464
Ginsburg, J., dissenting
wife is an ancient principle of our jurisprudence." Mackenzie v. Hare, 239 U. S. 299, 311 (1915).
The statutory rule that women relinquished their United States citizenship upon marriage to an alien encountered increasing opposition, fueled in large part by the women's suffrage movement and the enhanced importance of citizenship to women as they obtained the right to vote. See Bredbenner 64, 68-81; Sapiro, supra, at 12-13. In response, Congress provided a measure of relief. Under the 1922 Cable Act, marriage to an alien no longer stripped a woman of her citizenship automatically. Act of Sept. 22, 1922 (Cable Act), ch. 411, § 3, 42 Stat. 1022. But equal respect for a woman's nationality remained only partially realized. A woman still lost her United States citizenship if she married an alien ineligible for citizenship; she could not become a citizen by naturalization if her husband did not qualify for citizenship; she was presumed to have renounced her citizenship if she lived abroad in her husband's country for two years, or if she lived abroad elsewhere for five years. Id., §§ 3, 5; see also Sapiro, supra, at 11-12. A woman who became a naturalized citizen was unable to transmit her citizenship to her children if her noncitizen husband remained alive and they were not separated. See In re Citizenship Status of Minor Children, 25 F. 2d 210 (NJ 1928) ("the status of the wife was dependent upon that of her husband, and therefore the children acquired their citizenship from the same source as had been theretofore existent under the common law"); see also Gettys, supra, at 56-57. No restrictions of like kind applied to male United States citizens.
Instead, Congress treated wives and children of male United States citizens or immigrants benevolently. The 1855 legislation automatically granted citizenship to women who married United States citizens. Act of Feb. 10, 1855, ch. 71, § 2, 10 Stat. 604; see also Kelly v. Owen, 7 Wall. 496, 498 (1869) (the 1855 Act "confers the privileges of citizenship upon women married to citizens of the United States" with-
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