Most of us here are familiar with the name of Sir John Marks Templeton — not the least because the media have repeatedly reminded us who he is when they bring up the topic of renouncing U.S. citizenship. He was the prototypical “wealthy American fleeing to a tax haven”, though of course his later philanthropy made him too sympathetic a figure for the simplistic, black-and-white picture that journalists love to paint of “selfish traitors who refuse to pay their fair share”, and so his name is less mentioned these days in comparison to those who left more recently, like Denise Rich and Eduardo Saverin.
But a few years before Templeton made his famous move to the Bahamas, another American went and made a name for himself by discussing his desire to give up his citizenship and resettle on that famous island of warm breezes and low taxes. Homeland newspaper hacks who read this description are probably chomping at the bit for yet another story of an Economic Benedict Arnold who would was so ungrateful for the Amazing Benefits of being a citizen of the Greatest Country on Earth that he would dare speak out publicly about shirking his God-given duty to the IRS. But that’s not quite what we have here: meet Mr. Cleveland Ferguson, Bahamian immigrant and disabled Korean War veteran.
