of education and citizenship is not linear. The least educated immigrants may have the lowest likelihood of being citizens, but the highest levels of education are not associated with the highest chances of being a citizen. Just as the presence of undocumented immigrants who are not eligible for citizenship in the Census data may lower the proportion of naturalized among the least educated, there is a similar problem for the most educated. U.S. Census data include temporary, highly skilled immigrants who are not eligible for naturalization. In fact, there was an influx of these workers in the late 1990s, when the high-­tech boom resulted in increased quotas for temporary worker visas (Batalova 2006; Usdansky and Espenshade 2001). Thus, the inclusion of immigrants not eligible for naturalization in the data is probably responsible for some of the lower figures among the most highly educated. Another likely and probably concurrent explanation has to do with the rise of a globalized elite uninterested in American citizenship. Returns to advanced



C itizenship and I nequality

55

education have increased over time, and those with high levels of human capital may view migration as a less permanent strategy than in the past, either reversible through return home or remigration elsewhere in the world where one’s credentials fetch a high price (Massey and Akresh 2006). Consequently, some highly skilled immigrants may be less likely to apply for citizenship because they associate it with permanent settlement, and because it may hinder their property and earning prospects elsewhere.

Income, Race, and Country of Origin Level of education is an important stratifying element in the distribution of citizenship status among immigrants in the United States, but other social divisions are implicated as well. Other axes of difference intersect with citizenship, including income (the other common measure of socioeconomic status), race, and country of origin. To investigate the relationship between citizenship status and income, I distinguish between incomes that are below the poverty line, 101–­200 percent of the poverty line, 201–­300 percent of the poverty line, or three times the poverty line and higher. In 2010, the poverty line for an individual was $10,830 and $22,040 for a family of four (USDHHS 2010). Figure 2.6 shows the difference between immigrants with different income levels. Note that as with most figures in this chapter, only recent immigrants who came as adults are included.

FIGURE 2.6  Percentage naturalized by income

Source: 2011 American Community Survey. Note: The sample is limited to immigrants who are aged at least twenty-­five and arrived in the United States between five and fifteen years prior at age eighteen or higher.

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In line with my findings about level of education, there is a positive relationship between income level and the chances of being a naturalized citizen. Immigrants whose incomes were below poverty level were half as likely to have acquired citizenship than immigrants whose incomes were three times the poverty level or higher. In this way, the distribution of citizenship exacerbates socioeconomic inequality, with the most disadvantaged residents lacking access to the right to vote or protection from deportation. Multivariate analysis presented in the appendix shows that an additional dollar of total yearly income is associated with 1.4 percent higher odds of citizenship, controlling for other factors. No analysis of stratification in the United States would be complete without addressing race. Race has long been a powerful axis of inequality across multiple domains, from educational attainment to income, contact with the criminal justice system and family formation. How do immigration and citizenship play out within the American racial system? Do immigrants of color, particularly black immigrants from Africa or Latin America, have lower citizenship uptake than other immigrants? Figure 2.7 compares the proportion naturalized among different racial/ ethnic groups, distinguishing between white and black Hispanics and white and black non-­Hispanics. What is clear from this table is that the lowest levels of naturalization are observed among Hispanic immigrants. Hispanic ethnicity

FIGURE 2.7  Race/ethnicity and percentage naturalized

Source: 2011 American Community Survey. Note: The sample is limited to immigrants who are aged at least twenty-­five and arrived in the United States between five and fifteen years prior at age eighteen or higher.



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seems to matter more than race when it comes to citizenship. Most Hispanic immigrants face a hostile context of reception in the United States, which makes it less likely that they will either seek citizenship or are able to overcome the hurdles in acquiring it (Portes and Rumbaut 1996). In addition, most undocumented immigrants who would be captured by the Census but are not eligible for naturalization would also be Hispanic. At the same time, a Pew Research Center analysis of Current Population Survey data shows that two-­thirds of Mexican immigrants who are legal residents have not naturalized (Gonzalez-­Barrera et al. 2013). With Mexicans being the largest Hispanic immigrant group in the United States, this indicates that access to the privileges of citizenship is particularly low among Hispanic immigrants who are eligible to become citizens. Meanwhile, there are only small differences in proportion naturalized among white, non-­Hispanic immigrants, black, non-­Hispanic immigrants, and Asian immigrants. Note that immigrants who did not classify themselves in these major categories (many of whom are also Hispanic) have low naturalization levels as well. Low naturalization levels among Hispanic immigrants have serious consequences for individual and family access to full citizenship rights, employment opportunities, and the social safety net. But it is also worrisome for Hispanics in general: with so many Hispanic immigrants lacking the right to vote, the political influence of this ethno-­racial group falls far short of its potential. The lack of representation particularly affects immigrants, whose interests have to be represented by the small proportion of Hispanic immigrants who have naturalized or are native-­born Hispanics. Thus, naturalization works as a mechanism of exclusion that exacerbates the racist and xenophobic backlash against Hispanics and Hispanic immigrants in the United States. A different way to approach this problem is to consider naturalization among immigrants from different countries. Country of origin can serve as a marker of race and ethnicity that structures the experience of an immigrant once in the United States, including the path to naturalization. In addition, differences in naturalization rates among different immigrant groups could be explained using the concept of reversibility (Bloemraad 2006; Bueker 2006; Portes and Mozo 1985). Immigrants from far-­away countries, or countries with repressive regimes, especially refugees, are more likely to become citizens because it is more difficult for them to return or imagine returning to their home countries. In contrast, immigrants who come to the United States from Mexico and Canada have lower citizenship rates than other groups partly due to the relative ease with which they can “reverse” their immigrant status. Figure 2.8 shows the proportion naturalized for selected source countries of immigrants. There are drastic differences in the proportion of immigrants who have acquired citizenship between countries of origin. As predicted by

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FIGURE 2.8  Percentage naturalized by major country of origin

Source: 2011 American Community Survey. Note: The sample is limited to immigrants who are aged at least twenty-­five and arrived in the United States between five and fifteen years prior at age eighteen or higher.

the reversibility thesis, immigrants from the nearby countries of Guatemala, Mexico, and El Salvador have the lowest levels of citizenship. Meanwhile immigrants from the Philippines and Vietnam have the highest levels of citizenship. The difference between Vietnam and Guatemala is tenfold. Although this may seem to corroborate the reversibility thesis, reality is more complicated. For instance, many Salvadoran immigrants in the United States have had a difficult time obtaining refugee status, despite having escaped a bloody civil war; many are undocumented or live on temporary permits that make them ineligible for citizenship. Many also have low levels of education and face hostile contexts of reception as Hispanic immigrants. So it is not that they do not naturalize because it is easy for them to return to El Salvador, but that they face barriers to citizenship (Coutin 2003). The Vietnamese who arrived since 1996 are most likely to be family members of refugees who entered the United States in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Rather than difficulty in reversing migration, high levels of citizenship among this group reflect better access to citizenship through possession of a legal permanent resident status and the resources of a coethnic community with high naturalization rates. The reversibility hypothesis would predict that Canadian immigrants would have very low uptake of citizenship, but, in fact, adult Canadian immigrants who migrated to the United States recently are more likely to be naturalized than Mexican immigrants.



C itizenship and I nequality

59

These examples show the complex realities of citizenship acquisition by particular origin groups: it is important to consider barriers faced in the United States, and not simply the ease with which immigrants could return. The reversibility thesis is further undermined by research indicating that citizenship acquisition can actually be a means to increased transnational activity by easing travel to and contacts with the home country, as well as improved capacity to influence the foreign policy of the American government (Gilbertson and Singer 2003; Karpathakis 1999). Thus, there may not be a straightforward relationship between citizenship acquisition and distance from the home country or the repressiveness of its regime. Note also the variability in citizenship levels among Asian immigrants: immigrants from Korea and China have much lower chances of being citizens than immigrants from Vietnam and Philippines, with Indian immigrants in between. These statistics help correct the common lumping of all Asian Americans into one category. As the proportion of naturalized immigrants declined in the United States, citizenship status and the benefits it conveys came to be more unequally distributed. Most notably, between 1970 and 2011, as levels of citizenship fell across the board, the least educated fell further and further behind everyone else. This cannot be explained solely by the presence of undocumented immigrants ineligible for citizenship. Not surprisingly, higher income is also associated with higher likelihood of citizenship. The patterns of naturalization intersect with patterns of racial stratification, with Hispanic immigrants having some of the lowest levels of citizenship. The growing disparities in who becomes an American citizen are a part of the greater American story of rising economic inequality, increasing prevalence of contingent labor, relative dearth of social mobility, and an expanding and racialized mass incarceration system. The process of naturalization contributes to and intersects with these societal trends by sorting immigrants by socioeconomic status and race. USCIS has begun directly promoting citizenship acquisition, which may increase the rates of citizenship among the most disadvantaged. Despite some post-­9/11 delays in application processing, the number of naturalized continued to be high in the 2000s (USDHS 2009). The same period, however, saw the development of a new and more rigorous naturalization test. Aside from raising the citizenship hurdle for those with low levels of education, this test is indicative of the ongoing anxiety about the “cheapening” of citizenship expressed by conservative politicians and activists who believe the test is too easy (Preston 2007). In addition, naturalization fees increased from a $60 in 1989 to $680 in 2008 (Gelatt and McHugh 2007). Thus, it seems unlikely that current American policies toward citizenship will adequately reverse the dismal levels of naturalization and the inequalities hidden within these statistics.

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THE ROAD TO CITIZENSHIP

Concern about the consequences of extremely low levels of naturalization and the compounded disadvantage of the least educated and those from Latin America should outweigh anxiety over maintaining high boundaries around citizenship. For guidance in lowering inequality and raising citizenship rates, the United States does not have to look farther than its northern neighbor. Not only are Canadian citizenship rates much higher than in the United States but the distribution of citizenship across levels of education is far more equal. The United States could raise naturalization rates, especially among the disadvantaged segments of the immigrant population, by replicating some of the Canadian programs promoting citizenship and assisting in the naturalization process through English and civics classes. Those who worry about lowering citizenship boundaries should be reassured by findings that, despite lower barriers to citizenship, new immigrant Canadian citizens have more active understandings of citizenship and a more positive attitude toward their host country than new citizens in the United States (Aptekar 2010).

3 Voices of Immigrants

Citizenship status matters to immigrants because it confers political membership, protects them from deportation, and carries other benefits with tangible material consequences. It also has the potential to increase the power of ethnic and immigrant groups. But naturalization of immigrants is important for the nation as a whole. Nations are more than geographical areas covering the planet in a checkerboard of borders; they are premised on the idea of the correspondence of a people to a polity, defined by difference, boundaries, and processes of exclusion from their neighbors. By definition, then, immigration threatens the nation by introducing an influx of foreigners who break that correspondence and violate the premises of a system of bounded nations (Joppke 1999). Here is where naturalization comes in: it is a process that can turn foreigners into members, reproducing the nation. In the previous chapter, we saw that many immigrants, particularly Hispanic immigrants and those with low levels of education, do not have access to the benefits of citizenship, casting a shadow on the potential of naturalization to reproduce the nation. What about immigrants who do become citizens? Are their understandings of naturalization compatible with the reproduction of the nation, or are they naturalizing for the “wrong” reasons? In this chapter, I present the voices of immigrants transitioning from foreigners to official members of the nation. How do these immigrants describe citizenship and its acquisition? Do they find its meaning fundamentally connected to membership, belonging, and identity? If so, naturalization certainly works to reproduce the nation, creating new citizen members attached to their new country. In fact, many native-­born citizens take it for granted that citizenship in their country is something eagerly sought out by immigrants; they often think of citizenship as a privilege for which immigrants exchange steadfast allegiance

61

62

THE ROAD TO CITIZENSHIP

(Aleinikoff 2000). This traditional view presumes that citizenship connects loyal citizens to their country. At the same time, there is also anxiety about immigrants’ motivations: Are they naturalizing for material gain instead of out of love and loyalty? Immigration critics worry that naturalization for the “wrong” reasons undermines the very institution of American citizenship (Honig 2001). This worry about citizenship acquisition for instrumental reasons is a historical constant, inflamed most recently after welfare benefits were tied to citizenship status in the late 1990s. The new rules were accompanied by an upswing in the number of naturalizations (Foner 2001). Critics feared that social reproduction of the nation would be undermined if immigrants sought citizenship for instrumental reasons, such as access to benefits. Studies of trends in citizenship acquisition and welfare utilization counter such claims (Van Hook, Brown, and Bean 2006), but how new citizens themselves understand naturalization is an empirical question and one that has received scant attention (Kivisto 2007). Do immigrants naturalize for instrumental reasons and, if so, is that incompatible with an attachment to the United States? The worry that immigrants are naturalizing instrumentally is ironic, because the United States, itself, uses naturalization instrumentally. For instance, the liberalization of naturalization restrictions has often been tied to the needs of the American military, from the Civil War to the present, when the promise of citizenship is used in recruiting soldiers for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (Amaya 2013; Schneider 2011). The acquisition of American citizenship may affect immigrants’ ability to hold on to their previous citizenships. Do new citizens view American citizenship as compatible with continual attachment to their home countries? Such split loyalties may appear problematic for the development of strong ties to the host country. However, existing research shows that immigrants who come from countries that allow, or even encourage, dual nationality are more likely to become American citizens and be involved in American politics than immigrants who would not be able to maintain such binational ties upon naturalization (Jones-­Correa 1998). Loyalty to sending countries and transnational practices do not necessarily preclude immigrants from connecting citizenship to membership and belonging in the United States. There is evidence that some groups of immigrants, especially the globalized elite, transcend the system of nation-­states in their beliefs and actions. These individuals treat citizenship as a mere formality and naturalize to reduce the annoyances of international travel and relocation, without necessarily having plans to settle in the United States permanently (Massey and Akresh 2006). Or they do not naturalize at all because their previous citizenships—­perhaps in the European Union or Canada—­allow them to accommodate their lifestyle preferences sufficiently. I showed evidence of lower rates of naturalization among the highly skilled in chapter 2. In addition, some immigrants view themselves as



V oices of I mmigrants

63

transcending national membership, instead pointing at belonging in nonnational entities. Perhaps their loyalty is foremost to a diasporic ethnic group, or to a supranational entity such the European Union, or to pan-­African nationalism. Would making such postnational immigrants into American citizens render naturalization meaningless? To answer these questions, we must listen to new citizens themselves as they discuss their acquisition of citizenship.1 In what follows, I review existing research on immigrants’ motivations in acquiring citizenship. Drawing on interviews and surveys of immigrants, scholars have found a mix of reasons for naturalizing, and variation by immigrant group. Results of my own interviews also reveal a mix of motivations for naturalizing. However, my methodology allows me to move beyond the standard benefits of citizenship as reasons for naturalization, and show that many immigrants conceptualize citizenship as a normal step toward settling down in the United States. This is the case despite the fact that immigrants do not necessarily connect citizenship itself to membership, belonging, and identity, and emphasize that it is the process of building a life in the United States that makes them American. I show that this understanding of citizenship is compatible with the reproduction of the nation through naturalization, even as it contradicts common narratives of citizenship acquisition as a significant transition that leads to belonging.

Mixed Motivations There are many more quantitative studies of factors associated with acquisition of citizenship than studies of immigrants’ motivations and understandings of the naturalization process. Existing research shows that immigrants can exhibit a mixture of instrumental and affective reasons for seeking citizenship, naturalizing pragmatically while also thinking about the rights and responsibilities that come with American citizenship. In one study of immigrants’ own understandings of naturalization, the anthropologist Caroline Brettell (2006) interviewed newcomers from El Salvador, India, Nigeria, and Vietnam residing in the Dallas–­Fort Worth area. For these immigrants, citizenship was both about the benefits they would be gaining and their identities. For instance, Brettell found that Asian Indian immigrants naturalized because they were settled in the United States, wanted to show commitment to the United States, and were interested in sponsoring the migration of family members. Nigerian respondents were highly interested in the travel benefits of citizenship, but also had a high level of interest in voting. For some Indian respondents, naturalization was an emotionally laden transition; this was much less so for Vietnamese immigrants (Brettell 2006). These findings indicate that seeking citizenship for ostensibly instrumental reasons, such as sponsoring family migration or easing

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travel, is compatible with understanding citizenship as affiliation, membership, and belonging. Similarly, in a study by the anthropologist Luis Plascencia (2012), Mexican immigrants taking citizenship classes said that they wanted to become citizens in order to sponsor the migration of a relative, become a full member of society, and vote. Plascencia shows that national membership had a concrete and specific meaning for some of these immigrants, and entailed acceptance as equals in their communities and workplaces. Acquiring citizenship was disappointing to immigrants when they continued to be treated as exploitable foreigners despite their formal membership in the nation (Plascencia 2012). In her book on naturalization in Canada and the United States, the sociologist Irene Bloemraad (2006) examined how Portuguese and Vietnamese immigrants understood citizenship. She found that for many, acquiring American citizenship meant receiving a set of legal rights. They also thought that naturalization would bring full economic membership. However, few immigrants in Bloemraad’s American portion of the study had a sense of political citizenship predicated on a set of obligations between citizen and state. This was in contrast to Canada, where such a mutual relationship was central to immigrants’ understanding of citizenship (Bloemraad 2006). In a later study of immigrant parents and their American-­born children, Bloemraad (2013) found that those who were naturalized associated citizenship with civic inclusion as well as practical benefits, such as protection against deportation and the ability to sponsor the migration of family members. For some disadvantaged and stigmatized immigrants, naturalization may not spell membership, belonging, or identity at all. In a study of an extended family of Dominican immigrants in New York, the sociologist Greta Gilbertson found that naturalization can be sought in order to facilitate transnational lifestyles. The subjects of the study did not naturalize out of a growing sense of belonging to the United States or a desire to be fuller members of the national community. Instead, Gilbertson argues that American citizenship was employed by these immigrants as a form of resistance against state control. They resisted dominant discourse that cast them as undeserving immigrants, and sought naturalization to facilitate extended travel to the Dominican Republic, to maintain access to social benefits upon eventual return migration, and defensively, as a reaction to the criminalization of legal permanent residents (Gilbertson 2004). In the American context, people who go through the naturalization process are immigrants born outside of the United States. In many European countries, however, children of immigrants do not get automatic citizenship, and, particularly in the case of non-­European origin people, they face discrimination and prejudice as foreigners. In the Netherlands, Dutch-­born children of immigrants can go through an expedited naturalization process once they turn eighteen.



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As reported by the anthropologist Oskar Verkaaik (2010), even as they opt to obtain citizenship, these young people feel resentful about their experience of exclusion from Dutch society, sometimes disrupting their naturalization ceremonies. In Austria, where citizenship for children born in Austria to immigrant parents is also not automatic, immigrants sometimes naturalize in order to pass on citizenship to their children (Street 2013).2 In Germany, naturalization rates declined after automatic citizenship was extended to most children born to immigrants in Germany, because the incentive to pass on citizenship to children had been removed (Street 2014). Children born in the United States get automatic citizenship, and minor children of immigrants born outside of the United States get citizenship when their parents naturalize. Nevertheless, the fraught naturalization experience of the Dutch second-­generation can be viewed as a more extreme version of the resistive and defensive naturalization that Gilbertson (2004) reports for Dominican immigrants, an American immigrant group that experiences marginalization and criminalization. The literature does not provide a simple answer to why immigrants become citizens. It points to the complexity of naturalization for immigrants, with multiple intertwined motivations and ideas. In this chapter, I present the findings of my research with new citizens. Unlike the studies described above, mine relies on interviews with immigrants who have literally minutes before successfully completed their citizenship interviews, rather than immigrants at various stages in the process or those who have naturalized long ago or not at all. This allowed me to examine the understandings of citizenship among those who are successfully acquiring it. My interviews with immigrant citizens marshal two imperatives: (1) considering the extent to which immigrants naturalize for the ostensibly wrong reasons rather than as an expression of their attachment to the United States, and (2) examining whether the meanings immigrants attach to naturalization and citizenship are compatible with naturalization as a mechanism of social reproduction. In other words, are critics correct to fear the cheapening of American citizenship? Do immigrants connect their newly acquired citizenship to membership and belonging? These questions contribute to our understanding of the role of immigration in the construction of the American nation, particularly by shedding light on the mechanisms by which foreigners are turned into members. Like other researchers, I find a mix of motivations for becoming a citizen. My contribution, however, is to show that even naturalizing for what at first glance appears to be instrumental reasons can actually signal attachment to the United States and interest in full membership. Moreover, beyond specific benefits of citizenship, immigrants explain naturalization as a commonsense step toward building a life in the United States. I find evidence of defensive naturalization, with citizenship providing a measure of security for immigrants at a

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THE ROAD TO CITIZENSHIP

time of general encroachment on immigrant rights. I also find that many people claim a strong sense of belonging and membership in their adopted country while resisting the assumption that it is formal American citizenship that led them to feel that attachment. It is not necessarily the formal induction into citizenship that makes immigrants belong, but the everyday long-­term experience of working, studying, and raising a family in the United States.

Interviews with Immigrants In order to learn about immigrants’ decisions to become American citizens, I conducted interviews with immigrants completing the naturalization process. Over a period of four months in late 2007 and early 2008, I talked to seventy-­ two people in the waiting room of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services field office in southern New Jersey. I did not speak with immigrants who were waiting to be called for their interviews, many of whom were busy reviewing the list of one hundred questions for the last time or whispering with their attorneys. Instead, I approached people who came out having passed their citizenship interviews.3 The only thing separating these immigrants from American citizenship was the oath ceremony. For many, it would take place later the same day. Everyone who acquires citizenship in southern New Jersey has to pass through this particular waiting room. Conducting research there instead of finding new citizens through community organizations or friendship and family ties, which are common strategies in other studies (e.g., Brettell 2006; Gilbertson and Singer 2003), allowed me to speak with a wider range of naturalizing immigrants. Even though it is tempting to speculate on the representativeness of this set of cases, or “sample,” I follow sociologist Mario Small in avoiding the fallacy of using quantitative research concepts that are a poor fit for interview-­ based studies (Small 2009). The collection of cases that I examine in this chapter helps answer some of the “how” and “why” questions about naturalization, as well as shedding light on the cultural schemas that organize people’s thinking about citizenship. Each interview lasted five to ten minutes and was recorded. I first asked immigrants to reflect on their decisions to become a citizen: Please tell me how you decided to become a citizen. What were you thinking when you decided to naturalize? I also asked them to consider what citizenship acquisition meant to them. Depending on responses, I prompted respondents with more targeted questions: Did you think it would be easier to travel when you decided to apply for citizenship? Do you think getting citizenship makes you more American? Does being a citizen make you feel more secure?4 At the end of the interviews, I gathered basic demographic information, such as age, level of education, and family status. The response rate was 79 percent. In an attempt to reduce social



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desirability bias, I assured respondents of anonymity and told them that I was a naturalized citizen myself.5 It must be noted that fieldwork took place during a heated presidential primary season. The USCIS waiting room where interviews were conducted had a television tuned to CNN, which quite often showed stories about this election. Thus, respondents may have been more likely to think of politics, elections, and voting when asked about their reasons for naturalizing. Table 3.1 presents selected descriptive characteristics of this set of interviews. Half of the respondents came from Asia, with India and the Philippines being the largest source countries. A comparison of the distribution of source countries and regions with data on immigrants naturalized in New Jersey and the country as a whole in 2007 shows that the population of subjects in my study included more Indian, Filipino, Canadian, Greek, Central American, and Ukrainian immigrants, and fewer Chinese, Korean, Ecuadorian, and other South American immigrants than was the average for the state (Office of Immigration Statistics 2008). New Jersey has a much higher proportion of naturalizing immigrants from India than the nation as a whole, and far fewer new citizens born in Mexico. An exclusive focus on immigrants from southern New Jersey and selection bias are likely explanations for the discrepancies. As is true of all immigrants to the United States, most of the immigrants interviewed for this book arrived through family reunification provisions. That means that family members already residing in the United States as permanent residents or citizens, or just then migrating as permanent residents, were able to sponsor their migration. Some said that they arrived in the United States by marrying an American citizen or a permanent resident. Other interviewees arrived on various visas, including work visas and student visas. A few people won green cards in the diversity lottery, and a few others did not wish to discuss details of their entry. I interviewed people with a wide range of educational achievement: a quarter with a high school education or less, slightly more than that with some college education, and another quarter with a college education. An additional 18 percent of the total had advanced degrees. Most immigrants that I spoke with had arrived in the United States as young adults between eighteen and thirty-­four years old. Two-­thirds were relatively recent arrivals, having lived in the United States for less than fifteen years. In 2007 and 2008, when interviews were conducted, the age of the vast majority of those I interviewed fell between eighteen and fifty-­four. There were slightly more male respondents than female respondents. Interviews with naturalizing immigrants provide a rich source of material. I start by discussing how respondents decided to apply for citizenship. I note the reasons for naturalizing volunteered by respondents answering open-­ ended questions, as well as the subsequent and more specific prompts about

TABLE 3.1.

Respondent characteristics Region of origin

Number of respondents

Asia

Percent of total

37

51

Africa

5

7

Former USSR

3

4

Europe

5

7

Canada

4

6

Caribbean

7

9

Latin America

10

14

Oceania

1

1

Mode of entry Refugee

3

4

34

47

Student

7

10

Professional/H1B

6

8

Diversity lottery

4

6

Marriage

8

11

Family reunification

Work visa

3

4

Other visa

2

3

Unknown

5

7

High school or less

18

25

Some college

20

28

College

19

26

College plus

13

18

Unknown

2

3

Education

Came as a minor

15

21

Came as 18–­34-year-old

37

51

Came as 35+ years old

14

19

In country