Should Those Who Attack the Nation Have an Absolute Right to Remain Its Citizens?

Abstract

Macklin is certainly right to worry about the possible abuses of denationalisation. But a liberal constitutional regime can control such abuses by scrupulously controlling the state’s exercise of this power through a variety of familiar institutions and practices. These include a careful definition and exacting limitation of the grounds for revocation; demanding procedural and evidentiary requirements before such a power can be exercised; a right to legal counsel; and an independent judiciary accustomed to challenging state power in the name of protecting individual rights. We have entrusted our precious liberties to the faithful working through of these institutions and practices. Some of these liberties are even more precious than our right to retain our citizenship when we have knowingly acted in horrendous ways that make it justifiable, under the safeguards I describe, for the state to declare that status forfeited.