Citizenship and Naturalization: The Constitutional Structure
U.S. citizenship before the Fourteenth Amendment was a contested category — the Constitution did not define it, Congress had not defined it by statute, and *Dred Scott* had held that some people born on U.S. soil could not be citizens. The 14th Amendment, ratified in 1868, supplied the definition: 'All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.' That single sentence created the dual federal/state structure modern citizenship operates under. The Slaughter-House Cases (1873) treated the structure as deliberate. 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(23) defines 'naturalization' broadly — 'the conferring of nationality of a state upon a person after birth, by any means whatsoever' — language that has carried doctrinal weight in some directions and not in others. This concept page lays out the structure; the operative-status question for federal-statute purposes is treated in a paired finding.
Jan 1, 0001