Under the law in force until December 31, 1974, German citizenship was automatically transferred at birth and by birth to legitimate children of German fathers and illegitimate children of German mothers. The growth of legal awareness and the desire to eliminate discrimination led to the creation of the law "On Amending the Imperial and State Citizenship Law" (Gesetz zur Änderung des Reichs- und Staatsangehörigkeitsgesetzes vom 20.12.1974, RuStAÄndG 74). It entered into force on January 1, 1975. Since that day, German citizenship has been transferred through both the female and male lines. As usual, there are some exceptions to this rule, which I will not dwell on now.
A special rule for acquiring German citizenship was created for those born between March 31, 1953 and December 31, 1974 to a German mother and a foreign father, and who therefore did not become German at the time and by virtue of birth. Persons interested in acquiring German citizenship had to submit a special written declaration of their desire to become so. Any German institution (German embassy, Federal Administrative Office, tax office, other authorities) is obliged to accept this declaration and forward it to the competent processing authority.
Former Germans could also submit the declaration. This mainly concerns illegitimate children of German mothers who acquired German citizenship at birth but later lost it as a result of a subsequent marriage between the German mother and a foreign father.
The general deadline for submitting the declaration ended in 1977. Article 3, paragraph 7 of RuStAÄndG 74 provides, in exceptional cases, an additional six-month period for submitting the declaration when its timely submission was impossible due to objective circumstances beyond the applicant's control. Many interested persons say that they did not know at all that their mother had German citizenship. Therefore, the question regularly arises of classifying ignorance of the legal requirements and the fact of the mother's naturalization as an exceptional case in which the applicant cannot be blamed for the late submission of the declaration. Another argument in favor of applicants is the numerous unsuccessful appeals to German authorities (usually the German embassy) before 1993, when applicants drew attention to possible naturalization but received no instructions on the need to submit this declaration in a timely manner.
The Federal Administrative Office and the Higher Administrative Court of Münster believe that Russian Germans should have submitted the declaration before 1993. On an individual basis, it is still possible to provide evidence of the timely submission of the declaration after 1993. In justified cases, through lengthy court proceedings, it was possible to obtain the issuance of a "Certificate of German Citizenship" to the plaintiffs. Naturalizations under the "List of the German People of Ukraine" are also important for practice.
Final guidelines on the law enforcement practice of accepting such declarations will be approved by the Federal Administrative Court. This highest judicial instance of administrative law is scheduled to issue decisions on test cases in 2006-2007. Then all interested parties will finally be able to learn about the limits of the duty to take care of one's own affairs that persons living in the CIS had to exercise.
The legislator decided to put an end to lengthy and costly legal disputes over the admissibility of submitting a declaration of intent to become a German citizen. In the legislative act entitled "Erstes Gesetz über die Bereinigung von Bundesrecht im Zuständigkeitsbereich des Bundesministers des Innern, BGBl. 2006 Teil I, Nr. 8 vom 22.02.2006", July 31, 2006 was set as the last day for accepting such declarations. After that date, no one will be able to become German by submitting a declaration of intent to become a German citizen. This means the following: those who submitted a declaration before that date may insist on a substantive review of their reasons for the late submission. After July 31, 2006, no German institution will accept such declarations. Of course, declarations submitted before that date remain valid. Applicants whose claims to German citizenship imply the legal form of submitting a declaration must submit it before that date in order to retain the right to be granted German citizenship and not miss this final deadline.