| United States passport | |
The front cover of a contemporary United States biometric passport (2007)
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Front of a passport card (2009)
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| Date first issued | August 2007 (biometric passport booklet) |
| Issued by | United States |
| Type of document | Passport |
| Purpose | Identification |
| Eligibility requirements | Citizens and non-citizen nationals |
| Expiration | 10 years after acquisition for adults; 5 years for minors under 16 |
United States passports are passports issued to citizens and non-citizen nationals of the United States of America.[1] They are issued exclusively by the U.S. Department of State.[2] Besides issuing passports (in booklet form), also limited use passport cards are issued by the same organization subject to the same requirements.[3]
U.S. passport booklets are valid for travel by Americans anywhere in the world, although travel to certain countries and/or for certain purposes may require a visa and the U.S. itself restricts its nationals from traveling to or engaging in commercial transactions in certain countries. They conform with recommended standards (i.e., size, composition, layout, technology) of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).[4] There are five types of passport booklets; as well, the Department of State has issued only e-passports as standard since August 2007, though non-biometric passports are valid until their expiry dates.[5]
American consular officials issued passports to some citizens of some of the thirteen states during the War for Independence (1775–1783). Passports were sheets of paper printed on one side, included a description of the bearer, and were valid for three to six months. The minister to France, Benjamin Franklin, based the design of passports issued by his mission on that of the French passport.[6]
The Department of Foreign Affairs of the war period also issued passports, and the department, carried over by the Articles of Confederation government (1783–1789), continued to issue passports. In July, 1789, the Department of Foreign Affairs was carried over by the government established under the Constitution. In September of that year, the name of the department was changed to Department of State. The department handled foreign relations and issued passports, and, until the mid-nineteenth century, had various domestic duties.
For decades thereafter, passports were issued not only by the Department of State but also by states and cities, and by notaries public. Passports issued by American authorities other than the Department of State breached propriety and caused confusion abroad. Some European countries refused to recognize passports not issued by the Department of State, unless United States consular officials endorsed them. The problems led the Congress in 1856 to give to the Department of State sole authority to issue passports.[7][8]
From 1776 to 1783, no state government had a passport requirement. The Articles of Confederation government (1783–1789) did not have a passport requirement.
From 1789 through late 1941, the government established under the Constitution required passports of citizens only during the American Civil War (1861–1865) and during and shortly after World War I (1914–1918). The passport requirement of the Civil War era lacked statutory authority. After the outbreak of World War I, passports were required by executive order,[9] though there was no statutory authority for the requirement. The Travel Control Act of May 22, 1918 permitted the president, when the United States was at war, to proclaim a passport requirement, and a proclamation was issued on August 18, 1918. Though World War I ended on November 11, 1918, the passport requirement lingered until March 3, 1921.[10]
There was an absence of a passport requirement under United States law between 1921 and 1941. World War II (1939–1945) again led to passport requirements under the Travel Control Act of 1918. A 1978 amendment to the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 made it illegal to to enter or depart the United States without an issued passport even in peacetime.[11]
The contemporary period of required passports for Americans under United States law began on November 29, 1941.[12]
In Europe, general peace between the end of the Napoleonic Wars (1815) and the beginning of World War I (1914), and development of railroads, gave rise to international travel by large numbers of people. Passports were not usually required; there were limited wars which caused some exceptions. Countries such as Czarist Russia and the Ottoman Empire maintained passport requirements. During World War I (1914–1918), European countries had passport requirements. After that war, many European countries retained their passport requirements. Foreign passport requirements undercut the absence of a passport requirement for Americans, under United States law, between 1921 and 1941.
Even when passports were not usually required, U.S. passports were requested by Americans. Records of the Department of State show that 130,360 passports were issued between 1810 and 1873, and that 369,844 passports were issued between 1877 and 1909. Some of those passports were family passports or group passports. A passport application could cover, variously, a wife, a child or children, one or more servants, or a female traveling under the protection of a man. The passport would be issued to the man. Similarly, a passport application could cover a child traveling with its mother. The passport would be issued to the mother. The number of Americans who traveled without passports is unknown.[13]
The League of Nations held a conference in 1920 concerning passports and through-train travel, and conferences in 1926 and 1927 concerning passports. The 1920 conference put forward guidelines on the layout and features of passports, which the 1926 and 1927 conferences followed up. Those guidelines were steps in the shaping of contemporary passports. One of the guidelines was about 32-page passport booklets, such as the U.S. type III mentioned in this section, below. Another guideline was about languages in passports. See Languages, below.
A conference on travel and tourism held by the United Nations in 1963 did not result in standardised passports. Passport standardization was accomplished in 1980 under the auspices of the International Civil Aviation Organization.
The design and contents of U.S. passports changed over the years.[14] For example, in 1926, the Department of State introduced the type III passport. This had a stiff red cover, with a window cutout through which the passport number was visible. That style of passport contained 32 pages.[15]
American passports had green covers from 1941 until 1976, when the cover was changed to blue, as part of the U.S. bicentennial celebration. Green covers were again issued from April, 1993, until March, 1994, and included a special one-page tribute to Benjamin Franklin in commemoration of the 200th anniversary of the United States Consular Service.
In 1981, the United States became the first country to introduce machine-readable passports.[16] In 2000, the Department of State started to issue passports with digital photos, and as of 2010, all previous series have expired.
In fiscal year 2007, the Department of State issued 18,382,798 passports.[17]
In 2006, the Department of State began to issue biometric passports to diplomats and other officials.[18] Later in 2006, biometric passports were issued to the public.[19] Since August 2007, the department has issued only biometric passports. An issued non-biometric will remain valid until its stated date of expiration, with the final non-biometric passports expiring on August 1, 2017.[20]
Within the Department of State, responsibility for passport issuance lies with Passport Services, a unit of the Bureau of Consular Affairs.
Passport Services operates twenty-two regional passport agencies in the United States to serve the general public.[21] The most recent additions include the opening of public counters at the National Passport Center in New Hampshire and at the Arkansas Agency, as well as opening New York's second regional agency in Buffalo in October 2010.[22] Additionally, Passport Services plans to open regional agencies in El Paso, Texas, Atlanta, Georgia and San Diego, California in 2011.[23] Passport applications most of these locations require citizens provide proof of travel within 14 days of the application date, or who need to obtain foreign visas before traveling.
There are about 9,000 passport acceptance facilities in the United States, designated by Passport Services, at which routine passport applications may be filed. These facilities include United States courts, state courts, post offices, public libraries, county offices and city offices.[24]
An application for a United States passport made abroad is forwarded by a U.S. embassy or consulate to Passport Services for processing in the United States. The resulting passport is sent to the embassy or consulate for issuance to the applicant. An emergency passport is issuable by the embassy or consulate. As per Haig v. Agee, the Presidential administration may deny or revoke passports for foreign policy or national security reasons at any time. Perhaps the most notable example of enforcement of this ability was the 1948 denial of a passport to U.S. Representative Leo Isacson, who sought to go to Paris to attend a conference as an observer for the American Council for a Democratic Greece, a Communist front organization, because of the group's role in opposing the Greek government in the Greek Civil War.[25][26]
U.S. passport expediting companies are companies registered through the U.S. Department of State’s National Hand Courier Program to submit passport applications to the Regional Passport Agencies on the behalf of others. For individuals that are traveling in sooner than fourteen days and are unable to submit their application in person at one of the Regional Passport Agencies, passport expediting companies may provide assistance.
As a condition to be registered through the National Hand Courier Program, U.S. passport expediters are held to a strict code of conduct, which includes background screenings of all employees who handle passport applications. Additionally, companies must follow procedures to safeguard applicants' personal information.
United States passports are issuable only to persons who owe permanent allegiance to the United States – i.e., citizens and non-citizen nationals of the United States.[27]
"All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States ..."[28] Under this provision, "United States" means the 50 states and the District of Columbia only.[29]
By acts of Congress, every person born in Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands is a United States citizen by birth.[30] Also, every person born in the former Panama Canal Zone whose father or mother (or both) are or were a citizen is a United States citizen by birth.[31]
Other acts of Congress provide for acquisition of citizenship by persons born abroad.[32]
Every citizen is a national of the United States. Not every national is a citizen. There is a small class of American Samoans, born in American Samoa, including Swains Island, who are nationals but not citizens of the United States,[33] See Passport message, below.
United States law permits dual nationality.[34] Consequently, having and using a foreign passport are permissible. However, when a U.S. citizen uses a passport to leave or enter the United States, they're required to use a U.S. passport.[35] This requirement extends to a U.S. citizen who is a dual national.[36]
The Department of State does not get many requests for certificates of non-citizenship nationality, which are issuable by the department. Production of a limited number of certificates would be costly, and, if produced, certificates would have to meet security standards. Accordingly, the Department of State chose not to issue certificates of non-citizen nationality. Instead, the department issues passports to non-citizen nationals. An issued passport certifies the status of a non-citizen national.[47] The certification is in the form of an endorsement in the passport: "The bearer of this passport is a United States national and not a United States citizen."
More than one valid United States passport of the same type may not be held, except if authorized by the Department of State.[48]
It is routine for the Department of State to authorize a holder of a regular passport to hold, in addition, a diplomatic passport or an official passport or a no-fee passport.
One circumstance which may call for issuance of a second passport of a particular type is a prolonged visa-processing delay. Another is safety or security, such as travel between Israel and a country which refuses to grant entry to a person with a passport which indicates travel to Israel. The period of validity of a second passport issued under either circumstance is generally two years from the date of issue.[49]
Those who need a second identification document in addition to the US passport may hold a U.S. passport card. This passport card is used by US citizens living abroad when they need to renew their regular passport book, renew their residency permit or apply for a visa - in other words, when they cannot show their regular passport yet are required by local law to carry valid identification.
On the front cover, a representation of the Great Seal of the United States is at the center. "PASSPORT" (in all capital letters) appears above the representation of the Great Seal, and "United States of America" (in Garamond italic) appears below.
An Official passport has "OFFICIAL" (in all capital letters) above "PASSPORT". The capital letters of "OFFICIAL" are somewhat smaller than the capital letters of "PASSPORT".
A Diplomatic passport has "DIPLOMATIC" (in all capital letters) above "PASSPORT". The capital letters of "DIPLOMATIC" are somewhat smaller than the capital letters of "PASSPORT".
A Travel Document, in both forms (Refugee Travel Document and Permit to Re-Enter), features the seal of the Department of Homeland Security instead of the Great Seal of the United States. Above the seal the words "TRAVEL DOCUMENT" appears in all capital letters. Below the seal is the legend "Issued by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services" in upper and lower case.
A biometric passport has the e-passport symbol at the bottom.
There are 32 pages in a biometric passport. Frequent travelers may be issued 52-page passports. Extra visa pages may be added to a passport.[50] Extra visa pages can be added by mail (if the passport holder resides in the U.S.) and at most U.S. embassies and consulates (if the passport holder resides or visits a country overseas). The addition of visa pages used to be free, but as of July 13, 2010, the service costs $82.
Each passport has a data page and a signature page.
A data page has a visual zone and a machine-readable zone. The visual zone has a digitized photograph of the passport holder, data about the passport, and data about the passport holder:
The machine-readable zone is present at the bottom of the page and starts with P<USA.
A signature page has a line for the signature of a passport holder. A passport is not valid until it is signed by the passport holder. If a holder is unable to sign his passport, it is to be signed by a person who has legal authority to sign on the holder's behalf.[51]
The standards for the names of places of birth that appear in passports are listed in volume 7 of the Foreign Affairs Manual, published by the Department of State.[52][53] For places within the US, it contains the State and country, but for places outside the US, only the country is mentioned. The name of the country is the current name of the country that is presently in control of the territory the place of birth and thus changes upon a change of a country name. Special provisions are in place for people born in Palestine/Israel. Place of birth was first added to U.S. passports in 1917. A request to list no place of birth in a passport is never accepted.[54] A citizen born outside the United States may be able to have his city or town of birth entered in his passport, if he or she objects to the standard country name. However, if a foreign country denies a visa or entry due to the place-of-birth designation, the Department of State will issue a replacement passport at normal fees, and will not facilitate entry into the foreign country.[55]
Standards for passport photographs are listed among the FAQs of the Department of State, Bureau of Consular Affairs website.[56] The standards are:
Passports of many countries contain a message, nominally from the official who is in charge of passport issuance (e.g., secretary of state, minister of foreign affairs), addressed to authorities of other countries. The message identifies the bearer as a citizen of the issuing country, requests that he or she be allowed to enter and pass through the other country, and requests further that, when necessary, he or she be given help consistent with international norms. In United States passports, the message is in English, French and Spanish. The message is:
In English:
in French:
and in Spanish:
The term "citizen/national" and its equivalent terms ("citoyen ou ressortissant"; "ciudadano o nacional") are in the message, as some people born in American Samoa, including Swains Island, are nationals but not citizens of the United States.
The masculine inflections of "Le Secrétaire d'Etat" and "El Secretario de Estado" are used in all passports, regardless of the Secretary of State's gender at the time of issuance.
Fees for applying vary based on whether or not an applicant is applying for a new passport or they are renewing an expiring passport. Fees also vary depending on whether an applicant is under the age of 16.
First time adult applicants pay application fees of $110 per passport book and $30 per passport card. Additionally, a $25 execution fee is charged separately for every application submitted. This means that if a person were to apply for the passport book and card simultaneously on the same application, they would pay only one execution fee.[57]
All minor applicants are considered first time applicants until they reach age 16. Minor applicants pay an $80 application fee for the passport book and a $15 application fee for the passport card. The same $25 execution fee is charged per application.[57]
Adults wishing to renew their passports may do so up to five years after expiration at a cost of $110 for the passport book and $30 for the passport card. Passports for minors under age 16 cannot be renewed.[57]
If a person is already in possession of a passport book and would like a passport card additionally (or vice versa), they may submit their currently valid passport book or card as evidence of citizenship and apply for a renewal to avoid paying the $25 execution fee. However, if the passport book or card holder is unable or unwilling to relinquish their currently valid passport for the duration of the processing, they may submit other primary evidence of citizenship, such as a US birth certificate or naturalization certificate, and apply as a first time applicant, paying the execution fee and submitting a written explanation as to why they are applying in this manner.[58]
At a League of Nations conference in 1920 about passports and through-train travel, a recommendation was that passports be written in French (historically, the language of diplomacy) and one other language.
English, the de-facto national language of the United States, has always been used in U.S. passports. At some point subsequent to 1920, English and French were used in passports. Spanish was added during the second Clinton administration, in recognition of Spanish-speaking Puerto Rico.
The field names on the data page, the passport message, the warning on the second page that the bearer is responsible for obtaining visas, and the designations of the amendments-and-endorsements pages, are printed in English, French and Spanish.
The legal driving force of biometric passports is the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2002, which states that smart-card Identity cards may be used in lieu of visas. That law also provides that foreigners who travel to the U.S., and want to enter the U.S. visa-free under the Visa Waiver Program, must bear machine-readable passports which comply with international standards. If a foreign passport was issued on or after October 26, 2006, that passport must be a biometric passport.
The chip of a U.S. passport stores an image of the photograph of the passport holder, passport data, and personal data of the passport holder; and has capacity to store additional data.[20] The capacity of the Radio-frequency identification (RFID) chip is 64 kilobytes, which is large enough to store biometric identifiers, such as fingerprints and retina scans, in addition to an image of a photograph, passport data and personal data.
Data in a passport chip is scannable by readers, a capability which is intended to speed up immigration processing. A passport does not have to be plugged into a reader in order for data therein to be read. Like toll-road chips, data in passport chips can be read when passport chips are proximate to readers. The passport cover contains a radio-frequency shield, so the cover must be opened for the data to be read.
According to the Department of State, the Basic Access Control (BAC) security protocol prevents access to that data unless the printed information within the passport is also known or can be guessed.[62]
According to privacy advocates, the BAC and the shielded cover are ineffective when a passport is open, and that a passport may have to be opened for inspection in a public place such as a hotel, a bank, or an Internet cafe. An open passport is subject to illicit reading of chip data, such as by a government agent who is tracking a passport holder's movements or by a criminal who is intending identity theft.[63]