Origin of Citizenship

Citizenship as we understand it today is the result of centuries of social, economic, and political experiments, in which improvement in human relations has slowly developed the idea of the benefits of governmental rules and restrictions for the protection of the rights of persons and property. Ancient Greece was composed of a number of city states, each one independent of the other and conferring certain privileges upon its subjects. The greatest advantages of citizenship among these city states was conferred by the Athenians, limited, however, to native sons of native fathers and mothers, excluding from such privileges foreigners and slaves. The Athenian idea of citizenship was philosophical rather than practical. It was left to the Romans, in succeeding centuries, to develop the more practical phases of citizenship, i.e., safety of the Republic, public service, stern simplicity, devotion to duty. Above all other duties and obligations was placed that of unselfish duty to the state. It was this Roman virtue of loyalty to public duty, this devotion on the part of the citizen to the interest of the state, that, more than any other quality of the Roman character, helped to make Rome great. Roman citizenship was confined to a privileged class, native or adopted. In the Anglo-Saxon races there was slowly developed the idea and ideals of self-government and of individual worth, in contrast with the earlier Greek and Roman domination of the state over the individual. Out of these experiments in government and human relations there has been evolved the ideals and principles of American citizenship.