In 1994, Juan Mari Bras, a Puerto Rican lawyer and political historian, renounced his US citizenship before a consular agent in the US Embassy of Venezuela. In December 1995, his denaturalization was confirmed by the US State Department: Mari Bras was no longer an American citizen. That same month, he requested that the Puerto Rican State Department furnish him with proof of his Puerto Rican citizenship. This request involved more than just a bureaucratic formality. Despite the fact that over 3.6 million Puerto Ricans live in a supposedly self-determining territory, Mari Bras sought to become the world's only Puerto Rican citizen.
Mari Bras claimed that, as a Puerto Rican national born and raised on the island, he was clearly a Puerto Rican citizen and therefore had every right to continue to reside, work and, most importantly, vote in Puerto Rico. The State Department responded promptly, claiming that Puerto Rican citizenship does not exist independent of American citizenship. While Puerto Rican citizenship had been granted to Puerto Ricans by the US Congress in the 1900 Foraker Act, it was effectively revoked in 1917 by the Jones Act. The 1917 act granted islanders a partial American citizenship; though without voting rights, Puerto Ricans were nonetheless available for the draft, just in time for the first World War. The State Department's response to Mari Bras stated that Puerto Rican citizenship currently exists only as an equivalent to residency: Puerto Rican citizens are those US citizens who reside in Puerto Rico. The Secretary of State agreed, claiming that after a year of residence on the island, any US citizen can gain Puerto Rican citizenship. It became clear to a public very much engaged in Mari Bras's battle that, in the eyes of the State Department, Puerto Ricans needed to be American in order to be Puerto Rican. Mari Bras was, under all appearances of the law, a foreigner in his own land.
Fortunately, the Federal Immigration Services disagreed. To them, Juan Mari Bras was clearly not a foreigner; where else could he possibly be from, given that he had lived in Puerto Rico all his life and had neither renounced nor abandoned his home? Put another way: where could he be deported to other than Puerto Rico? Can one actually suggest that Mari Bras, in rejecting the second-class citizenship he was branded with at birth, has come to reside illegally on the island? And perhaps more importantly, can Puerto Rican citizenship exist independently, thereby allowing Mari Bras specifically, and Puerto Ricans generally, the right to finally enjoy a truly unconditional citizenship? Without any concrete answers to this public and legal debate, Puerto Ricans will simply continue as the second-class citizens they have been since the United States first conquered their island and subsequently granted them an American citizenship which curtailed their rights as both Puerto Ricans and Americans.
Out of the past 500 years, Puerto Rico has been independent for a total of eight months. Of course, the island enjoyed centuries of autonomy before it was "discovered" by Columbus, but after his arrival it was incorporated into the Spanish Empire. After centuries of colonial rule, Spain granted the island an independent government on November 25, 1897. A few months later, the United States declared war on Spain. The official reason for the declaration of war was Spain's refusal to comply with Congress's demand that Cuba be granted absolute sovereignty and independence by the Spanish government. However the imperial designs behind this "splendid little war" were clear, especially given decades of thwarted attempts on the US's part to acquire the colony. (President Polk had gone so far as to requisition $100 million for the purchase from his Cabinet in the 1840s.) But Cuban resistance to the invasion caused the United States' Armed Forces difficulties, which led the land-hungry United States to look to Puerto Rico as an only slightly less desirable, yet easily more conquerable, Spanish territory.
The US's July 25, 1898 invasion of Puerto Rico (a mere eight months after Spain granted autonomy) was met with surprising enthusiasm by the civilian population. This enthusiasm only increased after General Miles, leader of the invading troops, publicly proclaimed his army's cause to be one of "liberty, justice and humanity." The Americans had come, he said, "to seek the enemies of our government and of yours to destroy or capture all in armed resistance," and to "release [Puerto Ricans] from [their] former political relations." Unfortunately, the joyous population of the newly "liberated" island paid little attention to the closing sentences of Miles's statement; it was there that he declared the army's "hope [that] this [liberation from Spanish oppression] will be followed by the cheerful acceptance of the Government of the United States." Surely a foreknowledge of the ensuing decades of domination would have quelled such a celebration.
The history of Puerto Rico under the United States since then has been one of domination and colonialism, beginning with the post-war military government and continuing today under the island's non-incorporated territory status. Currently, the United States maintains full control over both the civil rights of the People of Puerto Rico and the political status of the island. Since 1952, the Puerto Rican government has been popularly elected by the People of Puerto Rico. Nevertheless, this government enjoys no sovereignty: legislation passed by the Puerto Rican government often depends on US approval before it can be implemented. Furthermore, all American laws must be enforced on the island, a concept that becomes absurd when one imagines, for instance, how disastrous an English-only law would be in a predominantly Spanish-speaking territory. Along the same lines, decisions made by Puerto Rico's highest court, its Supreme Court, can be second-guessed by the American government's lowest, the First Circuit Court of Boston. These blatant injustices are exacerbated by an even greater wrong: the People of Puerto Rico have no vote in the American government that controls their own. In a word, Puerto Rico is a twentieth-century (and, as far as anyone can tell, twenty-first century) colony.
Despite this American attempt at subjugation, Puerto Rico remains a nation, with its own national characteristics, shared language, nature, and customs. It thus follows that those who live in this nation are, by nationality, Puerto Rican. Since 1952, these Puerto Ricans have been only semi-autonomous despite a Constitution which establishes a connection between the Puerto Rican state and its people, clearly identifying them as "the People of Puerto Rico." These people are citizens of the Puerto Rican government, not by virtue of their relationship to a foreign body, but by virtue of their national and political affiliation to the Puerto Rican nation.
This affiliation has even been recognized by the nation that oppresses them. When one examines the Foraker Act, for instance, one finds that Puerto Rican citizenship is first granted to those who are "born in Puerto Rico and, therefore, subject to its jurisdiction," and later to those who come to reside on the island, thus implying that the citizenship being granted is primarily a national one, not a residential one. This national citizenship, argues Mari Bras, was meant to replace the Spanish citizenship that Puerto Ricans enjoyed at the time of the American invasion. The Jones Act, which later granted Puerto Ricans US citizenship without rescinding their Puerto Rican citizenship, was interpreted in 1922 by the Supreme Court as giving them the right to "move to the United States and establish their residence there, incorporating themselves into the political body and therefore enjoying all civil rights, both social and political, of US citizens." The decision explains that since it is only while residing within the United States that Puerto Ricans can exercise rights such as voting in national US elections, their American citizenship is not complete until they come to reside in the US. Thus, Puerto Ricans' US citizenship neither denied their independent status as Puerto Ricans nor granted them full status as Americans. Puerto Ricans continued then, as they do now, to be a nation with corresponding nationals and citizens.
When one realizes the larger political implications of Mari Bras's struggle, the importance of this one man's fight to the future of the island becomes clear. As Mari Bras himself commented, this "juridical experiment" he has undertaken has led to a full revision of all legislation relating to Puerto Rican citizenship. Similarly, it has broadened the scope of discussions of the island's status vis-à-vis the United States, and, more particularly, of the pro-independence struggle. To advocates of the status quo, those who wish for the island to remain within the existing framework of a "commonwealth," the debate certainly feels uncomfortable because it points to the inadequacies of the island's colonial status. After the Puerto Rican government's public admissions of Puerto Ricans' lack of political identity outside an American one, supporters of the status-quo--forever eager to promulgate the myth of autonomy--were forced to admit that Puerto Rico is indeed far closer to a colonial status than an autonomous one. Pro-statehood advocates, on the other hand, focus on the fact that Puerto Ricans are truly incomplete US citizens, a fact most conspicuous in their inability to vote for the President of the government that rules over their own government, and so tailor the debate to fit their goal of statehood. As they see it, statehood would truly incorporate Puerto Ricans into the US mainstream.
The debate is of even greater importance to pro-independence advocates; gaining full Puerto Rican citizenship would surely further their struggle, especially if Puerto Rico were to be recognized by the United States as an independent political entity with full rights to govern its own people. Mari Bras feels that his struggle has greatly impacted the independence movement: the question of citizenship has led the movement away from the concerns of party politics and back to one of its original foundations--the Puerto Rican nation itself. In Puerto Rico, a nation whose own government is subject to another one, being able to claim independent nationality becomes crucial not only culturally, but politically. Concepts of nationhood and citizenship, at best vaguely appreciated by those who have never been denied them, become controversial and vital. When you can't really trust your government because it can't even guarantee itself anything, whether you are a nation or not matters, and it matters a lot.
At the center of the struggle lies a grim reality: as it stands now, Puerto Rico has little, if any, hope of independently deciding the question of its national citizenship. Not only were most of the old decisions and laws that govern the political realities of Puerto Rico made by the US; any ruling the Puerto Rican government makes now is subject to revision by the US government. What remains to be done is create a truly strong movement of independent citizens that openly stand against the injustices of colonialism. Puerto Rican citizenship can only strengthen that case. Should Mari Bras be successful in receiving full rights outside of the sphere of US citizenship, he would set a precedent that would force the United States to rethink its almost-century-old policy towards its colonies. Mari Bras has the power to expose the one-sided relationship for what it is: a thinly veiled violation of the natural rights of the People of Puerto Rico.