Citizen of Which Republic? Foreigners and the Construction of National Citizenship in Central America, 1823-1845

The law of the South American states with reference to nationality of origin remains to be noticed.

Sir Alexander Cockburn, Nationality: or, The law relating to subjects and aliens, considered with a view to future legislation (London, W. Ridgway, 1869), 17.

In December 1841, voters in Sonsonate (El Salvador) elected Frenchman and long-time resident, Luis Bertrand Save, as their alcalde, or municipal judge, for 1842. The governor insisted that Save accept the office. However, Save convinced El Salvador's president that he should not serve since he was not a citizen of the country, citing French and Salvadoran laws to back up his argument. French law mattered because Save could lose his qualité de français , or "Frenchness," by holding office in a foreign government, and Salvadoran laws limited office-holding to its own citizens. In 1843, Save was again elected alcalde and again protested because "the law requires for these positions that it is indispensable that the elected be a citizen of the country. While I am a vecino (for I live in Sonsonate), I am not a ciudadano (citizen), and as a foreigner, have neither a letter of naturalization, nor am I naturalized de facto." ¹ That is, Save acknowledged the importance of local citizenship and accepted the status of a Sonsonate vecino, or community member, but pointed out that he lacked national membership because his domicile did not make a "foreigner" a citizen, and he lacked the institutional change of status, naturalization, to overcome that foreignness.

At first glance, Save's predicament seems to arise from tensions between ancien regime practices of citizenship that gave householders full political rights, or citizenship, in their community and new legal codes that defined citizenship in terms of a national republic. The response by Sonsonate's governor seemingly confirms this impression, asserting that Save had "the capacities the law requires to be [a citizen], and the obligation to support communal responsibilities ( cargas )." ² Similarly, Salvadoran Minister General José Jimenez responded to a furious note from the French Consul General that Save had "enjoyed in that city more than twenty years the privileges ( fueros ) of a Salvadoran citizen, and should justly contribute his service." ³ The language of vecino, carga, and fuero falls squarely into that of early modern belonging. However, when Save insisted he had not become a Salvadoran or citizen 'de facto' and when the Sonsonate governor pointed out Save's capacity to serve as magistrate, they indicated that the republic's new laws, enacted in the 1840s to naturalize foreign residents automatically, caused the tension. Save's resistance came not from a question of principle, for in the 1830s he had held municipal office in Sonsonate, but from practicality: after France started sending diplomats to Central America, his home republic was much more likely to realize he was serving in a foreign government and, as a consequence, revoke his "qualité de français."

Because he was forced into office, Save ultimately preserved his status as a Frenchman; the French government ruled that he had done his best to avoid holding this disqualifying position. However, his experience suggests that tensions between local and national citizenship, as well as new governments' challenge in dealing with "foreigners" as opposed to "nationals," were acute. That none of the actors even used the word "national" to describe members of what we now understand to be members of a national community further suggests that the separate categories of a "national" and "citizen" of a country had not yet been fully defined. Both Save and his adversaries agreed that he was a Sonsonate vecino, and thus had a certain responsibility to the local community. However, their opinions diverged on the extent of that obligation, and on his relationship to the national community, whether as a national (Salvadoran) or foreigner (Frenchman).

A complicating factor at the root of the conflict was a fundamental question: what republic mattered in issues of belonging? Was it the local republic, or city, in which an alien resided; the foreign republic, or country of origin; or...