I believe, however, that the better view permits some flexibility in the assessment of Congressional purpose. Several cases have permitted deviation from the residency requirements where external forces — including Government rulings — rendered fruitless the petitioners' good-faith attempts at compliance. In re Yarina, 73 F. Supp. 688 (N.D. Ohio 1947), granted citizenship to an alien who was captured at Wake Island in 1941 and forcibly transported by the Japanese to a concentration camp, holding that this absence from the country should not be considered disbarring within the intention of the statute. Another case granted section 1430(b) accelerated naturalization to the wife of an overseas serviceman who was willing to promptly join her husband in Thailand and was precluded from doing so solely because this area was designated a combat zone in which all dependents were forbidden. See Petition for Naturalization of Simpson, 315 F. Supp. 584 (W.D.La. 1970); Petition for Naturalization of Sun Cha Tom, 294 F. Supp. 791 (D. Hawaii 1968).

Guam is a possession and under the sovereignty of the United States and a Honolulu resident transferred for work purposes from Honolulu to Guam remains within the dominion of the United States and, in my opinion, may claim for naturalization purpose Honolulu as his continuous place of residence, unless he should establish a new residence at the end of his work term. In the case of In re Yarina, 1947, 73 F. Supp. 688, it was held: "The fact that alien having civilian employment at Wake Island was taken, as a prisoner of war, to China and Japan after having been captured by Japanese did not interrupt alien's continuous residence in the United States for naturalization purposes, since his departure was not voluntary." By analogy it would seem that a term employee in the Engineering force of the Army constructing defense works would likely feel compelled to go and remain wherever he was directed and transported, whether within or without the United States, and it should not work to his detriment and defeat him at any time in attaining naturalization which, by birth as a national and by residence within the dominion of the United States for twenty years, he had earned.

The children contend, and the superior court held, that since their absences from the state were in compliance with a divorce decree, they did not lose their Alaska residency. In support of its holding, the superior court cited In re Yarina, 73 F. Supp. 688 (N.D. Ohio 1947). Yarina involved an immigrant to the United States who, while living on United States soil in order to become naturalized, was captured by the Japanese in the early days of World War II. Following Yarina's release at the end of the war, he was denied citizenship because he had not lived on United States soil for the required period of time. The court held that the statute denying citizenship to an alien absent for more than one year during his naturalization contemplated a voluntary absence.