Citizenship Quotes

“I am a citizen of the world.”
― Sylvia Beach

“If we, citizens, do not support our artists, then we sacrifice our imagination on the altar of crude reality and we end up believing in nothing and having worthless dreams.”
― Yann Martel, Life of Pi

“[F]reedom isn't free. It shouldn't be a bragging point that "Oh, I don't get involved in politics," as if that makes you somehow cleaner. No, that makes you derelict of duty in a republic. Liars and panderers in government would have a much harder time of it if so many people didn't insist on their right to remain ignorant and blindly agreeable.”
― Bill Maher, When You Ride Alone You Ride With Bin Laden: What the Government Should Be Telling Us to Help Fight the War on Terrorism

“Everything can be explained to the people, on the single condition that you want them to understand.”
― Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

“It’s not unpatriotic to denounce an injustice committed on our behalf, perhaps it’s the most patriotic thing we can do.”
― E.A. Bucchianeri, Brushstrokes of a Gadfly,

“Finding an access to the ‘open public space’ is the challenge that really matters in life. We may know that everyone might feel like an alien to someone else or sometimes even to oneself, whether native, foreigner or exile, whether assimilated or singular, whether straight or gay. Be that as it may, a basic premise for the safeguard of self-fulfillment is the availability of a comforting maneuvering ground for one and all and an opportunity to enter a 'space of appearance' with a gate to a ‘citizenship of the world’. ("His master's voice" )”
― Erik Pevernagie

“You go on, I presume, with your latin Exercises: and I wish to hear of your beginning upon Sallust who is one of the most polished and perfect of the Roman Historians, every Period of whom, and I had almost said every Syllable and every Letter is worth Studying.

In Company with Sallust, Cicero, Tacitus and Livy, you will learn Wisdom and Virtue. You will see them represented, with all the Charms which Language and Imagination can exhibit, and Vice and Folly painted in all their Deformity and Horror.

You will ever remember that all the End of study is to make you a good Man and a useful Citizen.—This will ever be the Sum total of the Advice of your affectionate Father,

John Adams”
― John Adams, The Letters of John and Abigail Adams

“If every single Jew born anywhere in the world has the right to become an Israeli citizen, then all the Palestinians who were chucked out of Palestine by the Zionist Government should have the same right, very simple.”
― Tariq Ali

“There are thousands who are in opinion opposed to slavery and to the war, who yet in effect do nothing to put an end to them; who, esteeming themselves children of Washington and Franklin, sit down with their hands in their pockets, and say that they know not what to do, and do nothing....”
― Henry David Thoreau, Civil Disobedience and Other Essays

“The Declaration of Independence . . . is much more than a political document. It constitutes a spiritual manifesto—revelation, if you will—declaring not for this nation only, but for all nations, the source of man's rights. Nephi, a Book of Mormon prophet, foresaw over 2,300 years ago that this event would transpire. The colonies he saw would break with Great Britain and that 'the power of the Lord was with [the colonists],' that they 'were delivered by the power of God out of the hands of all other nations' (1 Nephi 13:16, 19). "The Declaration of Independence was to set forth the moral justification of a rebellion against a long-recognized political tradition—the divine right of kings. At issue was the fundamental question of whether men's rights were God-given or whether these rights were to be dispensed by governments to their subjects. This document proclaimed that all men have certain inalienable rights. In other words, these rights came from God.”
― Ezra Taft Benson

“If a policy is wrongheaded feckless and corrupt I take it personally and consider it a moral obligation to sound off and not shut up until it's fixed.”
― David Hackworth

“You are a citizen, and citizenship carries responsibilities.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“I think it’s important to live in a nice country rather than a powerful one. Power makes everybody crazy.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Letters

“In a republican nation, whose citizens are to be led by reason and persuasion and not by force, the art of reasoning becomes of first importance”
― Thomas Jefferson

“Citizenship is more than an individual exchange of freedoms for rights; it is also membership in a body politic, a nation, and a community. To be deemed fair, a system must offer its citizens equal opportunities for public recognition, and groups cannot systematically suffer from misrecognition in the form of stereotype and stigma.”
― Melissa V. Harris-Perry, Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America

“I didn't flee a dictator or swim an ocean to be an American like some do. I just thought long and hard about it.”
― Craig Ferguson, American on Purpose: The Improbable Adventures of an Unlikely Patriot

“Your right to swing your arms ends just where the other man’s nose begins.”
― Zechariah Chafee Jr.

“I have finally learned that I am as much a part of this country as those villagers. Whether they like it or not, my umbilical cord is buried in the earth of Vietnam just like theirs.”
― Sherry Garland, Song of the Buffalo Boy

“It makes me wonder what belonging to a place means. Charles died a Russian in Paris. Viktor called it wrong and was a Russian in Vienna for fifty years, then Austrian, then a citizen of the Reich, and then stateless. Elisabeth kept Dutch citizenship in England for fifty years. And Iggie was Austrian, then American, then an Austrian living in Japan.

You assimilate, but you need somewhere else to go. You keep your passport to hand. You keep something private.”
― Edmund de Waal, The Hare With Amber Eyes: A Family's Century of Art and Loss

“Everyone who receives protection from the society owes a return for the benefit.”
― John Stuart Mill, The Corn Laws

“It worsened when ads started coming up on her HOME page after reading it. The ads had horrible titles:

Dream Youth For The Low Grades.
Alternate Longevity.
A Secret Pleasurable Way To Youth.
Get Your Dream Citizenship With A Pleasing Pleasure Contract.”
― Misba, The Oldest Dance

“When Kusha discovered how many unevolved men and women enter such contracts just for citizenship, it made her face crease. As if she’d caught a nasty smell.”
― Misba, The Oldest Dance

“[T]he success of democracy depends, in the end, on the reliability of the judgments we citizens make, and hence upon our capacity and determination to weigh arguments and evidence rationally.”
― Irving Copi

“Encouraging Robert E. Lee to take a job as college president, "You might be presenting to the world in such a position an example of quiet usefulness and gentle patriotism.”
― William Nelson Pendleton

“A golden visa is a permanent residency visa issued to individuals who invest, often through the purchase of property, a certain sum of money into the issuing country.

The United States EB-5 visa program requires overseas applicants to invest a minimum of anywhere from $500,000 to $1 million, depending on the location of the project, and requires at least 10 jobs to be either created or preserved.[22] When these criteria are met, the applicant and their family become eligible for a green card. There is an annual cap of 10,000 applications under the EB-5 program.[citation needed] The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has offered its EB-5 Immigrant Investor Program since 1990. It is designed to encourage foreign investment in infrastructure projects in the U.S., particularly in Targeted Employment Areas (TEA), high unemployment areas. The funds are channeled through agencies called regional centers, now designated only by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The funding opportunities allow the investor to make a sound financial investment and obtain a U.S. “Green Card.

A large majority of users of such programs are wealthy Chinese seeking legal security and a better quality of life outside of their home country.”
― Wikipedia: Immigrant investor programs

“A person can be recognized or granted citizenship on a number of bases. Usually citizenship based on circumstances of birth is automatic, but an application may be required.

Citizenship by birth (jus sanguinis).

Born within a country (jus soli). Some people are automatically citizens of the state in which they are born. Most countries in the Americas grant unconditional jus soli citizenship, while it has been limited or abolished in almost all other countries.


Citizenship by marriage (jus matrimonii).

Naturalization. States normally grant citizenship to people who have entered the country legally and been granted permit to stay, or been granted political asylum, and also lived there for a specified period. In some countries, naturalization is subject to conditions which may include passing a test demonstrating reasonable knowledge of the language or way of life of the host country, good conduct (no serious criminal record) and moral character (such as drunkenness, or gambling), vowing allegiance to their new state or its ruler and renouncing their prior citizenship. Some states allow dual citizenship and do not require naturalized citizens to formally renounce any other citizenship.

Citizenship by investment or Economic Citizenship. Wealthy people invest money in property or businesses, buy government bonds or simply donate cash directly, in exchange for citizenship and a passport.”
― Wikipedia: Citizenship

“What do you want?” I asked, trying to ignore him.

“Probably something that you want.”

I rolled my eyes at the emphasis of the word you.

“And what would I want?” I asked.

“To go back to Africa. If you want to live in America as if it's Africa, then you might as well go back to Africa.”

“Go BACK?” I asked, emphasizing my incredulity at the sound of the word back.

“Isn’t that where you came from?”

“I mean… I could see it in my ancestry… my parents were of African decency… but I was born in America, and I am legally an American citizen.”
― Lucy Carter, The Reformation

“Unlike everyone else in Israel, she and her descendants cannot become citizens of Israel for 10 generations. (De 23:3-7) What could be worse than a Moabite convert? A widowed Moabite convert!
Michael Ben Zehabe, Ruth: a woman’s guide to husband material, pg 27”
― Michael Ben Zehabe, Ruth: A Woman's Guide to Husband Material

“These stories relieve me of the pain of belonging nowhere and give me the key to everywhere. As I once longed for a singular place, a singular ethnicity or plot of land over generations, I now long for its opposite, for a space beyond belonging. I have travelled to many places in order to scope a sense of ownership or repatriation, but as I try to square my politics with my privilege, it seems that my only true inheritance is that I am always running somewhere else.”
― Tessa McWatt, Shame on Me: An Anatomy of Race and Belonging

“Even those too lazy to vote feel it their birthright to blast our elected representatives from every direction. We complain bitterly when we do not get all we want as if it were possible to have more services with lower taxes, broader health care coverage with no federal involvement, a cleaner environment without regulations, security from terrorists with no infringement on privacy, and cheaper consumer goods made locally by workers with higher wages. In short, we crave all the benefits of change without the costs. When we are disappointed, our response is to retreat into cynicism, then start thinking about whether there might be a quicker, easier, and less democratic way to satisfy our wants.”
― Madeleine K. Albright, Fascism: A Warning