Petros responds to Steven J. Mopsick, 30-year IRS veteran latest comment, that some Canadians have probably found that the Overseas Voluntary Disclosure Initiative penalty of 27.5% is actually quite a good deal, since these Canadians are tax cheats and frauds. UPDATE: Steven J. Mopsick responds with a Jack and Jill scenario of a wealthy montréalais couple with a Swiss Bank account.
Are you planning to buy that condo in Florida? Don’t. If you have one already, sell it, even if you have to take a loss.
Are you planning on taking that company transfer to the United States? Politely tell your boss, thanks, but no thanks.
Steven J. Mopsick explains to us why certain Canadians would gladly hand 27.5% of their wealth, including real estate, over to the IRS, who obviously needs the money more than us filthy rich Canadian tax cheats:
To all. I would respectfully ask that you read my post today on the 2% Payroll Tax and what I wrote about the IRS Manual and penalty administration particularly, the duty the IRS has to administer the FBAR penalties in a reasonable manner.
@Petros: may I suggest a change of perspective. You don’t know every Canadian who may have entered into one of the OVDI programs. In fact for some of them, and some Canadians who may be signing up to make one right now, would be embarrassed to talk to you about it because FOR THEM IT WAS A GOOD DEAL! THEY HAD BEEN FILING FALSE TAX RETURNS. In some cases, they would have done jail time had the IRS come to them first. Again, OVDI is not for everyone. Sadly, some people receivd bad advice about OVDI and did not properly weigh their options. I guess some tried to do it themselves. That said,
It’s one thing to be listed in a computer data base. It’s quite another for a government program to hunt for your name and spit it out for special abuse.
If you haven’t had any reason to think of the IRS for a period of the recent ten or twenty past years, you probably don’t have anything to worry about..
Respectfully submitted,
30 Year IRS Vet
If the IRS thinks it is ok to raid the RRSPs of Canadians, the War of 2012 really has begun. I think these two paragraphs tell us more about what is going on inside of the heads of the IRS than anything I’ve ever read; it reveals the mentality of Mordor.
Our Canadian friend, IJ, who made the mistake of moving to the states a few years ago, asks for clarification:
@Steven,
“FOR THEM IT WAS A GOOD DEAL! THEY HAD BEEN FILING FALSE TAX RETURNS. In some cases, they would have done jail time had the IRS come to them first.”Can you be more specific what facts would lead to jail time ?
Filing incorrect return with incorrect perception is not filing false return which IRS has to prove 1. affirmative act, 2. tax due, 3. acting willfully.
Did Tim Geithner file false return ? And so did Charles Rangel ?
IJ, is a Canadian in the 2011 OVDI, and he doesn’t think its a good deal at all. He is a minnow.
Unfortunately, there may be some other Canadians who live in the United States that have taken US citizenship there, but who find the OVDI a good deal. That I may grant. But they live in the jurisdiction of the United States. I just don’t know anyone like that. I don’t frequent the same country clubs.
As for those of us who are actually living in Canada, I can’t think of anyone who would see it as a good deal. I hate the extra-territorial tax reach of the United States. I believe its is evil and wrong. I believe any Canadian resident who pays an FBAR fine is inadvertently weakening the Canadian economy, and that it is a casus belli (Steven, casus belli is Latin for, “a reason to go to war”). Last I checked, Canada was a much needed ally of the United States: so why the hell are you raiding our retirement accounts? That is not the act of a friend but of an enemy.
I have much more to say to Steven, but I am absolutely tongue-tied, because the fury that I feel is keeping me from thinking straight. So I am going to take this to the Isaac Brock readership. Does anyone out there know of any Canadian residents and/or Canadian citizens, who think that the OVDI is actually a good deal because they are tax cheats and they have been filing fraudulent returns?
Originally published 7:33 am February 20, 2012
@sxhubert1975, I’n not a lawyer either, but I totally agree that a signed oath like you have ought to be indesputable evidence that you clearlhy intended to five up your US citizenship.
@Roger: LOL at “while even others insists that it means born naturally through a vaginal delivery as proposed to a Ceserian section.”
Unfortunately, I suspect some may actually believe that. A prominent Republican candidate is currently talking about allowing states to ban contraception, so there are probably those who believe the above as well.
@Schubert: I was aware you didn’t know what a CLN was. I just wish I had written to Kissinger as well. Silly me, I simply believed then (and continued to believe for almost 40 years!) that the clear information the US Consulate gave me was honest and accurate. That’s part of the reason I don’t want to go anywhere near them to get a CLN now. History has shown me they can’t be trusted.
@Blaze, I haven’t heard any Republican candidate suggesting the states ought to be able to ban conraception. That would like banning water from flowing down hill. But what I have heard several mentioning is the Federal Government should not be able to force health insurance companies insuring employees of religious organizations that frown on contraception to provide contraceptives at no charge to their employees. You have a very different health care system in Canada. This is a freedom of religion issue rather than a health care issue.
@ Tiger: “I also had to swear the following Renunciation Oath ‘I hereby renounce all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign sovereign or state of whom or which I may at this time be a subject or citizen’. Now I was brought up to believe that swearing on a bible before God was sacred and I see no reason why that is no longer the case!”
Your comment brought to mind lyrics from an old Phil Ochs protest song, (paraphrasing the US motto), “And heaven only knows in which God they can trust!”
@ Roger Conklin @ pacifica777 and @ Schubert1975
The renunciation Oath followed the Oath of Allegiance to the Queen and her heirs. I agree with Schubert and pacifica, putting a hand on bible and renouncing any allegiance to a foreign sovereign, certainly should prove your intent was to give up your prior citizenship.
I have applied through the “Access to Information and Privacy Commissioner” for a copy to that oath which will bear my signature.
Having said all of the above, like Blaze, I don’t trust the Americans anymore and I don’t plan on going anywhere near them to obtain a CLN.
I’ve been an avid fan of this blog for the past several weeks, gleaning much from your very astute observations and lively conversations, but hesitant to add my own 2 cents’ worth which so far seems not as valuable as many of yours. When I read usxcanada’s question “Is there anyone out there besides accidental Schubert1975 who now possesses a precious CLN?” I knew I needed to share my husband’s experience.
We came to Canada in the mid-70s and very soon realized that this would be our lifetime home. As soon as he was eligible, my hubby, Mr. Ladybug, applied for Canadian citizenship and achieved it in early 1979. As the U.S. didn’t allow dual citizenship at that time, he KNEW that he was no longer a U.S. citizen. A few weeks ago when the IRS’ latest intentions became news around here, we began to look for a letter we knew he had received back then from the U.S. Govt. but weren’t sure was still around. In fact, we thought it had probably been lost in the shuffle many years ago. We both could remember his receiving it, although much of what was in it was pretty fuzzy in our minds after more than 30 years. However, our recollection was that it gave him a certain amount of time to respond if he did not want to lose his U.S. citizenship and if he did not respond they would “lose it for him.”
A couple of weeks ago Mr. LB brought up from the storeroom many boxes of files from the past and placed them all in the living room, saying that he was going to look through these reams of paper and find that document if, indeed, it still existed. Well, would you believe it, the first file that he took out of the first box was titled “U.S. Citizenship Relinquishment Docs – Very Important.” That looked promising! Inside were letters, documents and the much desired CLN (which we didn’t even remember he had received). And I thought I’d outgrown believing in guardian angels!
Here’s the sequence of events: Exactly a year after becoming a Canadian citizen, he received a letter from the U.S. Consulate in our province stating that “information available to this office indicates that you were naturalized as a citizen of Canada on —- 1979 upon your own application.” It went on to say that he may thereby have lost U.S. citizenship. A form was attached that Mr. LB could complete regarding his “possible loss” of U.S. nationality. It went on to state that “if we have not received a reply from you within 60 days we will assume that you do not wish to submit any information or evidence for consideration in making a decision regarding the loss of your United States nationality.” Mr. LB did nothing as he considered himself no longer a U.S. citizen and he did not wish to regain his citizenship. Four months later another letter came (both letters were double registered) and this one informed him once again that it appeared he was giving up his U.S. citizenship and stated “If you fail to reply to this letter within sixty days of the date of this letter your silence will be considered to mean that you intended to relinquish your United States Citizenship by your action in obtaining voluntary naturalization in Canada. In that event a final determination will be made that you voluntarily expatriated yourself under the provisions of Section 349(a)(1) of the Immigration and Nationality Act with the intention to relinquish your United States citizenship.”
In June, 1981 (a full two years after he actually relinquished and more than a year after the Consulate’s first letter) Mr. LB received his official Certificate of Loss of Nationality of the United States complete with an official seal (does yours have a seal on it, Schubert?). It also had a form attached which the Consulate had sent a year earlier to the Canadian Citizenship Registration Branch requesting information on the granting of his citizenship.
I know this doesn’t help those who are wondering if they can get a backdated CLN now but it does answer the question, “Is there another CLN out there anywhere?” I’m so happy to report that my guy has one and is sitting in the catbird seat!
Meantime, I’m still a dual citizen pondering my options, but that’s a story for another time. This is a bit of a long introduction but I thought you would be interested in some of the details of our excellent adventure into outdated, but thankfully preserved, files. Just wish it had taken him a little longer to find his CLN and he might have cleaned out a few of those files!
@ Ladybug,
Actually, I believe it does help people like myself, Blaze and others who have this clear recollection that when we became Canadians back in the 70’s, 80’s or earlier, we were relinquishing our U.S. citizenship. I myself feel it is more proof that the Americans really believe we did give up our citizenship because we did nothing or filed nothing with a consulate to retain the citizenship of the u.s. I for one plan on printing out your post as possible proof, should I need it that I am truly NOT AN AMERICAN.
Thanks for joining our post, Ladybug. And luck Mr. Ladybug!
@All and @Lady Bug
Today, throughout most of the world including parts of North America, “show me your papers” is considered a minor inconvenience of modern life. I certainly don’t speak for the government, and I know the US Immigration and Naturalization Service is perhaps the number one US agency which has the reputation for being the most obnoxious and difficult to deal with but very, very few Canadians will ever get a request from the Internal Revenue Service asking where your tax return is now that we have FATCA. Why would they write to you?
There is probably going to be a ground swell of political support against the FATCA idea of your local Canadian bank becoming a withholding agent for the IRS. Whether you win that battle will depend on how well your government leaders represent you in their talks in Washington. Do the people representing you now have the strength to tell the Treasury Department “hell no” on the names of our “American” depositors!!? I have no idea and will admit to a common American habit of not paying attention to the government and politics of our neighboring nations.
If your government cannot reach an accord on the Canadian privacy issue, then probably sometime in 2016 or 2017, after all the FATCA bells and whistles are installed in the new banking FATCA computers, your private bank information is going to get mixed up with some US Treasury /IRS computer program and data base. If there is something in this cross checked program which causes the machine to blow a fuse when it comes to your name, a few months later a person will review what the government has and then decide if he wants to send you an invitation to chat about your taxes, and if appropriate, file a return. Or if there are a lot of fuse blowers, more than the IRS can handle with a person on the job, a Canadian could get a computer generated letter asking if you think you should file a return under our voluntary self reporting system please do so. If not,”if our phone still ain’t ringin we’ll assume it still ain’t you”
Respectfully submitted,
30 Year IRS Vet
@ Steven
I personally would like to thank you for your contributions to the IBS. You have been amazing resilient under alot of pressure from most of the members of this blog. At times, I have to admit that I have thought “we are shooting the messenger”.
I hope your observations above prove to be true and I hope that the FATCA regulations get either changed or go away completely. However, I am not an optimist that they will “go away”. I also hope and pray that our government will protect all of us who are citizens of this land. As I still have siblings in the United States, I also hope that I will be able to cross the border to visit them, since my plan is to do nothing as I have considered myself to be only a Canadian for 40 years.
Your ambassador to Canada, Mr. Jacobson, stated some time ago, that the IRS did not plan on going after the “grandmas and grandpas” of the world. Well, I am one of those grandmas and I have not had alot of good sleeps in the last few months.As “Just Me” has said in many of his posts “This really does use up too many LCUs”.
I do thank you again. We all have had alot of fun with “Jack and Jill”. I really wouldn’t mind meeting them someday. I think even after paying all their penalties to the IRS (and of course we know they must owe penalties also to the CRA), they certainly have alot more money than I have ever seen.
@Roger your post back at 6:10am 02/22 says
But in one sense the US is a tax haven because interest earned by deposits in accounts owned by non-resident foreign citizens is not taxed by the IRS.
You have missed an important point – this interest is NOT TAXABLE anywhere else in the world. Whilst it may be interesting to know of large offshore accounts, it is not for income tax purposes
Ladybug – Thanks so much for sharing your story. Interesting and useful. The narrative shows astounding zeal and tenacity on the part of some consular agent. Like schubert1975, this is another case of a successful rummaging through happily preserved detritus producing an ancient CLN.
Petros has been waiting almost a year now, I think. Various others have logged onto the CLN queue. Somewhere nobledreamer took a shot at producing a list of waiters. When will IBrockers see a first report of a modern CLN in hand?
Is getting CLN an antidote to the spread of VD?
@P33t, Is the US the only country in the world that taxes interest income? I confess to not being an expert on this, but I believe it is taxed in Brazil, including interest earned abroad by residents of Brazil. I know that both domestic and foreign interest income was taxed when I lived there 36+ years back. Please enlighten me further on this.
@ Canada taxes interest income. Also Canada has a the lowest interest rate in the world that I know of, intentionally lower than the United States. This is creating a housing bubble here. A couple of years ago, Canada created a TFSA so that you can invest in a savings account and not be taxed on it. But who can afford to have a “high interest” savings account at 2% when the annual rate of inflation is probably around 10%?
My experience similar to Mr. Ladybug’s: I became a Canadian citizen in 1973. In 1976 I received two registered letters, seven months apart, from the embassy, telling me that if I did not respond within 60 days my silence would be considered to mean that I intended to relinquish my U.S. citizenship. I did not respond. In 1977 I received a CLN, which like Mr. Ladybug I put away and forgot about, not realizing until recently its value. Mine too is now is a safety deposit box. Over the years people who should have known better demeaned its value by saying things like, “Oh, they just wanted to make you feel bad.” “What did you do to p*** them off?” “Oh, they handed those things out like candy.” I find it interesting that the letters, written in 1976, used the phrase “intended to relinquish,” which anticipates the Supreme Court decision Vance v. Terrazas in 1980. It was this decision that established guidelines for the State Department in the matter of taking away a citizen’s citizenship. Prior to 1980 State presumed that anyone taking out citizenship in another country intended to lose their U.S. citizenship. The Court ruling – that they had to presume that citizens wanted to keep their citizenship – led Congress to change the Immigration and Nationality Act in 1986 and State to change its policy regarding loss of nationality in 1990. I don’t think it can be said that U.S. consulates lied when they told those who became Canadian citizens in the 1970s that they had thereby lost their U.S. citizenship. Such a statement was lawful up until the Court ruling in 1980. However, that doesn’t mean they are now U.S. citizens, in my view. The Court found that intent to relinquish can be expressed in words or can be found as a fair inference from conduct. Many contributors to this website have mentioned actions such as believing they gave up their U.S. citizenship on becoming Canadian, not filing U.S. taxes, not having a U.S. passport, working and paying taxes in Canada for many years, and so on. It is surely a “fair inference” from these beliefs and actions to say that these people are not U.S. citizens.
@TomOn
I totally agree with you. My research also showed up the 1980 Supreme Court ruling and the 1986 Amendment to the INA (Immigration and Nationality Act). Many of us posting on this site (and we now number quite a few), have believed for 40 years that we are not U.S. citizens and none of our actions speak otherwise. I really don’t believe the IRS wants to end up in court over this and it is perhaps why Steven in an earlier post indicated to all of us “Don’t make the day of the IRS” by throwing a bunch of late returns at them.
@TomOn and Ladybug
WELCOME! I was beginning to wonder if I were the only person in Canada who stumbled onto a long-forgotten and long-ignored CLN in a panic when I first heard about OVDI and all that jazz in August. (Thank God my wife and I, unlike some others, decided not to “come forward” under OVDI, on the grounds that, if it’s an amnesty, it’s for criminals and coming forward is a tacit admission you’re a criminal, and we’re not criminals and have done nothing wrong, so why would we apply for this nightmare? Not on your sweet Nelly.)
Yes my CLN does have an embossed seal of the Vice-Consul of the US Embassy in Ottawa, plus his signature plus the signature of the Director of the Passport Office in Washington. The seal doesn’t photocopy at all, as it’s embossed and not printed, but it’s still visible on the original. Unlike the snazzy new CLNs, mine doesn’t have the “great seal of the US” (the eagle with the arrows in the claws and the shield over its chest) at the top, but it’s still very official. The blanks are all filled out by typewriter (remember typewriters?).
@Ladybug VERY IMPORTANT PLEASE. You would do many persons on this website a HUGE service if you could have your husband make a photocopy of the letter he got from State telling him “if we don’t hear a compelling reason otherwise from you by X date, zap you’re no longer American.” Have him blank out on the copy with black marker pen his name and address, but please leave the date of the letter visible. Then scan or photograph the document (with a digital camera) and post the resulting JPG as an attachment to a post in this thread or, much preferably, start a new thread titled something like “proof that in the 1970s you automatically lost your US citizenship on becoming a foreign national as standard practice” and post the attachment there.
I never got that notice, but then I triggered my CLN by writing a snarky letter to the Secretary of State which made it very clear what I thought of my former US citizenship and what Kissinger could do with it. But that notice is potentially VERY important evidence to support a whole lot of relinquishment cases, especially those going back before about 1980 or whenever the US changed its tune. This reinforces in print, on an official government letterhead, the “common understanding” that we all had back then about all this.
If you don’t know how to do attach a JPG to a post, register on the Brock forum (upper right side of home page for link) and send Schubert1975 a private email and either I’ll explain in detail or tell you how to get the attachment to me and I’ll post it for you.
@Schubert1975 and @ Ladybug
Thanks you Schubert for suggesting this to Ladybug. I would so love to have that “blacked out” copy and I have no doubt Blaze and others would also appreciate it. I wish we did not need all this proof but as FATCA evolves and regulations become final, I fear we will need the proof of loss of citizenship for our Financial Institutions. So Ladybug, please do scan, photograph and post the document.
@ Ladybug Hi rather than deface the document itself, send the scan in jpg format and I can “photoshop” it (I actually use Corel Paint, Canadian software).
@ladybug
@TomOn
I would be interested in knowing how those letters came to be spit out. When you became Canadian citizens did you yourselves inform the American government or was Canada sending out some paperwork to inform the US that “Mr. Ladybug” and “TomOn” have become Canadian citizens and have therefore expatriated themselves.
@Petros, Ladybug
please note I said black out on a PHOTOCOPY of the original, not the original itself …
@ Schubert: my bad.
@TomOn: Thanks for posting. I agree with you, but I suspect at least part of the reason the Embassy sent you a CLN was because they wanted to “punish” you for the audacity of becoming a citizen of another country.
Little did they know today that CLN would be like Gold. Just don’t tell Doug Shulman–He will declare you a “US Person” (not citizen!) and demand the gold back at 2012 value.
How did US Embassy know you had you had become Canadian? Was there someone from Consulate or Embassy at your ceremony? Did you contact them? Did CIC contact them?
I recall someone from Consulate at my 1973 ceremony. I signed a document with that man (Of course it was a man, women weren’t hired in responsible positions then). I was certain I recalled the words “permanent and irrevocable.” Sure enough, in information Tiger sent me, those exact words are used.
TomOn, based on your experience, I may finally have a clue why I didn’t get a CLN. You received two registered letters in 1976, three years after your 1973 ceremony. By 1976, I had moved twice. In fact, the apartment building where I lived in 1973 was torn down for a parking lot (“They took Paradise and turned it into a parking lot”–Joni Mitchell, Big Yellow Taxi–I digress). So, if US Embassy sent a letter to that address, neither I nor the building were still there. The letter may have been returned No Such Address or Addressee Unknown. By 1977, when you received your CLN, I had moved a third time (I really am a stable person–very few moves since then!). I never reported a change of address to US Consulate. I didn’t even think of it–I wasn’t a US citizen.
Were you at the same address in 1976 as you were in 1973?
Information Tiger uncovered on DOS website is complex, but intriguing. Tiger, I hope you don’t mind, I’m posting a link to that information:
http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/109065.pdf
@Ladybug: Are you kidding me?!? You didn’t think your contributions were as “valuable as many” of us?!? You have no idea how valuable your contributions are (But like TomOn’s CLN turning into gold, we won’t report your worth to IRS!)
As you may know, I am the casting director for War of 1812: The Movie. You have just been cast as Head of CSIS. Mr LB is Lead Investigator. I hope you will both accept the roles.
@Steven: You ask “Why would they write” to us after FATCA. Again, I ask Are you kidding me?!? Because they want to charge us massive penalties for not reporting our earnings, savings and investments for the last 40 or more years, which have already been taxed in our country of residence. Otherwise, why are they demanding the information?
IRS didn’t care about us 40 years ago. We didn’t have any money then. Of course, we didn’t–We were young. Now that we’re near or in retirement, we have retirement savings, homes with mortgagees paid off (and not subject to capital gains because interest on our mortgages was not deductible from our Canadian income), investments, etc.
We have these assets because, as responsible Canadians, we did exactly what our Canadian government asked us to: We planned for our retirements with income earned, saved and taxed in Canada.
In terms of blowing a fuse, I will admit that’s something the US has always been good at. Unfortunately, it’s others who end up in the dark when the lights go off out in the cold when the heat goes off.
Unlike, California, it gets pretty cold in Canada in the winter. We’re a hardy bunch! .But, we still wish our American neighbours would stop blowing fuses!
@Blaze and for other information:
Much as I’d like to believe that CLNs were issued as a form of punishment, I don’t think that’s strictly the case. It is my understanding that once, for whatever reason and by whatever means, a consular official or maybe someone else in DOS learns that you’ve committed a potentially expatriating act, the law and department procedure requires that they attempt to contact you to ascertain whether it was voluntary and with intent to relinquish. Prior to a Supreme Court decision in the 1980s, your burden of proof was that it wasn’t voluntary or intentional of reqlinquishment, if you said yes to both, they accepted that and you got a CLN. After the Supreme Court, the burden is now on you to prove it was intentional to relinquish, or at least to swear to that effect under oath and to substantiate per Question 13 on Form 2079. If you say “no it wasn’t voluntary” or “no that wasn’t my intent” they now accept that without question and issue some sort of confirmation that you still are a US citizen (which in this case presumably is what you want, if you said “no” to either or both questions).
But I don’t think punishment enters into the DOS actions, though arguably that was the intent of the legislators who passed the provisions of Section 349. I’d love to believe that Kissinger wanted to punish me and now it’s backfired on him or whoever at State, but I honestly don’t believe that is likely what happened.
And yes Blaze, I think your address changes might very well be a factor in your lack of a CLN, especially if the address change occurred soon after your citizenship ceremony and encounter with the US consular official at that event. Given what you’ve said, you definitely should have received a CLN or at least one of the letters that Ladybug’s husband and TomOn got. Either that, or the official was abjectly derelict in his duty if he didn’t report you as having committed an expatriating act. That was his job, and if he went out of his way to caution you about what you were about to do, he should also have reported you to higher authority or recommended preparation of a CLN once he was aware (if he was aware) that you’d ignored his advice and proceeded. In any case someone at DOS should have contacted you afterward for clarification.
I’ve never worked in the US government, but I did work in the Government of Canada. Bureaucracies tend to function much the same in any country, and I think my interpretation is correct.
Will be interesting whether your ATI request for your citizenship file unearths any reference to the consular officer or correspondence with DOS (though in the latter case, intergovernmental communication is usually not included in ATI reports but is blanked out under the legislation protecting intergovernmental correspondence).
If there were some way of querying at State or at the Embassy whether in fact a CLN ever was issued to you but you never got it, that might be interesting, but I can’t think how you could do that without “outing” yourself to them, and I’m not recommending you try. (Yet another nasty Catch-22, there are lots of those floating around here, aren’t there?)
@schubert1975
Our reasoning too: OVDI was administered through the Criminal Justice Department. We weren’t criminals, so OVDI wasn’t for us.
@hijacked2012
After becoming Canadian citizens, in 1973, we sent a note in 1974 to the IRS informing them that as Canadian citizens we were no longer U.S. citizens and would therefore no longer be filing 1040s. If we were mistaken, we continued, please let us know. Never heard from them again. They had been sending us tax forms each year. They sent no tax forms for 1974 or for any year thereafter.
@Blaze
I agree re the punish angle. At the time I wrote to State to point out the vindictive appearance of their actions…. I don’t know how the embassy knew I’d become Canadian. There was no one from the embassy at the ceremony (that I know of). Nobody approached me with a document to sign…. Not having received a CLN, my wife called the embassy after I got mine to clarify her status. She was told, as you and many others were, that she was definitely not a U.S. citizen. As I recall, I also complained in my letter to State about the hostility she encountered at the embassy…. Lest you think that only men received CLNs, which we thought for a very long time, we know of a woman who received one. To please her mother, she returned her CLN to the embassy (or did they snatch it back?) and then went through the restore process to get her U.S. citizenship back. Her unfortunate experience makes a point: If those without CLNs are still U.S. citizens, why the need to go through a restore process to get the U.S. citizenship back? As I understand it, the restore process requires, among other things, signing that you did not intend to relinquish U.S. citizenship on becoming Canadian…. Your frequent moves in 1973 may be the reason you didn’t get the two registered letters that Mr. Ladybug and I got followed by a CLN (over a two-year period by the way). We were at the same address from 1973 on. Before that, we moved frequently, and they never had any trouble getting through to us.