This section is, far and away, the most important section in the Bill as it provides for the main source of citizenship—birth in Ireland. It also provides that citizenship, when established, may descend through the blood of either the father or mother. For a full understanding, its provisions must be read in conjunction with the provisions of Section 7 which require formalities to be complied with in certain cases.
As a preliminary, it is necessary to refer to the corresponding provisions of existing law governing the acquisition of citizenship — that is the law contained in Article 3 of the 1922 Constitution and Section 2 of the Act of 1955 which is paraphrased in pages 3 and 4 of the Explanatory Memorandum circulated with the Bill.
In relation to persons born before 6th December, 1922, existing law makes no provision for citizenship in the case of considerable overseas populations of the Irish race who were born, or whose immediate forefathers were born in Ireland. In Australia, Britain, Canada, the U.S.A. and elsewhere, there are large numbers of persons who emigrated from Ireland before 6th December, 1922, and who did not have a domicile in Ireland on that date. They are not citizens under Article 3 of the 1922 Constitution. And for one reason or another—unawareness, perhaps, of the registration provisions of Section 2 (4) of the Act of 1935, or because they are prohibited by being naturalised citizens of their country of residence—they have not become Irish citizens by registration. Only 4,409 persons have registered since 1935 and their sons and daughters, children of direct Irish stock, are not Irish citizens and could only become Irish citizens by coming to live in Ireland and taking out naturalisation papers.
As regards persons born since 6th December, 1922, the provisions of Section 2 of the 1935 Act which govern their citizenship seem to us to be defective in many respects. While citizenship is provided for by birth in the Twenty-Six Counties, birth in the Six Counties is treated the same as birth in any alien land; furthermore, the provision that a person born outside the Twenty-Six counties of an Irish father born outside the Twenty-Six Counties can acquire citizenship by registration only within two years of birth seems unduly restrictive; and derivation of citizenship through the father, in disregard of the mother, does not commend itself to us.
Section 6 of this Bill (as qualified by Section 7) proposes to rectify that position. If it is enacted into law, every living person born in any part of the 32 Counties before 6th December, 1922, will be an Irish citizen from birth; every living person born outside the 32 Counties whose father or mother was born in any part of the 32 Counties before 6th December, 1922, will be an Irish citizen; every living person who is the grandchild of a person born in any part of the 32 Counties prior to 6th December, 1922, will be an Irish citizen—provided that where the person and his or her parents are all born outside the 32 Counties citizenship is conditional on registration.
That is how we propose that citizenship will originate in and flow from persons born before 6th December, 1922. The vast majority of persons living in any part of the 32 Counties, to-day, will almost certainly be covered by this new umbrella of citizenship. And their children born outside Ireland will be citizens by descent and so on into future generations.
But, in addition to the line of citizenship flowing from our pre-1922 stock, Section 6 makes provision for citizenship which originates by birth in the Twenty-Six County State and is transmitted from either the Irish father or Irish mother to the children born abroad.
Furthermore, there is yet a third originating source of citizenship: where birth, without Irish ancestry, takes place in the Six Counties on or after 6th December, 1922 — that fact alone enables the person concerned to declare himself to be an Irish citizen, in which case his citizenship dates from his birth and is the citizenship of his children. Once citizenship is established in this way, it continues without formality of any kind through succeeding generations born in the Six Counties.
There are ways, apart from birth in the national territory, in which Irish citizenship may originate, such as the issue to a person of a certificate of citizenship, under Section 12, or a certificate of naturalisation under Section 18. The citizenship of the children born to such citizens is provided for in Section 6, which says that "every person is an Irish citizen if his father or mother was an Irish citizen at the time of that person's birth".
I think that our proposals in Section 6—as qualified in Section 7—are just and generous and that they will have the general approval of the House.
