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5394.

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

C.O. 885

No. 342.

(GENERAL.)

QUEEN'S ADVOCATE to FOREIGN OFFICE.

MY LORD,

Doctors' Commons, May 30, 1865. I AM honoured with your Lordship's commands, signified in Mr. Hammond's letter of the 26th instant, stating that he was directed by your Lordship to transmit to me a Despatch from Her Majesty's Minister in Mexico inquiring as to the extent and nature of the protection to be afforded by him to naturalised British subjects in that country. The reply which has been received from the Home Office to the reference which your Lordship directed to be made to that Department was also enclosed, and Mr. Hammond was pleased to state that your Lordship proposes to answer Mr. Scarlett to the effect that the rule laid down in Lord Palmerston's Circular of 1851, of which a copy was enclosed, is only applicable to persons holding certificates of naturalisation granted after that date, and that persons holding such certificates are not to be held entitled to the same rights and capacities in Mexico as a natural-born British subject. That your Lordship is also of opinion that the protection to be accorded in virtue of Lord Clarendon's Circular of 1854, of which a copy is also enclosed, applies merely to the right of sojourn and of locomotion, but not to protection generally in regard to business pursuits in which naturalised British subjects may be engaged; and Mr. Hammond was pleased to request that I would take this question into considera- tion and inform your Lordship of my opinion of the nature of the reply which your Lordship proposes to return to Mr. Scarlett's Despatch, and also with regard to the omission which Sir George Grey proposes to make in the present form of the certificate of naturalisation, a copy of which was also enclosed for information.

my

In obedience to your Lordship's commands, I have taken these papers into considera- tion, and have the honour to

Report

That I am of opinion that the answer which your Lordship proposes to return to Mr. Scarlett is right and proper, both as to the construction to be put upon the rule laid down in Lord Palmerston's Circular of 1851, and as to the character of the protec- tion to be accorded in virtue of Lord Clarendon's Circular of 1854.

With respect to the expediency, of omitting for the future in the passports of naturalised persons the words "other than such as may be conferred upon him by the

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grant of a passport from the Secretary of State to enable him to travel in foreign "parts," such an omission does not appear to me expedient.

It not unfrequently happens that the foreigner who has become a naturalised British subject has also undergone a process of denaturalisation according to the laws of his native country which he has abandoned.

It seems also generally to be reasonable that the country of naturalisation should give the ordinary travelling passport security to a naturalised subject in all countries but the country of his birth and original allegiance, and in that also where by the law he has been solemnly denaturalised.

The Earl Russell, K.G.,

&c.

&c.

&c.

I have, &c.

(Signed) ROBERT PHILLIMORE.

16278.-172. #5.-9/06.

10 PUBLIC RECORD_OFFICE, LONDON

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