ughhh... been working on this for a year already and I still have such a headache about it. Has no one else had trouble obtaining the documents needed for application? I'm not even talking about the Polish ones--I mean the US ones! It's incredibly confusing, given that my grandfather came to Michigan and then moved to LA, and each state has its own separate archives, and the Polish lawyer I'm in contact with can't really help me in that aspect.

 

As long as you know what events happened where (i.e. marriage in Michigan, birth in CA), it shouldn't be too hard. Even in the, in my opinion, worst state in the union, New York, they were able to get me what I needed within a month. And they had to dig really deep to find the old marriage certificate I needed, and had little definitive information. The ONLY thing that took ridiculously long was the FOIA/USCIS/INS form which took a little over a year to get, showing my ancestor didn't become a citizen.

I live in Florida and was able to get my birth and parents marriage certificates, with apostilles, in less than 7 days all via mail. That's quality.

 

I didn't know about this site, hopely it will be completed soon. I found the act also in spanish which I've been looking for a long time.

 

I'm impressed. I was going to say, New York is by far the worst... for apostilles there, you have to apply to three separate agencies successively. I didn't actually mean I was having issues with my birth certificate; I'm having trouble with obtaining copies of Michigan marriage certificates. I'll probably figure it out soon; I think I'm just looking in the wrong place.

I actually had a big breakthrough not an hour ago. I ordered a certified copy of the ship's manifest of the ship that my grandfather immigrated on, as well as a certified copy of his naturalization certificate--both online, from the National Archives. This may be useful to anyone else from the U.S. who needs those types of documents. [http://www.archives.gov/order/] Note, though, that you can only get the naturalization papers from them if the person was naturalized in a federal court (such as district courts). If it was done in state or local courts, you need to request from the state or municipality.

 

Hey everyone,

Well, finally made it to the consulate in London today. I could have cried when I saw the queue, and even ended up in the visa queue to begin with, which resulted in me having to join the back of the passport queue when I got to the door.....ahhh.......

Took my Polish birth certificate and confirmation of citizenship certificate and 2 photo's. As it was my first passport, I had to fill in 2 passport applications, they made photocopies of the above 2 documents and kept the birth certificate. (still 1 original left)

Then it was over to counter 7 to pay.....£85 lighter and now up to a 4 month wait.....soon come I suppose, at least i won't have to queue when I go to collect my passport.

It saves time if you go to the front of the queue initially to get the application form from the guy on the door and then join the queue and fill it in there ready for when they let you in to see one of the staff at a passport counter.

Anyway, if anyone has any questions, I'd be happy to share my experiences.........

 

When I went there it was funny as I mistakenly joined the visa queue and I started filing in the application with the help of someone there, and the lady of the visa section received my passport application and helped me to complete it! by that time had not even sent my birth certificate to Poland.

Did they retained the originals of your confirmation certificate and your birth certificate???! For me they made a fotocopy and gave me the originals back... strange

It's a bit more expensive now. I payed £67 in 2005.

Anyway congratulations... Was your PESEL form OK?

 

duane, did you use a lawyer or do the whole thing yoruself?

 

Hi polskiarg

Yeah they kept the original Polish birth certificate even though they made a photocopy of it, I did ask about getting it back but they said they keep it as its my first Polish passport. I got my confirmation of citizenship certificate back, they only kept a photocopy of that.

I had to fill in two passport application forms, as they said it was because it is my first Polish passport.

The PESEL form was okay too, I had prefilled it in (word document off the net) and the only thing I had to fill in extra was point 12 on the form, putting the act of birth, serial number and issue city of my Polish birth certificate - I also had to put the same details into the passport application.

Can't wait for it to come.....hehe.......hopefully be here in December or earlier if I am very lucky, but it will be an excellent addition to Christmas gifts

Hey jdotjdot89,

No I had a lawyer handle my case, Piotr Staczek. He's cool, probably took the same length of time as the average length of time for a case to be processed including getting all the paperwork together and get a reply back from the Wojewoda Mazowiecki (for me it was 18 months) a long time, but well worth the wait, when you get the confirmation of citizenship its a great feeling!

 

Congratulations Duane!

To follow up on jdotjdot89 question, do you think now you could have done it yourself or was a lawyer necessary?

 

Hey Harjeet,

Well, I didn't know anything about the whole process of what to start doing to get a Polish passport. The way of going about it on the Polish consulate website is just a bit different to how I done it. So it seemed a bit daunting thinking of all the work involved, so I don't really think I would have got much done on my own - thats just my opinion.

I decided to find a lawyer, pay a fee, and have him do the work, which he did. He told me what I needed and when I needed to send it, translations of UK documents etc etc. I can do a step by step list of how I went about it over the weekend and then post it on here, but I suppose you've got to remember each case is different. I acquired citizenship through my father who in turn acquired it through his father (my grandfather) who is Polish born.

 

Hey Duane,

I was more curious of your post-reaction. Mostly because it was my perception that a lawyer in Warsaw, I am assuming your lawyer was there, could get the paper work through faster and I don't know what kind of evidence you had and needed.

We set in our papers Feb 2008 and got a letter in August that our application letter was not detailed enough. The guy who translated our papers was an expert who a few years back could grant citizenship himself. Anyways this guy translated our documents to Polish, including this not proper letter, anyways he claims that some people from the beginning of 2008 had already received a reply. If his claims are true the order of processing applications in Warsaw is somewhat random. However, this is also an expert also failed to find a problem with our application letter.

 

Yeah my lawyer was in Warsaw, and on his part he was very efficient in getting the paperwork required to the Wojewoda Mazowiecki, and when chasing up certain actions if they seemed to be taking to long.

The paperwork which in submiited in total was;

Notarised copy of my UK passport (from Polish consulate)
Original UK birth certificate
Notarised copy of my fathers Polish ID card (done in Poland)
Official copy of my parents UK marriage certificate & Polish translation (parents divorced years ago, translation done in Poland)
Copy of my fathers change of name deed poll certificate - signed and stamped by a UK notary public and then apostilled by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office in London.

The deed poll document was a pain, as the Wojewoda Mazowiecki wanted proof my father was my father as he had a different first name on his birth certificate to his Polish ID card........ahhh....I thought....dad what were you thinking! lol That probably took about a month to sort out in its self.

 

meant to say he had different name on my birth certificate to his ID card [/quote]

 

My father had also a different spelling of his surname on my birth certificate to that of his confirmation of citizenship, but fortunately on his marriage certificate he had the same spelling as on my birth certificate, so the issue was sorted out very quickly in 2 days.

 

Hi all

Talking about lawyers, has anyone ever heard of a Mr. Lukasz Piotrowski? Is he any good? He is willing to to the footwork for me for a cost of 1500 Euros.
I am not going to ask as to how long it took since each case is and will be different from another. At least I can get him started with what limited information I have.

 

There is a post about him here

http://www.easyexpat.com/forums/ftopic_ ... asc-60.htm

Jan.Pooh "Hi, as I know one of the best Polish law office that render legal services regarding to certification is Advocate Lukasz Piotrowski, Law Office. I know it becouse he obtain Polish certification for my uncle and now he has rest of my uncle family case. They are Israeli citizen. I know that he cooperated with Charsky but Piotrowski has got his own law office now(Charsky have some problem with Clients I dont know what a problem but my uncle left him and now adv. Piotrowski handle his case)"

 

gjene, I was wondering if you or anyone else could confirm whether http://www.polishcitizenship.org/about-polish-citizenship-org/ is Lukasz Piotrowski's website. Very generic web address, but the contact info listed matches what a previous poster here listed. I've been slowly working at contacting attorneys regarding my less than clear case (been distracted by college move-in a week and a half ago), but now should have more time on my hands.

Additionally, last weekend I submitted details regarding my situation to Charsky's website. Anyone know how long it may take for him to respond?

 

As more of a general question, I wanted to summarize/post my findings thus far to see if people here agree/disagree with my interpretation of the 1920 citizenship act.


First off, via this translation of the 1920 citizenship act http://www.polishcitizenship.pl/index.php?p=general_information, it would seem I have confirmation of my great-great-grandparent's acquisition of Polish citizenship.

So, assuming I am interpreting the act correctly, since my great-great-grandparents were born in what became part of the Polish State, under Article 2, section 2 they would have been granted Polish citizenship (in addition, at least one of them was born in Russian-controlled parts of Poland, and thus I think they'd be covered under Article 2, section 1d as well).

Assuming that's the case, then I would think that their children, born between 1905-1909, would also have gained citizenship upon the 1920 acts passage, and therefore it would have been passed onto my grandparents up to me.



But off that same site I came across something darkening my already less-than-clear case. On the main page, http://www.polishcitizenship.pl/, there is apparently a translation of “CIRCULAR No.18, Minister of the Interior, 9th of July 1925”. The translation is quite confusing, but unless I'm way off it seems that case A would apply to my great-grandparents (born 1905-1909 to Polish-born immigrants), who apparently would not have gained citizenship upon the passage of the 1920 act as a result of having US citizenship by birth. Now, I had thought from reading things here that US citizenship via birth did not conflict with Polish citizenship being passed on, but I suppose the situation could well be different for someone born in the US before the 1920 act. In any case, if my attempt at deciphering that document was successful, than I may have hit a deal-breaker in my quest for citizenship...



Edit: However, as I just remembered, one of my three Polish great-grandparents was born in Canada en-route to the United States. Since, according to the Wikipedia page on Canadian Nationality law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_nationality_law, citizenship via birth was not granted until 1947, she wouldn't have held any non-Polish citizenship at the time of the 1920 Act's passage, and as a result, would have definitely gained Polish citizenship. And, according to http://www.polishcitizenship.pl/:

Therefore, since it seems she at least definitely became a Polish citizen upon the act's passage, and since her child (my grandfather) was born in 1928, he would have definitely been jointly an American and Polish citizen, and would have passed that on to my mother and then me. Or so I think/hope anyway...


Edit 2: Well, it seems that, being born in Canada prior to 1947, my great-grandmother would have become a British subject. I'm not sure what the distinction is between a British "subject' and "citizen"; in any case the articles I quote earlier regarding the 1920 Act state that it makes no distinction of nationality, "as far as it does not serve another country’s citizenship to the person." So I'm not sure whether the birth of a child to a non-citizen couple in Canada would have granted her the status of a British subject, and if so whether that has any bearing on the 1920 Act.

 

I can give you my thoughts on what I read but I just read what you wrote and the posts you listed.

People who left poland before the 1920 law could possibly claim polish citizenship.
"2) was born on the territory of The Polish State, as far as it is not entitled to another country’s citizenship; " however you have to prove they should have received Polish citizenship when this law passed.

If the child born in the US was 21+ at the time of 1920 law the did NOT get polish citizenship. Minor children may possibly claim citizenship.

With your great-great grandparents it depends if they took us citizenship before 1920. If they did "Polish citizen cannot simultaneously be a citizen of another country." and there was nothing to be pass on.

If they did not get it until after 1920 and your grand parents were under 21 then maybe.

I think Charsky email will provide more insight.

 

Harjeet, thanks for the reply,

Well, of my six great-great-grandparents, I only have naturalization documents for 2, and both of them gained citizenship after their grandchildren (my grandparents) were born. So at least in the case of those two, that shouldn't be an issue.

My great-grandparents were around 11 years old at the passage of the 1920 act, so assuming my great-great-grandparents had citizenship I would think it would have passed on up to me. However, as I mentioned in the first post the section "With regards to point a):" in that article debates two conflicting views as to whether children under 21 born in the US of parents who gained citizenship at 1920 would have gained citizenship. The author/translator seems to conclude that in such a case the children did not gain citizenship since they possessed American citizenship from birth. Again, like I said in my first post, I haven't seen anything like that mentioned elsewhere, but then again my case seems unique.

I still haven't received a reply from Charsky, perhaps I should try sending an email directly (as opposed to using the online submission page). As I said in my previous post, if it turns out that the translated article is correct, I guess I would have one last shot trying to gain citizenship via my great-grandmother, who was born in Canada en-route to the United States (and thus did not have US citizenship via birth)...Canada did not have citizenship via birth until 1947, thought it does seem like she *may* have become a British subject (what distinction there is between that and citizenship I'm not sure).