WASHINGTON, USA – Before 1994, Taiwanese Americans were forced to list “China” as their place of birth on US passports, a misrepresentation that fueled a policy campaign by the Formosan Association for Public Affairs (FAPA) advocating to correct this oversight and affirm the rightful identity of Taiwanese Americans.
October 25, 2024, marks the 30th anniversary of enacting the 1994 US passport birthplace “Taiwan” campaign — a landmark shift for Taiwanese Americans’ identity and representation. FAPA successfully championed a crucial policy change allowing individuals to designate “Taiwan” as their place of birth on US passports.
Three decades ago, FAPA and our members worked with our friends in both chambers of US Congress to propose, introduce, and successfully pass this crucial birthplace policy change. Since these bills became law, Taiwanese Americans born in Taiwan could finally have “Taiwan” rightly designated as their place of birth on their US passports.
Prior to the FAPA policy campaign, naturalized US citizens born in “Taiwan” had to be falsely recorded as born in “China” on their US passports, which incorrectly implied that “Taiwan is part of China” and offensively suggested that Taiwanese Americans were also “Chinese” — an identity that most of them did not recognize and share. Taiwanese Americans were frustrated by the unjust treatment to mislabel their birthplace for decades. ㅤ
Part I: “Record of Place of Birth for Taiwanese Americans”
In September 1991, FAPA launched a campaign to correct Taiwanese Americans’ birthplace designation in US passports from “China” to “Taiwan.”
In 1992, FAPA asked members of Congress to write to the Department of State to allow this correction, but to no avail. Although the US “One-China policy” has never recognized that Taiwan is part of China, the State Department wrongly cited this policy and replied that it couldn’t change the birthplace designation from “China” to “Taiwan” for Taiwanese Americans unless the US changed this policy.
The incident showed clearly how highly confusing and misleading the “One-China policy” is and how easily it could lead to harmful misinterpretations, even for the State Department and its officials.
In early 1993, under the leadership of National President John Chen, FAPA shifted its strategy to correct Taiwanese Americans’ birthplace designation through “congressional legislation.” With the help of Rep. Howard Berman (D-CA) and Senator Claiborne Pell (D-RI), the place of birth “Taiwan” amendment was soon included in the “Foreign Relations Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 1994 and 1995.”
This bill was passed and became law in April 1994. The Act’s Section 132, titled “Record of Place of Birth for Taiwanese-Americans,” requires the Secretary of State to permit US citizens born in Taiwan to have their place of birth recorded as “Taiwan” on their “registration of birth” or “certification of nationality.”
Part II: Specifying the “Place of Birth: ‘Taiwan’” designation to be applied in US Passports
Despite the passage of the “Record of Place of Birth for Taiwanese-Americans,” the then State Department spokesperson Mike McCurry issued a statement in May 1994, surprisingly saying that the birthplace “Taiwan” amendment for Taiwanese Americans does not affect designation on US passports. Taiwanese Americans felt genuinely humiliated by such unreasonable interpretation by the State Department, which certainly was misled again by its confusing “One-China policy.”
Nevertheless, FAPA was not deterred by this setback and did not give up. In the summer of 1994, FAPA South Florida Chapter President Song Yea Lee was invited by Rep. Peter Deutsch (D-FL) to meet and even jog with US President Bill Clinton at the Miami Beach. Chapter President Lee used this rare opportunity to seek Clinton’s support to correct Taiwanese Americans’ place of birth designation in US passports from “China” to “Taiwan.”
FAPA headquarters and Chapter President Song Yea Lee also immediately worked with Rep. Deutsch to propose a technical amendment to the same aforementioned “Foreign Relations Authorization Act” by inserting “or issuance of a passport” to its Section 132. Such a correction would make it explicitly clear that this birthplace amendment would allow Taiwan-born Taiwanese Americans to designate “Taiwan” as their place of birth on their “US passports.”
This technical amendment proposal was passed in the House on September 19 then in the Senate on October 7. On October 25, 1994, President Bill Clinton signed the bill into law for Taiwanese Americans to designate their place of birth as Taiwan in US passports, effective immediately.
Thus, completing the policy campaign for Taiwanese Americans to designate Taiwan as their rightful place of birth on US passports, affecting all Taiwanese Americans to this day. ㅤ
Part III: Implementation of Law
On the night of November 16, 1994, Chian-Ho Yang, a Taiwanese immigrant to the US widely regarded as Taiwan’s first female journalist, informed the FAPA headquarters that she had earlier that afternoon received her US passport with “Taiwan” listed as her place of birth, and thanked FAPA for the successful policy advocacy campaign.
The moment that FAPA was notified of the first successful implementation of the birthplace amendment marked a long overdue victory and a proud new beginning for all Taiwanese Americans, as immigrants born in Taiwan could finally and rightfully have “Taiwan” instead of “China” recognized as their birthplace on US passports and other official documents.
The 1994 enactment and continued implementation of this birthplace “Taiwan” amendment reaffirmed the US position that “Taiwan is not part of China” and marked a critical step for the US government to gradually move toward implicitly recognizing the independence of Taiwan, over which the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has never exercised control.
Without knowing the history, people might find it hard to imagine that Taiwanese Americans born in “Taiwan” had been forced to be wrongly recorded as born in “China” on US official documents for decades. We should remember that the things we enjoy and take for granted now may not have been the case in the past.
This change is a testament to the unwavering advocacy of those who came before us, as the freedoms we enjoy today are the result of dedicated efforts to rectify injustices and ensure accurate representation for future generations.
On this 30th anniversary of enacting the US passport birthplace “Taiwan” amendment, we celebrate this milestone victory and retrospect relevant history. We also want to call on the US to end its highly confusing and harmful “One China policy” (as we have seen during the birthplace correction campaign) and instead adopt a more realistic “One China, One Taiwan policy” that recognizes the reality that Taiwan is an independent sovereign country and that Taiwan and China are not subordinate to each other.
