Opinion
No. 1653.
August 6, 1925.
Appeal from the District Court of the United States for the District of Massachusetts, James Arnold Lowell, Judge. Question of law certified by the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the First Circuit to the Supreme Court of the United States. This is a petition under section 15 of the Act of June 29, 1906 (Comp. St. § 4374), to cancel the certificate of naturalization issued to one Hidemitsu Toyota. The agreed facts are as follows: "It is agreed that Hidemitsu Toyota is a person of the Japanese race, born in Japan; that he entered the United States in the year 1913; that he has served substantially continually in the United States Coast Guard Service (formerly called the United States Revenue Cutter Service) from November, 1913, to date, May, 1923; that during nearly all the period when the United States was engaged in the recent Great War the said service was a part of the naval forces of the United States; that he has eight or more honorable discharges issued to him for such service, some of them being for service during the said war; that he filed his petition for naturalization, said petition being No. 58,600 in the District Court of the United States for the District of Massachusetts, at Boston, on May 14, 1921, relying on the Act of May 9, 1918, c. 69, 40 Stat. 543 (Comp. Stat. 1918, Comp. St. Ann. Supp. 1919, § 4352 [7]-[13], and section 4352aa), and on the Act of July 19, 1919, c. 24, § 1, 41 Stat. 222 (Comp. Stat. Supp. 1923, § 4352aaa); that the said District Court granted his said petition on May 16, 1921, by virtue of the said acts; that on the same day a certificate of naturalization, No. 1,591,923, was issued to him. It is further agreed that, if a person of the Japanese race born in Japan may legally be naturalized under subdivision 7, section 4, of the Act of June 29, 1906, as amended by the Act of May 9, 1918, or the Act of July 19, 1919, the defendant in this case is legally naturalized." In the District Court it was held that Toyota was not entitled to be naturalized under subdivision 7, § 4, of the Act of June 29, 1906, as amended by the Act of May 9, 1918, or under the Act of July 19, 1919, and entered an order canceling his certificate of citizenship, from which order or decree this appeal was taken. We desire the instruction of the Supreme Court upon the following questions: (1) Whether a person of the Japanese race, born in Japan, may legally be naturalized under subdivision 7, § 4, of the Act of June 29, 1906, as amended by the Act of May 9, 1918. (2) Whether such subject may legally be naturalized under the Act of July 19, 1919, c. 24, § 1, 41 Stat. 222 (Comp. Stat. Ann. Supp. 1923, § 4352aaa]. It is now, to wit, November 10, 1923, ordered that the foregoing statement of facts, and questions of law arising thereon, be certified under the seal of this court, and transmitted to the Supreme Court.
Laurence M. Lombard, of Boston, Mass., for appellant.
Laurence Curtis, 2d., Asst. U.S. Atty., of Boston, Mass. (Robert O. Harris, U.S. Atty., of Boston, Mass., on the brief), for the United States.
Before BINGHAM, JOHNSON, and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.
The decree of the District Court (290 F. 971) is affirmed, in conformance with answers to certified questions. 45 S. Ct. 563, 69 L. Ed. ___.