[Franklin Imprint]. Certificate of Naturalization and Oath of Allegiance

(FRANKLIN IMPRINT). Certificate of Naturalization and Oath of Allegiance

This particular copy is accomplished in manuscript, and signed by Edward Shippen Jr. 4

October 1765. Shippen, father in law of Benedict Arnold and a moderate loyalist, he would later serve as the chief justice of Pennsylvania.

The text of the document, which served as a certificate of naturalization and an oath of allegiance to the British king, was notable for requiring immigrants who wished to become citizens to provide certification that they had "taken the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper within three months before the said court, took and subscribed the Oaths, and did make and repeat the Declaration... according to the Directions of an Act of Parliament... (entitled] AN ACT FOR NATURALIZING SUCH FOREIGN PROTESTANTS, AND OTHERS, THEREIN MENTIONED, AS ARE SETTLED IN ANY OF HIS MAJESTY'S COLONIES IN AMERICA.

A rare surviving ephemeral publication by Franklin and Hall. All such job printing from this press are rare on the market.

From Catalog III

The printed form by which a foreign Protestant became a British subject under the Act of 1740, on certifying that he had taken the sacrament within three months and sworn the oaths. This copy is signed by Edward Shippen, Jr. — later chief justice of Pennsylvania and father-in-law of Benedict Arnold — three weeks before the Stamp Act was to take effect.