AnalysisHouse Bill 2253 prohibits the Secretary of State from issuing an Apostille or certification on any document related to allegiance to a government, sovereignty or “in itinere” status. There are pockets or remnants of “freemen” or “sovereign citizens” in the United States who have disavowed their U.S. citizenship and claim to be free from the laws of the U.S. These individuals often seek to use their status as “in itinere” to claim that they are a “jurisdiction” unto themselves – that is, they can live by the laws of their choosing while they are in the United States. Please see the “Notice of In Itinere Status” document that is included at the end of this Alert. The Notice is taken to a Notary and then presented to the Secretary of State for an Apostille. These freemen or sovereign citizens may also abuse the traditional notarial protest provisions of the Uniform Commercial Code to absolve themselves from paying taxes, repaying their mortgages and generally avoiding debt obligations. The U.S. State Department has said, “Documents concerning U.S. citizenship, allegiance to the United States or any U.S. state or other jurisdiction, sovereignty, Actual Notice of In Itinere Status and World Service Authority (or similar) so called ‘citizenship’ documents, have no force or validity, and could be used for fraudulent or criminal purposes. Accordingly, the U.S. Department of State Authentications Office and U.S. embassies and consulates abroad have been instructed to refuse to provide authentication or notarial services for such documents under the refusal authority provided in 22 CFR 92.9 and 22 CFR 131.2. The Department of State recommends that state Secretaries of State and Notary Public Administrators refuse to notarize, authenticate, or affix the Hague Apostille to such documents.” Thus, HB 2253 now provides statutory authorization for the Secretary of State to refuse to authenticate such documents that are sought by sovereign citizens to buttress their claims to be a country unto themselves.
Read House Bill 2253.