User:Caribbean H.Q./Puerto Rican citizenship

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Is everybody born in Puerto Rico, Puerto Rican?

Hello there and Welcome! If you are here you probably got redirected here by a link on a certain talk page. I decided to write this essay after ecountering the same question in several pages over a short time period, the question was: Does being born in Puerto Rico makes you Puerto Rican even if your aren’t related by ethnicity, cultural background or if you didn’t live there for an extended period of time? The answer is yes. Now without any more stalling here is the reason behind this:

During 1898, as a result of the Spanish-American war Spain was forced to forfeit Puerto Rico to the United States after the United States Army invaded the island on July 25, 1898. Following these events the United States recognized the Puerto Rican Citizenship and it was granted to every person born in the island regardless of their origin, sex or race. In 1917 the Jones-Shafroth Act granted every man and woman born on the island the American citizenship. However the United States goverment never made renouncing the Puerto Rican nationality a requirement nor did they took any legal action to make said nationality invalid. What does this mean? It means that everybody born in the island since 1917 has dual citizenship, interesting isn’t it? Of couse Puerto Ricans don’t have any reason to relinquish their Puerto Rican nationality because it doesn’t interfere in any activity that requires the American citizenship, they have the same rights and can travel to mainland United States without the need of a passport like any other American citizen.


The ethnicity issue

Although being Puerto Rican is often refered to as an "ethnicity" this is a common misconception. Trought the years Puerto Rico has been the destiny of several inmigrants ranging from countries such as: Haiti, Dominican Republic, Corsica, France, Ireland and even places as far away from the island as China and Germany. In other words someone can be Puerto Rican and have absolutely zero percent of Spanish, Taino, African or for that matter hispanic heritage. I hope this essay helped you understand the complicated definition of the term Puerto Rican and that it serves as a source of interesting information that can be taken under consideration in future edits.

¡Adios!