citizenship

n. condition of being a member of a country

Citizenship is membership in a political community (originally a city or town but now usually a country) and carries with it rights to political participation; a person having such membership is a citizen. It is largely coterminous with nationality, although it is possible to have a nationality without being a citizen (i.e., be legally subject to a state and entitled to its protection (or persecution) without having rights of political participation in it); it is also possible to have political rights without being a national of a state. In most nations, a non-citizen is a non-national and called either a foreigner or an alien. In the United States, because there is state citizenship, foreign is the legal term for someone not a citizen of the state, and alien is reserved for someone not a citizen of the United States. Thus New York insurance companies are foreign in New Jersey, while a Dutch insurer is alien.
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Noun
1. the status of a citizen with rights and duties
(hypernym) legal status
(classification) law, jurisprudence
2. conduct as a citizen; "award for good citizenship"
(hypernym) demeanor, demeanour, behavior, behaviour, conduct, deportment

(n.)
The state of being a citizen; the status of a citizen.
  

CITIZENSHIP, AMERICAN - Status acquired by birth within the United States or through judicial proceedings known as 'naturalization.' One is also a citizen, even though born outside the United States, if both of his parents were citizens and one of them had a residence in the United States prior to the birth.

A citizen is one who, under the Constitution and laws of the United States, has a right to vote for representatives in congress and other public officers, and who is qualified to fill offices in the gift of the people. In a more extended sense, under the word citizen are included all persons born in the United States and naturalized persons born out of the same who have not lost their right as such. This includes men, women and children.

Citizens are either native born or naturalized. Native citizens may fill any office; naturalized citizens may be elected or appointed to any office under the Constitution of the United States, except the office of president and vice-president. The Constitution provides, that 'the citizens of each state shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states.' Art. 4, s. 2.

Obs. All natives are not citizens of the United States; the descendants of the aborigines, and those of African origin, are not entitled to the rights of citizens. Anterior to the adoption of the Constitution of the United States each state had the right to make citizens of such persons as it pleased. That Constitution does not authorize any but white persons to become citizens of the United States; and it must therefore be presumed that no one is a citizen who is not white.

A citizen of the United States residing in any state of the Union is a citizen of that state.
   

This entry contains material from Bouvier's Legal Dictionary, a work published in the 1850's.