Among one of the most important aspects to consider when assessing an individual’s eligibility to apply for Italian citizenship jure sanguinis (by descent) is determining when, or if, the ancestor who was born in Italy naturalized. Some cases might be particularly challenging, especially the ones involving an ancestor who was born in Italy and who emigrated to the United States as a minor. This is due to the fact that in most cases, children who were born in Italy and emigrated to the U.S. with their parents became American citizens when one of their parents naturalized. In fact, if the child’s parent naturalized in U.S. before the child reached the age of majority, it was likely that the child would automatically acquire the parent’s citizenship. This means that if the ancestor through whom you are claiming citizenship was born in Italy and was still a minor when his/her parent naturalized as an American citizen, then the child effectively lost his/her right to Italian citizenship and would have been unable to pass it to his/her children as an adult.
There is also another case which might apply to some individuals seeking Italian citizenship, and which entails claiming citizenship through an ancestor who was born in the U.S. to an Italian parent who naturalized as an American citizen while the child was still a minor.
Both scenarios share a common feature, i.e., the child was still a minor when the parent naturalized as a U.S. citizen; however, the difference between them is the country in which the child was born, and this ultimately determines one’s eligibility to apply for Italian citizenship. But let’s see how…
Minors born in Italy and derivative citizenship
In the first scenario we described – i.e., the case in which a child, who was born in Italy, naturalized automatically when the parent became a U.S. citizen prior to the child reaching the age of majority – the child lost his/her right to Italian citizenship and therefore also lost the ability to pass it on to future generations; regrettably, there are no exceptions to this rule. In other words, when the child’s parent naturalized as a U.S. citizen, the child also lost his/her right to Italian citizenship. In these cases, the child would have received an A Certificate of Citizenship, which documented derivative or acquired citizenship after birth. Please find more information about naturalization records here.
Minors born in the U.S. to Italian parents
On the other hand, if your ancestor, who was born in Italy, emigrated to the United States and naturalized as a U.S. citizen after the children were born in the U.S. and while they were still minors, then the children inherited Italian citizenship, therefore the rule described above does not apply. The reason for this is that based on the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, if a minor child was born is the United States, he/she was a U.S. citizen by birth. However, Article 7 of the Italian law 555/1912 states that if the child of an Italian immigrant was born in a foreign country and obtained the citizenship of that country involuntarily by birth according to the principle of jus soli, the child still had a right to maintain his/her Italian citizenship. Therefore, if your ancestor, who was born in Italy and emigrated to the United States, naturalized after his children were born in the U.S. but while they were still minors, you can file an application for the recognition of Italian citizenship jure sanguinis via the Italian consulate which covers the jurisdiction where you reside, or via a municipality in Italy. However, there are a number of other requirements you must meet. More specifically, your ancestor (who was born in Italy) must have been alive at the time Italy was unified as a nation on March 17, 1861, or he/she must have been born after that date. Furthermore, none of your ancestors in your direct line of descent must have ever renounced their Italian citizenship. Finally, your male Italian-born ancestor must have become a naturalized U.S. citizen after June 14, 1912. If he naturalized before that date and after his child’s birth, you cannot apply for Italian citizenship. As discussed in many of our previous articles, if you were born before January 1, 1948, you can claim citizenship only through your father. As a matter of fact, women could transfer citizenship to her children only if they were born on or after January 1, 1948. Therefore, if there is a woman in your Italian lineage whose child was born before January 1, 1948, you cannot apply for citizenship via an Italian consulate or municipality, but you might be able to apply via the court system instead. This is due to the fact that prior to January 1, 1948 Italian women did not have the same rights as men and therefore they could not pass their citizenship on to their children, which is now considered to be unlawful, and consequently, you can apply for citizenship via the court system in Italy.
***It is worth mentioning that if you have a 1948 court case and the child of your Italian- born ancestor was born in the U.S. and was a minor when the parent naturalized, you might face some challenges because some judges, especially within the court of Rome[1], give a more restrictive interpretation of law 155/1912 and maintain that Italian citizenship cannot be transmitted if the child who was born in the U.S. was still a minor when the parent became a U.S. citizen. Nevertheless, some decisions have been successfully challenged through the appellate court in Italy. On the other hand, if one of the Italian parents became a naturalized citizen before the child reached the age of majority, but the other parent did not naturalize while the child was a minor, your claim to citizenship will be approved.
Applying for Italian citizenship by descent with minor children: what you need to know
After having discussed eligibility by analyzing the cases in which a child was born in Italy or in the U.S. and whose parent naturalized as a U.S. citizen while the child was still a minor, it is worth explaining how you can apply for Italian citizenship with your minor children nowadays.
In particular, if you file an application for the recognition of Italian citizenship jure sanguinis, your children will automatically be part of your application at no additional cost and they will become Italian citizens when you are granted citizenship, provided that you present a certified copy of their birth certificates with an Apostille and a translation into Italian when you apply. This applies to all individuals who submit an application for Italian citizenship, be it via an Italian consulate, an Italian municipality or via a 1948 case.
If you have children after you are granted Italian citizenship, you must remember to register their births before they turn 18 in order for them to be recognized as Italian citizens. Registering a birth certificate via an Italian consulate entails filling out a form and mailing it to the consulate that covers the jurisdiction where you reside together with the child’s birth certificate, which bears an Apostille and which has been translated into Italian. The consulate will then notify you when the vital record has been registered in Italy. If you do not register your children’s births before they turn 18, they will need to formally apply for the recognition of Italian citizenship jure sanguinis and they will need to provide the Italian authorities with certified vital records of all the family members in the Italian lineage starting from the ancestor who was born in Italy. More detailed information about applying for Italian citizenship with children can be found here.
If you are interested in applying for Italian citizenship by descent and you would like a free eligibility assessment or further information about the application process, please feel free to contact our team of Italian citizenship experts at [email protected]. We’ll be happy to help you!
[1] Please note that after June 22, 2022 all 1948 cases must be filed at the court that covers the jurisdiction of the Italian ancestor’s municipality of birth. For more information click here.
