Thousands of Jews in the Eastern provinces of Czecho-Slovakia who are not citizens of any country as a result of the map-shifting following the war will be enabled to become Czecho-Slovakian citizens as the result of a new naturalization law that regulates with great liberality the process of acquiring citizenship. The announcement that the new measure had been drafted was made today in the Czecho-Slovak Senate by Jan Cerny, Minister of the Interior.
His announcement was made after the constitutional committee had adopted a resolution asking the government to grant citizenship to all applicants born in territory now belonging to the Czecho-Slovak Republic and also to those living in Czecho-Slovakia for a long period of time. Jewish war refugees in Czecho-Slovakia will be particularly benefited by the new law.
The bill that has now been prepared by the government was first introduced into parliament last January by the Social-Democrats, numerically the strongest party in the country. The bill provided that anyone who has lived within the present boundaries of Czecho-Slovakia since 1910 is eligible to citizenship. The Jewish members of Parliament offered an amendment to this bill which would make all residents of Czecho-Slovakia since 1915 qualified for citizenship. This amendment enables Jewish war refugees to become citizens, while the original bill provides for the Jews of Slovakia and Carpatho-Russia.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
