Reply to Americans using their ancestry to gain European citizenship

Forum Index » Off-Topic

Reply to "Americans using their ancestry to gain European citizenship - 40% of Americans eligible "

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Can someone tell me more about Italy?  My understanding was that I wasn’t eligible because my grandmother immigrated before Italian women had rights so there were no rights to transfer to me.  If she’s been a boy, it would have worked. Am I wrong?[/quote]

I second a PP and highly recommend joining the Facebook group "Dual US-Italian Citizenship."  Just as an example of how many people are seeking Italian citizenship, this group has grown to over 40,000 members in the past several years.  They have very extensive guides on all paths to Italian citizenship.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/23386646249/?hoisted_section_header_type=recently_seen&multi_permalinks=10160019539171250

The main thing to be aware of is whether or not your ancestor naturalized or became a citizen of the US or another country BEFORE the next generation was born.  So if your line is through your grandmother, she must not have become a US citizen before your mother or father was born.  Now, you are correct that before 1948, Italian women could not pass citizenship down to their children, only men passed down citizenship.  However, the new Constitution of 1948, oveturned that sexist law.  But you still can't go through your consulate, you must hire a lawyer in Italy, gather all your documents, and then file a case in court in Italy to haver your citizenship recognized.  That is known as a "1948 Case" and you can read more details on the Facebook group.

I am currently pursuing a 1948 case and will be ready to file my case in the Court of Bologna within the next six months.  All cases used to be filed in Rome, but the backlog was huge and the Italian government just de-centralized citizenship cases, so you now file in the regional court of your ancestor's home comune.  This should speed the process up and I hope to be recognized in the next two years.

The document gathering can take a couple of years.  You must have originals of all vital docs: birth, marriage, divorces, death, etc. of your direct line, and sometimes non-line spouses too.  Depends on what your lawyer requests.  Then they must be translated into Italian and apostilled.  This can take a very long time, and sometimes it's difficult to find docs.  To the PP who said they couldn't get docs because of a fire in Italy, I thought the same thing about my father, who was born in Italy.  However, the service provider I'm using to help gather docs in Italy found my father's birth certificate very quickly.  Sometimes those "fire" stories are family lore that is not true.  Also, churches will have extensive records of births/baptisms, marriages etc.  I would look into hiring someone in Italy to help locate Italian documents.  There are a lot of service providers listed on the Dual Citizenship Facebook group.

Why do it?  I feel a very strong connection to Italy.  All four of my grandparents and my father were from Italy and I've been traveling there regularly since I was 8 years old, so it's just personally important to me. DH and I plan to spend 4-6 months per year there after we retire.  I am also getting citizenship for my DC and a few nieces/nephews too.  They are all college-aged and it gives them the opportunity to live and work in any EU country.  My DC is very interested in living in Europe after college.

Good luck - it is a long and sometimes difficult experience, however, very rewarding.  As you search for documents, you learn a lot about your family and your heritage.  I highly recommend it!

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics