(1799), decided the case of M’Creery’s Lessee v. Allender, a dispute over whether an Irish emigrant, Thomas M’Creery, had become a naturalized American citizen and was thereby able to leave an estate to a relative who still lived in Ireland. The court decided in M’Creery’s favor, based on a certificate executed before Justice Samuel Chase. The certificate reads:
Thomas M’Creery, in order to become … naturalized according to the Act of Assembly … on the 30th of September, 1795, took the oath … before the Honorable Samuel Chase, Esquire, then being the Chief Judge of the State of Maryland … and did then and there receive from the said Chief Judge, a certificate thereof … :
Maryland; I, Samuel Chase, Chief Judge of the State of Maryland, do hereby certify all whom it may concern, that … personally appeared before me Thomas M’Creery, and did repeat and subscribe a declaration of his belief in the Christian Religion, and take the oath required by the Act of Assembly of this State, entitled, “An Act for Naturalization.”2131