What are the laws about valid marriage as it concerns citizenship? For countries where marrying a citizen rapidly accelerates the process of getting citizenship, are there any laws clarifying the terms under which this is legitimate? For example, if it was believed that the marriage was only in order to gain citizenship, would it be rejected or is there no legal objection to this?
switzerland A mariage that is only made to get citizenship or a residence permit is illegal. The german legal term for it is &quot;Scheinehe&quot;. This is defined as Eine [Scheinehe] liegt dann vor, wenn das heiratswillige Paar offensichtlich keine Lebensgemeinschaft führt, sondern die Bestimmungen über Zulassung und Aufenthalt von Ausländerinnen und Ausländern umgehen will. A sham marriage (see below for terminology) is on hand when the couple that requests the marriage obviously doesn't live in a partnership but wants to circumvent the laws about immigration and residence of foreigners. The marriage registrar may deny the marriage, or it may even later be voided. This source says that you can get a fine or a prison sentence of up to three years for this. If one even takes money to enter a fake marriage with someone, the sentence can be up to five years. So, better wait for the right one ;-) Terminology remark: It needs to be distinguished between the terms &quot;Scheinehe&quot; (english &quot;sham marriage&quot;) and &quot;Konvenienzehe&quot; (&quot;marriage of convenience&quot;). The later is a marriage mostly to keep one's social status and is typically arranged by the parents. This is legal and was very common in former times. In some countries, e.g. in India, it is still common. It differs from the sham marriage by the fact that the social status of both spouses is the same.
Yes, in most jurisdictions citizenship or residency is not a pre-requisite for standing. However, be aware that there are plenty of jurisdictions where the practical effect of being non-native gives you effectively no chance of winning. "Fair" in some countries means their citizens always beat foreigners.
I assume that since your wife entered on a K-1 visa, that you are a U.S. citizen. This makes a difference because the time limit is different in each case. Spouses of U.S. citizens can apply for naturalization once they have been lawful permanent residents and married to their spouses for three years: The spouse of a ​U.S.​ citizen who resides in the ​United States​ may be eligible for naturalization on the basis of ​his or her ​marriage​.​ The spouse must ​have continuously resided in the ​United States​ after ​be​coming​ a​n LPR ​for at least three years immediately preceding the date of filing the naturalization application and must have lived in marital union with his or her citizen spouse for at least those three years.​ If this doesn't apply for whatever reason, then the general rule for naturalization of permanent residents applies, and she will have to wait five years instead: An applicant must also reside continuously in the U​nited ​S​tates​ for at least five years as an LPR at the time of filing,​ though the applicant may file his or her application up to 90 days before ​reaching the five-year continuous residence period.​
Does this mean that anyone who is born in the US is automatically a US citizen, whether they want it or not? Yes (subject to a couple of exceptions, namely the children of diplomats with full immunity and the children of a hostile foreign occupier). Or does this amendment just offer the possibility of requesting citizenship? In other words: is there an action to be made in order to become a US citizen when born in the US (and therefore one is not before this action is performed)? No. For someone who falls under the 14th amendment's citizenship clause, the only way to avoid being a US citizen is to relinquish or renounce it, which generally means that one is stuck with the US citizenship for at least 18 years. Most countries' citizenship laws, or at least all of those with which I am familiar, operate this way—automatically—for "normal" cases of acquisition of citizenship by virtue of the circumstances of birth. This is true whether the citizenship derives from the place of birth or from the parents' citizenship.
First, it is quite unlikely that a US court would take on the case. Someone will have more details, but for example in EU law if you move away from the place you last lived together, you can only file for divorce in the country where your partner is living (in this case, India). Annullment is a much more serious matter than divorce, so I doubt any American court would take this case: Annulment would mean that a US court would have to decide that an Indian registry office didn't do its job right. Second, A needs convincing evidence. Frankly, "masculine appearance" and "typical masculine voice" are just opinions and therefore not evidence. Even if the court were convinced that B has a "masculine appearance" that's not evidence for being a male. A has to show the evidence, and as half of us know and the other half learned in their biology lessons, there is some pretty convincing evidence that someone is a man which A didnt' mention. And I'd ask anyone not to edit this out, because it is quite essential to the case. B doesn't have to visit a doctor and get a statement that she is a woman (which would destroy any case immediately), because based on the available evidence, A will lose the case anyway. On the other hand, after that court case has finished, B can at any time (after appropriate waiting times according to US law) come to the USA and file for divorce.
Statelessness is a very serious condition. It is quite likely that a person such as you describe may be required to board an aeroplane to that country but will not be permitted to pass through immigration on arrival - Mehran Karimi Nasseri lived in Charles de Gaulle airport for 18 years in this condition. There are many people in the world who are stateless and this may or may not affect their lives. Citizenship is generally only an issue when crossing international borders or in employment situations, the latter is significant in advanced countries but less of an issue in countries with less-developed economies.
I am not sure what you mean by &quot;accept&quot;. A citizen need not agree that any particular law is desirable, or good policy, or even rational. What a citizen must do is comply with all laws, or risk proceedings to enforce them, criminal or civil depending on the law in question and the specific circumstances. More exactly all valid laws must be complied with. In the US and many other places there are mechanisms for challenge laws as invalid. It is not generally a defense against an accusation of breaking a law that the law is not rational.
In the United States, the answer depends on who is unlawfully in power. In the hypothetical you presented, the answer is probably that the law would remain valid, as Congress generally has the sole authority to pass judgment on whether to admit the elected person. A third party would not have the ability to challenge the law based on the qualifications of a lawmaker. But if we were dealing with an administrative official promulgating regulations, those rules would generally be void if that official were unlawfully appointed. That was the case in Nat'l Labor Relations Bd. v. Canning, 573 U.S. 513 (2014), where a cola distributor challenged a labor regulation, saying that the members of the NLRB who enacted it were improperly appointed. The Court agreed that the appointments were improper, so the regulations were nullified. A judicial decision coming out under these circumstances would also be nullified if one of the judges weren't really a judge. That happened just last year, in Yovino v. Rizo. In that case, ten judges from the Ninth Circuit heard a case, and the vote split 6-4. But the author of the majority opinion died before the decision was published, which is when it become effective. The Supreme Court held that because there were therefore only five votes for that decision, it was not a majority opinion, and therefore not binding on future Ninth Circuit panels.