Back to the Constitution – Claremont Review of Books

When the First Congress in 1790 turned to the matter of the naturalization of foreigners, an authority expressly vested by the Constitution, it required that those seeking to become U.S. citizens take an oath “to support the constitution of the United States.” Five years later it modified the law, requiring (among other changes) that candidates for citizenship be “attached to the principles of the Constitution of the United States.” Until the 20th century, the exact language of the citizenship oath was left up to federal judges. But in 1929, through administrative regulations, the government formulated an official citizenship oath, which remains in effect. One of its requirements is that the applicant swear to “support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign