German Citizenship – The Next Decade

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Article 116, Berlin, German citizenship

Things got off to a rocky start when Brian and I arrived at our local Rathaus to renew our German passports last month. With the stern tone of many a German bureaucrat, Frau O. admonished us that we needed two appointments rather than one to complete our business and that my passport photo did not meet German requirements. As we waited in stunned silence to see if our appointment would proceed, she delivered the final punch. She could not process our applications until she contacted the German Consulate in the U.S. to see if we had already requested new passports. What?

As my blood started to boil and my head spun with memories of the bureaucratic hurdles and delays from my first German passport application, Frau O. explained that she needed confirmation that we were not engaged in… I’m not quite sure what… subterfuge, identity theft, espionage??? Despite my proficient German, I could not understand the basis for this extra step in the process. This was a simple document renewal, not a claim for new rights or privileges.

As my emotional temperature rose and I tried to explain my family history through clenched teeth without crying, something happened that I’ve often observed with German officials. Frau O. became a lot nicer when she saw my distress and assured me that this was a routine procedure that would not cause a significant delay.

Bureaucratic rigamarole notwithstanding, it’s actually becoming easier for descendants of families persecuted by the Nazis to reclaim their German citizenship. Some of the exclusions which I’ve previously written about (see New Citizenship, New Responsibilities) have been eliminated and a new legal entitlement to citizenship for certain individuals and their descendants has been created. You can read about these changes on the German Consulate website.

Three weeks after our appointment with Frau O. and just before my birthday, we got the news that we were all clear for renewed passports. Time for a celebration at one of our favourite restaurants, Royals and Rice. Our documents still haven’t arrived, but my anxiety has abated and I trust I’ll have my new passport when I head to California to visit my sister next month.

Starting our second decade as German citizens reminds me of all the privileges and benefits we enjoy. Germany’s social democracy continues to provide citizens and residents with a strong safety net just as our family continues to have a higher standard of living than we did back in Montana. In fact, social benefits have gotten even better since we first moved here:

• Berlin provides free public transit passes for all school kids as of 2019

• no quarterly payments at the doctor’s office for people with public health insurance

• increase of monthly Kindergeld payment per child from 184 euros for your first two children in 2010 to 219 euros for your first two children in 2021

• free entrance to Berlin museums on the first Sunday of every month as of July 2021

German society still has many social ills to address and there’s much at stake in this weekend’s federal elections. In July I wrote about the need for the Jewish community to pursue a more inclusive approach in fighting hate and the role we can play in strengthening German democracy. Over the next year I will volunteer as a mentor for people at risk of dropping out of their educational programs. I can’t think of a better way to contribute than to support the educational pursuits of Germany’s increasingly diverse population.

Shelf Life

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Article 116, German citizenship, German Jews, Jewish migration

I never expected fame or fortune from a book about German Jews reclaiming their German citizenship. In fact, the positive reviews and publicity for A Place They Called Home quite exceeded my expectations. My eleven co-authors and I, most of us novices in the publishing world, were elated that our stories reached, and even touched, an audience of readers interested in our journey towards citizenship and reconciliation. The criticism I feared did not materialize (though it still could!!) and I allowed myself to indulge in a transient sense of pride in our collective accomplishment.

Gratitude and fulfillment notwithstanding, I’ve now learned firsthand that it can be even harder to market a book than to write and edit one. With no agent and a niche publisher of limited resources, I’ve hardly been deluged with speaking invitations. Readers regularly tell me they are unable to get their reviews approved for posting on Amazon.com, a likely factor contributing to sluggish sales. Plans for a soft cover edition and translation into German remain on the back burner. But there’s some good news too.

When the book was released at the Center for Jewish History in New York last December, I made a commitment that any royalties would be used “to foster a robust civil society in which non-native Germans — whatever their religious, ethnic, or cultural background – can make Germany their Heimat.” Our first royalty payment has just been donated to the International Rescue Committee – Deutschland. I plan to do some more targeted marketing towards libraries and academics this fall and hope that the book will generate additional proceeds to contribute to a worthy organization.

In a news climate filled with reports of anti-Semitism, it’s important that we continue to share positive stories and experiences about Jewish life in Germany. Co-author Yermi Brenner has just published a moving personal essay for the Huff Post, I Migrated To The Country That Ethnically Cleansed My Ancestors. If you have ideas for articles, interviews, or speaking engagements to promote the book, please contact me!

December 10th Book Release

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Article 116, German citizenship, German Jews

A Place They Called Home. Reclaiming Citizenship. Stories of a New Jewish Return to Germany, my edited collection of essays published by Berlinica and supported by the Stiftung Zurückgeben, will appear on December 10, 2018. This is the first book to give a voice to the children and grandchildren of Holocaust survivors who reclaim German citizenship.

From Berlinica’s press release:

A Place They Called Home includes stories from Pippa Goldschmidt, the Edinburgh-based author of The Need for Better Regulation of Outer Space, Rabbi Kevin Hale from Massachusetts, who wrote a mezuzah for the Auschwitz Jewish Center’s Café Bergson in Oswiecim, Poland, TV journalist Maya Shwayder, who has covered topics from LGBT civil rights to the United Nations, and Yermi Brenner, an Israeli reporter who covers migration and minorities for The Jewish Daily Forward, Al Jazeera, and Huff Post.

The Leo Baeck Institute is hosting a book launch event at the Center for Jewish History in New York on December 10th at 6:30 pm. I will be there along with many of the book’s contributors, and historian David Sorkin will give remarks on the history of citizenship and Jewish emancipation in Europe.

A Place They Called Home is available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble and at bookstores all over.

And last but not least, here’s my latest blog post for The Times of Israel: Where’s the Good News About the Jews? A Report from Berlin.

A Pleasant and Productive Journey

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Article 116, Bundesverwaltungsamt, German citizenship, German Jews

As I settled into my seat on Monday afternoon for the train ride from Cologne back to Berlin, I waited for the the familiar words to float through the intercom: “Wir wünschen Ihnen eine angenehme Reise.” The Deutsche Bahn can always be counted on to wish passengers a pleasant journey, and indeed it was pleasant to be shuttled along at 200 km an hour knowing that my efforts to illuminate the meaning of reclaimed German citizenship for German Jews were starting to yield results.

The year has gotten off to a good start with some new submissions for my book, an expression of interest from a publisher, and a number of inquiries from journalists who are tracking the growing interest in European citizenship from American and British Jews. Two articles linking current politics and the citizenship trend appeared this week: Putting Past Aside, Jews Seek German Citizenship in the Age of Trump and Trump is Driving Some American Jews to Reclaim Citizenship in Europe.

My trip to Cologne fulfilled an important goal for my book: interviewing a federal official responsible for naturalization claims from members of families persecuted during the Nazi era. I felt like I hit the jackpot when I entered an office and found not one, but three Bundesverwaltungsamt officials seated around a table prepared to answer my questions. I had spent a lot of time preparing the questions in German and was pleased to get answers to most of them. The hard part was understanding the full meaning of the responses that covered a fair amount of legal and technical details. I’m grateful to Agnieszka, my friend and colleague who came along to help with interpretation.

The working trip to Cologne also doubled as a quick mother-daughter getaway. We enjoyed lots of sunshine, a Sunday morning stroll along the Rhine, and some great Thai food. I even got to experience what it’s like to be a millennial by taking selfies with Olivia. I’m still working on my technique, but we had fun taking this one in the elevator of our hotel.

Book Project Gets Boost for 2017

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Article 116, German citizenship, German Jews, Stiftung Zurückgeben

The transition to the new year brought good news for my book project in the form of a grant from the Stiftung Zurückgeben, a foundation that supports the creative work of Jewish women living in Germany. It helps to have support beyond my inner circle of family and friends, the cheerleaders who are a part of my book journey. Institutional support will boost my research and outreach efforts and help bring this multi-pronged, organically evolving arrangement of prose to publication.

Getting to know some of the people who are contributing their stories for the book has been a highlight of the past year. Low points have come when getting tongue-tied trying to explain the book to people in German, being unsure of next steps to take, and receiving comments like the following from a reviewer of an early draft of my memoir chapter: “This draft feels very much like the outer layer of an enormous onion that you’ve only started to peel.”

The journey to my inner voice has been slow and bumpy, with lots of sweating and squirming in my seat for hours on end. But sometimes I look up from my keyboard and find my daughter Olivia, sitting across from me at the table where we often work together and deeply immersed in a drawing project. She shows extraordinary discipline in her own artistic endeavors, a young role model who is also my most constructive and dedicated editor.

I’ve started the year with a good dose of inspiration, support, and determination, ready for the next steps in my effort to make meaning out of the thousands who have reclaimed their German citizenship in the post-Holocaust era.

Drawing by Olivia Swarthout

German Jews and the Brexit

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Article 116, Brexit, German citizenship, German Jews, Jewish identity

The uptick in applications for restored German citizenship from German Jews in the UK has begun. Prior to the Brexit referendum, UK citizens of German Jewish descent might not have felt a desire to have their German citizenship restored. But loss of an EU passport casts Germany in a new light. Thomas Harding expressed the sentiments of many others in his recent article for the Guardian, Brexit Drove me to Embrace my German Roots. Thanks to a reader for sending me this article in which Harding also cites Germany’s humane refugee policy as another factor that inspired him to seek German citizenship. A host of other recent articles report on Jewish fears of rising extremism and xenophobia in the post-Brexit UK.

Headed to the UK but for how long?

Our own disappointment in the Brexit vote hit home on a personal level. Our son Avery just met the rigorous requirements for acceptance to the mechanical engineering program at University of Southampton. He’ll still be able to enroll as an EU citizen for the next two years, but his tuition would more than double if he is reclassified as an international student so he’ll need to have a contingency plan for completing his degree. Our daughter Olivia hopes to study environmental science in Scotland where a potential new referendum on leaving the UK might still make that possible as an EU citizen. We’d love for our kids to pursue their undergraduate degrees in Germany, but as German and EU citizens we also value the freedom they have to choose among the member countries.

British Jews eligible for German citizenship may not be ready to fully embrace Germany, but does this matter? The fact that Germany offers them an avenue to membership in a more integrated European society is reason enough to clasp the hand of the German state. Despite pressures from its own anti-immigrant forces, Germany is still the country with the world’s best passport. British Jews of German descent who reclaim German citizenship will have some complicated identity issues to untangle. I’ve been in touch with a few applicants and hope to include some of their Brexit-related stories in my book on the German Jewish citizenship experience.

Book Update: Reading, Revising, and ‘Rithmatic

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Article 116, Berlin, German citizenship, German Jews

Thank goodness it’s been raining for my first week of summer break. I’ve spent the week indoors reading submissions, revising my own work, starting a background chapter, and entering numbers into a growing spreadsheet of annual German citizenship approvals. The more I work the more I realize how much work there is to do for my book on German Jews who have applied for Restored German Citizenship. How long will this endeavor take? I really have no idea.

I’ve logged many hours on the website for Germany’s Statisisches Bundesamt (Federal Office of Statistics). They publish well-organized, detailed reports with loads of useful statistics on German population, migration, and citizenship, among other topics. I’m now starting to piece together a historical overview of German Jews from every continent who have reclaimed their German citizenship. More than 30,000 people have taken this step in the last ten years alone. I hope the book will shed light on the significance of this form of Wiedergutmachung, a German term for reparations or redress.

After a fairly intensive teaching schedule so far this year, it’s nice to work in the quiet solitude of my apartment. I have at least a few more days until the kids are out of school and I’ll be forced to find a workspace at the local library. But this project will require more than solitary confinement. I also need to get out and talk to people about the book, articulate its rationale, bounce my ideas off friends and colleagues, find financial support for research, get a little moral support, and ultimately find a publisher.

Moments of doubt occasionally flicker through my mind. The biggest challenge is just finding the time to accomplish the tasks at hand. This summer I’ll also be busy with preparations to send our son Avery off to college in the UK, a vacation in Latvia and Russia, a few visitors, and some initial moves towards buying an apartment in Berlin. Maybe it will be a rainy summer that will enhance my productivity, but I’d prefer blue skies and lots of sunshine.

Photo credit: Berlinside

On Finding German Jews for Book Project

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Article 116, German citizenship, German Jews, Israel

A lot has happened since I first posted about my Restored German Citizenship book project. I’ve cast about in different parts of the world-wide web — joining a number of Facebook and genealogy groups — and managed to capture a few people’s attention. Through countless hours of online searches I discovered quite a few Yekke groups around the world. It was especially helpful to join GerSIG, the German Jewish Special Interest Group that is part of JewishGen.org.

My cyber searches yielded many new contacts, but they also seem to have resulted in a deluge of Spam messages from Jewish dating services. I’m not looking for a JDate, just people of German Jewish descent who have reclaimed their citizenship and want to share their personal stories with me.

So here’s the book update:

• More than a dozen people in the U.S., Canada, South Africa, Australia, and Germany have expressed interest in making a submission for the book.
• I’ve already received two wonderful draft submissions.
• While fishing around online for potential contributors, I applied to join the Times of Israel blogging community. Here’s my first post: What Does Your Reisepass Mean To You?
• I met with the Research Director for the Leo Baeck Institute, a primary research center for the history of German-speaking Jews. He liked the idea for the book and gave me a few good research tips.
• I’ve received kind offers of help, suggestions for publishers, and expressions of support from many Full Circle readers. Thank you!

In the coming months I’ll do more outreach to potential contributors, especially in Israel, South America, and the UK. I’ll also send some feelers out to publishers and continue with research on the last 65 years worth of Article 116 citizenship applications. I’ll post occasional updates here and look forward to receiving your advice and support.

Book Project on Restored German Citizenship

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Article 116, German citizenship, German Jews, Holocaust

It’s time to move on. I’ve told my German American Jewish story on this blog and in various publications over the last five years and reached a very broad audience. Now I plan to put together a compilation of stories of people who have reclaimed their citizenship under Article 116 of Germany’s Basic Law.

I believe our German citizenship stories are an important part of post-Holocaust history. These stories occasionally appear in the press, but there has been little comprehensive treatment of this topic since members of families that were persecuted by the Nazis began applying for restored citizenship after WWII. Reclaiming our citizenship is a part of reconciliation, helping us come to terms with the past, and live more fully in the present. It’s something positive to seize hold of, keeping us from being “stuck in time” even when we find it painful to revisit our family history. Our stories also have relevance for new generations of refugees and displaced persons.

If you have reclaimed your citizenship or are going through the process, please consider contributing your story to this book project. Submissions from South America, Israel, South Africa, the U.K., the U.S. and other parts of the diaspora are welcome. I’m also interested in including stories of those whose applications were rejected because only their mother was Jewish or due to other quirks in the German law. I’ve put together a list of German Citizenship Book Project Questions to help you think about and organize your story. Click on the link to download the list and you can start writing!

I do not yet have a publisher for this book but I will work hard to find one. If you have suggestions, advice, ideas, or questions, please post a comment or contact me at dswartho@aol.com. Please also share this post with any individuals or organizations who may be interested in this project.

3 Kids, 6 Passports

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Article 116, dual citizenship, German citizenship

“No tears, Donna!” I told myself when the civil servant handed me our children’s German passports at Rathaus Steglitz this morning. I’m cultivating the German art of appearing totally dispassionate while conducting public business and managed a brief, impersonal smile as I grasped the little burgundy booklets in my hand.

It was a short and simple ending to a process that began three and a half years ago. Avery and Olivia have been German citizens since 2011, but we waited to apply for their passports until Sam also received his citizenship (see Hurray for Sam!). Now the three of them are ready for the world. Olivia will have a chance to use her German passport next week when she goes to London with the International Schools Theatre Association.

I was recently dismayed to learn that 3,000 Americans renounced their citizenship last year. According to CNN Money, “the numbers for 2013 represent a dramatic spike — triple the average for the previous five years.” Tax consequences of our dual citizenship aside (and boy do we need to get up to speed on that), I remain first and foremost an American. Time will tell how our three children will feel about their six passports.