which the sovereign affords the subject." Alle- giance is the highest legal duty of the sub- ject, and consequently its violation, treason (q.v.), is the highest legal offense. Allegiance is of three kinds : { 1 ) Natural or implied allegiance is that which every native or natu- ralized citizen owes to the State to which he belongs and whose protection he enjoys. Independently of any express promise, every man. by availing himself of the benefits which an organized political society affords, comes under an implied obligation to defend it, and this equally whether the attack be from without or from within. This conception of allegiance as a political obligation, involved in the notion of citizenship, is comparatively modern, and has gradually supplanted the feudal conception of allegiance as a duty voluntarily assumed as an incident of the feudal tenure of land. (2) Ex- press allegiance is that obligation which arises from an express promise or oath of allegiance. The old English oath of allegiance corresponded in the case of the sovereign, as lord paramount of all the lands in England, to the oath of fealty, which, by the feudal law, all freehold tenants were required to take to their landlords. As administered for upward of 000 years, it con- tained a promise "to be true and faithful to the king and his heirs, and truth and faith to bear of life and limb and terrene honor, and not to know or hear of any ill or damage intended him. without defending him therefrom."
With the substitution of the political for the feudal motive for allegiance and its consequent general obligation, the importance of the oath of allegiance has greatly diminished. It is com- monly exacted of aliens acquiring naturalization, of persons lately in rebellion on resuming the status of citizens, and of public officers of all grades, and members of the bar. The form com- monly employed in this country is a simple oath to support the Constitution of the United States. (See Oath.) (3) Local or temporary allegiance is that obedience and temporary aid due from an alien (q.v.) to the State or community in which he resides, by virtue of which he becomes subject to its laws", and liable for duty in the maintenance of social order.
It is but recently that the principal govern- ments of Europe have come to recognize the right of persons voluntarily to change their allegiance as well as their residence, and such recognition is still grudging and imperfect. The United States has always held it to be a natural right, and our legislation so recognizes it. This dif- ference of view has sometimes brought ovir gov- ernment into sharp diplomatic conflict with the States of Europe, especially in the effort to pro- tect from military conscription former subjects of those States who had renounced their alle- giance and become naturalized citizens of the United States. These efforts have generally proved successful, but the principle contended for by our government, though accepted (so far, at least, as the naturalization of their subjects in the United States is concerned) by England, France, Germany. and Austria-Hungary, is repudi- ated by Russia. Turkey, and some other States. This principle is plainly declared in the act of Congress relating to naturalization (q.v.) , passed in July, 1808. The preamble states that the right of expatriation is natural and inherent in all people, and indispensable to the enjoy- ment of the rights to life, liberty, and the pur- suit of happiness ; that, recognizing this right, our government has received emigrants from all nations and given them citizenship and protec- tion ; that it is necessary for the maintenance of public peace that the claim of foreign alle- giance as to such adopted citizens should be promptly and finally disavowed : and therefore it was enacted that any declaration, opinion, order, or decision of any officer of this govern- ment which denies, impairs, restricts, or ques- tions the right of expatriation, is inconsistent with the fundamental principles of the govern- ment; that all naturalized citizens of the United States, while in foreign States, are entitled to, and shall receive from this government, the same protection of person and property that is accorded to native-born citizens in like circumstances. This broad declaration of rights and duties was fol- lowed in May, 1870, by the British Parliament in an act revising all British laws on alienage, expatriation, and naturalization — the govern- ment for the first time recognizing the right of subjects to renounce allegiance to the crown. Allegiance of the population of a State or district is often transferred en masse, as an inci- dent of territorial conquest or as the result of the cession of territory, as in the successive purchases of Louisiana from France, of Florida and the Philippine Islands from Spain, and of Alaska from Russia, as well as in the enforced cession to the United States of Texas and Porto Rico, and to Germany of Alsace-Lorraine as the result of successful war. The right of a State to claim the allegiance of the inhabitants of territory so acquired is undoubted, and it is only as a humane concession to the sentiment of loyalty of such a population that the right to choose between the old and the new allegiance is sometimes reserved by the treaty of cession. This permission has, in modern times, usually been granted, the inhabitants of the ceded terri- tory being permitted to retain their nationality by withdrawing within a specified period from the ceded district.
In military usage, allegiance is the oath de- manded of officers and men to the sovereign or president, as supreme commander-in-chief of the army. In the German Empire, the troops of Bavaria do not recognize the absolute control of the King of Prussia, except in time of war, when the full oath of allegiance and implicit obedience to the orders of the German Emperor is taken. Consult: Blackstone, Commentaries on the JjCiirs of Ennland, Book I., ch. x. ; Pollock and Jlaitland, History of Enr/lisk Law (second edition. Boston, 1899)', Volume I., pages 290-307, 4.5S-407, Volume II., pages 502-.')ll; Salmond. "Citizenship and Allegiance." in Laic Qtiarterh/ Review. Volume XVIII.. numbers 07, 09 (London, July, 1901, and -January, 1902) ; Kent. Oommen- tnries on American Laic, Volume II., section xxv. See also Citizen ; Subject.
AL'LEGORY (Gk.aX^jjYnpia, allcrioria, speaking otherwise, allegory, from aX/lof, alios, other ayopeveiv, agoreuein, to speak). The allegory as a literary manner is a narrative in which the incidents and the characters really refer to a complete and logical scheme of underlying thought. To be successful, the narrative must be not only interesting for it.self. but also in perfect harmony with the veiled course of abstract reasoning. Such is Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, where, under the guise of a journey
