A CBC story this morning stated that “applications from people around the world seeking Canadian citizenship certificates have been rising rapidly in recent months, fuelled by thousands of applications from the United States.” Under Bill C-3, those who can prove they were descended from a Canadian ancestor even if that ancestor left several generations ago can now apply for citizenship. Apparently, half of the applications are from the United States and the number of applications in general has soared to the point where there are now about 120,000 applications for citizenship waiting to be adjudicated and processed.
This is potentially just a drop in the bucket given that since the mid 19th century, literally several million Canadians emigrated to the United States. The period from 1867 to 1896 prior to the opening of the Canadian west, was a period of relatively anemic economic growth in Canada and many residents of Canada crossed the border into the opportunities offered by the larger US economy.
Indeed, by the 1910 US Census, Canadians were one of the largest categories of foreigners in the United States. As estimated by G.E. Jackson in a 1923 article in the American Academy of Political and Social Science, between 1850 and 1920, 1,890,000 Canadian born citizens moved to the United States. Figure 1 provides a chart of the numbers on Canadian net emigration to the United States provided by Jackson in his article. Note the decline after 1900 as the Canadian wheat boom era and prairie settlement and the industrialization of central Canada offered more opportunities and slowed the outflow.
In 1910, there were 1,204,637 Canadian born residents living in the United States. One imagines that their descendants easily number ten-fold today. If there are 10 to 12 million Americans of Canadian ancestry, then potentially, there could be many more applications to come regarding the recovery of lost Canadian citizenship.
Of course, it is unlikely that there will be ten million applications for lost citizenship from the United States, but the ultimate numbers could be more substantial than one might think. In any event, this story certainly helps highlight what for many Canadians is a forgotten aspect of our past.
