Perez v. Brownell

Perez v. Brownell
Argued May 1, 1957
Reargued October 28, 1957
Decided March 31, 1958
Full case nameClemente Martinez Perez v. Herbert Brownell Jr., Attorney General
Citations356 U.S. 44 (more)
78 S. Ct. 568; 2 L. Ed. 2d 603; 1958 U.S. LEXIS 1283
Case history
PriorCertiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
Holding
Congress has the power to revoke a person's United States citizenship as a result of the voluntary performance of specified actions (such as voting in a foreign election), even in the absence of any intent or desire to lose citizenship.
Court membership
Chief Justice
Earl Warren
Associate Justices
Hugo Black · Felix Frankfurter
William O. Douglas · Harold H. Burton
Tom C. Clark · John M. Harlan II
William J. Brennan Jr. · Charles E. Whittaker
Case opinions
MajorityFrankfurter, joined by Burton, Clark, Harlan, Brennan
DissentWarren, joined by Black, Douglas
DissentDouglas, joined by Black
DissentWhittaker
Laws applied
Nationality Act of 1940; U.S. Const. amend. XIV
Overruled by
Afroyim v. Rusk, 387 U.S. 253 (1967)

Perez v. Brownell, 356 U.S. 44 (1958), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court affirmed Congress's right to revoke United States citizenship as a result of a citizen's voluntary performance of specified actions, even in the absence of any intent or desire on the person's part to lose citizenship. Specifically, the Supreme Court upheld an act of Congress which provided for revocation of citizenship as a consequence of voting in a foreign election.[1]

The precedent was repudiated nine years later in Afroyim v. Rusk,[2] in which the Supreme Court held that the Fourteenth Amendment's Citizenship Clause guaranteed citizens' right to keep their citizenship and overturned the same law that it had upheld in Perez.

  1. ^ Perez v. Brownell, 356 U.S. 44 (1958).
  2. ^ Afroyim v. Rusk, 387 U.S. 253 (1967).