A US citizen came to the Law Office asking if he could obtain a Polish passport. His grandfather left Poland over 100 years ago in 1922. Since then, the family had no contact with Poland. My grandfather’s Polish passport has not survived either. An additional problem was the fact that the client’s ancestors came from what is now Belarus.
Polish citizenship is „passed on” from generation to generation on the basis of the law of blood (ius sanguinis) and if no one has lost citizenship along the way, theoretically there is no limit to the number of generations or the time that has passed since emigration.
After conducting archival searches in Belarus, we managed to obtain documents confirming my grandfather’s residence in Poland. Then, the Law Firm submitted an application for confirmation of citizenship to the Mazowieckie Voivode. The voivode issued a confirmation of Polish citizenship and the client was able to obtain a Polish passport.