"While this Government does not for a moment question the right of that of Switzerland to attach such conditions as it may deem proper to the emigration of its citizens, and while it also admits that an American citizen who, while in Switzerland, commits an offense against the criminal laws of that country, may properly be held to answer for such offense before the courts of Switzerland, it cannot give its assent to a doctrine so fraught with danger to the rights of American citizens as that which holds that a citizen of the United States of Swiss nativity may be tried before the criminal courts of Switzerland for acts done or committed within the territories of the United States. That the matter for which Mr. Meyer was held criminally liable in Zurich, is not only not criminal in this country, but is authorized by its laws, simply aggravates this particular case.

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Had his act constituted an offense against the criminal code of the United States or against the laws of the State of New York, this Government would still hold that he was amenable for such offense in the courts of the United States, or of the State of New York, as the case might be, and in these courts only.

"The naturalization of an alien in the United States is the voluntary act of the party himself. Under the laws of the United States, the consent of the Government of the country of his origin is not made a condition of his admission to citizenship, and when he has once attained the character of a citizen of the United States, it is held by the Government and laws of the United States to adhere to him with its proper rights and privileges, not only within the United States, but in any foreign country in which he may be, not excepting the country of his nativity or origin."

Mr. Frelinghuysen, Sec. of State, to Mr. Cramer, min. to Switzerland,
No. 17, Dec. 19, 1882, MS. Inst. Switzerland, II. 157.
October 17, 1882, Mr. Cramer reported that he had received from the
Swiss Government an extract from the records of the courts of
appeal and cassation of the canton of Zurich, and also a copy of a
communication from the supreme court of the canton to the executive
council, dated September 16, 1882, by which it appeared that Mr.
Meyer had been found guilty and sentenced to a year's imprisonment.
Mr. Cramer stated that it further appeared from the last-mentioned
document that Mr. Meyer was held still to be a citizen of Swit-
zerland, because he had not surrendered the rights and privileges of
Swiss citizenship, and that the high federal council, in view of the
action of the courts, was unable to interfere in the case. It appears
that when the sentence was passed Mr. Meyer was not in Switzer-
land. (Mr. John Davis, Act. Sec. of State, to Mr. Bliss, Jan. 25,
1883, 145 MS. Dom. Let. 321.)

July 28, 1883, Mr. Cramer was instructed to call the attention of the Swiss
Government to the position of the United States with regard to the
protection of all its citizens abroad, whether native or naturalized,
and to say that the President expected and entertained the hope that
the Swiss Government would find means to relieve Mr. Meyer from

the sentence hanging over him, so that he might visit that country, whenever business called or inclination prompted him, with the same freedom from molestation as a citizen of Switzerland would enjoy in the United States. (Mr. Frelinghuysen, Sec. of State, to Mr. Cramer. min. to Switzerland, No. 47, July 28, 1883, MS. Inst. Switzerland. II. 187.) Subsequently, on a suggestion of Mr. Meyer's counsel that a renewal of the protests against the sentence might prove effectual, Mr. Frelinghuysen said: Observing that we do not admit the contention of Switzerland in the above case, I have to ask that any action warranted by previous instructions, and the circumstances, may be taken at the proper time. An understanding as to this class of cases is very desirable." (Mr. Frelinghuysen, Sec. of State, to Mr. Cramer, min. to Switzerland, No. 72, Jan. 24, 1884, MS. Inst. Switzerland, II. 207.)

66

Carl Heinrich Weber, of Zurich, born in 1845, emigrated to the United States in 1873. He was then, and afterwards continued to be, under guardianship in Switzerland. In 1879, having acquired American citizenship, he applied to the authorities of the canton of Zurich for his release from Swiss citizenship. His application was opposed by his sister and his guardian, as well as by the orphans' court of Zurich, and later by the city council of Zurich. The case was ultimately brought before the high federal court, which, while admitting that, as a question of principle, a ward could not legally change his domicil without his guardian's consent, found as a fact that Weber's change of domicil was made with his guardian's tacit consent, and requested the authorities of the canton of Zurich to release him from his cantonal and town citizenship.

For. Rel. 1889, 689–691.

"It will be necessary for you to assert your claim to property in Swit-
zerland through legal proceedings in its courts, in the course of which
you will be able to avail yourself of the foregoing precedent. If
such proceedings should be delayed or obstructed, especially on the
ground of your American citizenship, it would be proper for you to
communicate fully all the facts to this Department, which, upon
proof of your naturalization, would then take such action, if any,
as it properly might under the circumstances." (Mr. Foster, Sec.
of State, to Miss Füllemann, Dec. 20, 1892, 189 MS. Dom. Let. 503.)
See the case of Jacob Zimmermann, For. Rel. 1879, 973; For. Rel. 1880,
952.

In the case of Fred Tschudy, a native of Switzerland, who had been naturalized in the United States and, on his return to Switzerland, was ordered to report for military duty, the minister of the United States at Berne, while maintaining the views of his Government as to the right of expatriation, also argued that the provisions of Article II. of the treaty between the United States and Switzerland of 1850, exempting the citizens of one of the two countries,

residing or established in the other," from military service, should, in the absence of any qualification or explanation of the word "citizens," be held to include all citizens, whether native or naturalized, of either Government.

Mr. Broadhead, min. to Switzerland, to Mr. Lachenal, min. of foreign affairs, Aug. 17, 1894, For. Rel. 1894, 685.

See, also, Mr. Uhl, Act. Sec. of State, to Mr. Broadhead, min. to Switzerland, Sept. 12, 1894, For. Rel. 1894, 686, approving Mr. Broadhead's presentation of the matter.

"Each state is entirely free to regulate as it suits it the extent and effect of its right of citizenship, as well as the conditions upon which it can be acquired and lost. Then the legislation.in this matter provides expressly that a native-born Swiss can not lose it, by the fact even of having acquired a foreign nationality, but only when the interested party has renounced by a declaration in good and due form his quality as a Swiss citizen, and has obtained the authorization ad hoc of competent authority. (Constitution Federal, Art. 44, Federal Law of 3d July, 1876, arts. 6, 7, and 8.)

"The interpretation which you believe you are able to give to art. 2 of the treaty in support of the demand of Mr. Tschudy can not be admitted in this case. The principle which inspires that article (2) is found in effect in almost all the treaties of settlement concluded between Switzerland and many powers, and no state has ever pretended by that to benefit persons who possess a double right of citizenship.

"It is contrary to the law of nations that a foreign state should intervene in the relations of a state with one of its own subjects, and it is for that reason that if Mr. Tschudy, being in the United States, found himself in a conflict of some nature with the government of that country, the federal council would not believe that it had the power to interpose, and would not fail on the contrary to acknowledge the American nativity of the above named (l' indigénat Americain du susnommé). We can then but repeat that as long as Mr. Tschudy has not lost the quality of a Swiss citizen by a formal renunciation and admission by competent authority, he will not be authorized to avail himself in Switzerland of the quality of an American citizen and must remain submissive to the military obligations, or their equivalent, in force in his original country."

Mr. Lachenal, Swiss min. of for. aff., to Mr. Broadhead, Am. min., Sept. 10, 1894, enclosed with Mr. Broadhead's No. 55, Sept. 18, 1894, 29 MS. Desp. Switzerland.

There are no cantonal laws on the subject of military service in Switzerland. The cantonal authorities are authorized to enforce the federal laws, which, in regard to the renunciation of allegiance and military service, are supreme.

Mr. Broadhead, min. to Switzerland, to Mr. Olney, Sec. of State, No. 87,
Aug. 16, 1895, 29 MS. Desp. Switzerland.

With this dispatch Mr. Broadhead enclosed a translation of a synopsis
furnished him by the Military Department, August 7, 1895, of the
military laws of Switzerland so far as they relate to foreigners
residing in that country and to natives of Switzerland who may
have been naturalized abroad.

By this synopsis it appears that by paragraph 1, article 18, of the Swiss
Federal Constitution of May 27, 1874, every Swiss citizen is held to
military service. By the law of November 13, 1874, this service
begins at the age of twenty, and the obligation to serve lasts till
the end of the forty-fourth year. By article 1 of the law of June 28.
1878, every Swiss citizen of the requisite age, whether living in or
outside of Switzerland, who does not personally perform military
service, is subject to a compensatory tax, and foreigners established
in Switzerland are equally subject to this tax unless they are ex-
empted by international treaties or belong to a state in which Swiss
citizens are bound neither to military service nor to the payment
of an equivalent tax.

With the same dispatch Mr. Broadhead also enclosed printed copies in
French and German of a circular issued by the Swiss Federal Council,
July 19, 1894, to the Confederated States, concerning the tax for
exemption from military service of Swiss citizens living in the United
States and of citizens of the United States domiciled in Switzerland.
In this circular it is stated:

1. Swiss citizens who are established in the United States or who have
returned from that country to Switzerland are subject, from May 1,
1894, to the tax for exemption from military service, and are con-
sequently to be inscribed on the rolls of that tax unless they can
prove that they have paid a similar tax in the United States.

2. Citizens of the United States established in Switzerland are, according to the circular, exempt from the military tax, but they are to cease to enjoy that exemption whenever Swiss citizens established in the United States are subjected to the payment of a military tax.

Mr. Broadhead stated that, according to the decree of the Federal Council
of February 5, 1886, rule 1, as above stated, applied to Swiss citizens
whether they had been naturalized in the United States or not. This
decree reads as follows:

"1. The Swiss citizen who resides in a foreign country and is bound to
military service, or to pay a corresponding tax, whether because he
is likewise a citizen of that country, or for any other reason, is not
held to pay the military tax in Switzerland for the time during which,
residing in a foreign land, he has performed his military duties,
"2. On the contrary, the Swiss who is at the same time a citizen of a
foreign country, in which he is not bound by any military oath,
can not invoke his double nationality so as to dispense with the
payment of the military tax in Switzerland even for the time during
which he has sojourned in a foreign land.”

For correspondence in relation to the military tax prior to Mr. Broad-
head's No. 87 of August 16, 1895, see For. Rel. 1894, 678-682.

"I have to acknowledge the receipt of your dispatches, Nos. 75 and 76, of the 15th and 18th ultimo, having particular reference

to the case of Mr. F. A. Schneider,

who has been ordered

by the military commander of the district of Zurich to report immedi ately for physical examination and military duty.

"Mr. F. A. Schneider is, as you have previously reported in your dispatch, No. 45, of October 12, 1896, a native-born citizen of the United States, his father at the time of his birth being lawfully invested with the full and complete character of an American citizen by naturalization. Whatever may be advanced in a contrary sense as respects the dual status of a person acquiring another allegiance without the consent of the state of his origin, this Government can not for an instant admit that such a contention is applicable to the case of a native-born citizen. So far as the knowledge of this Department exists-over more than a century of intercourse with its Sovereign equals no such contention has been maintained by any other Government, and if suggested has been emphatically denied.

"Even upon the careful statements you have recently made concerning the Swiss rule of a cantonal citizenship this extraordinary and exceptional doctrine of inherited allegiance appears nowhere distinctly formulated, and if it be put forward as a doctrine it not only finds no color in the received teachings of international law, but it is in itself faulty because apparently unlimited. There seems to be no end to the chain of inherited subjection which must ensue should the Swiss premise be admitted, for if a native-born son of a citizen of the United States can be claimed by Switzerland as a citizen because his father was formerly a Switzer, the grandson and the descendant of the remotest generations may with equal reason, or rather with equal unreasonableness, be claimed as Swiss citizens.

"It seems that he [Mr. Schneider] is held to service purely and simply on the alleged score of owing paramount allegiance to Switzerland. In this respect Article I. of our treaty with Switzerland of November 25, 1850, appears to be distinctly contravened. At the time that treaty was concluded there was no question touching the attitude of the United States in the vital regard of citizenship. Whatever may be argued as to the dual status of an individual forsaking his native land and embracing the allegiance of another government, or whatever claim may be made that the treaty between the United States and Switzerland may not specifically apply to those precise cases, there can be no doubt that the United States purposed and that Switzerland assented to the full protection of all nativeborn citizens of the United States. It is for the benefit of such that our treaties were and are concluded, and for their benefit we must claim their full application. This is not a question of an even counterpoise of claim between two conflicting jurisdictions in which each may in practice be supreme to enforce its own law over all affected