Chin Chuck Ming and Chin Chuck Sang, hereafter appellants, appeal from a judgment dismissing their petition under Section 503 of the Nationality Act of 1940 1 (formerly 8 U.S.C.A. § 903 , now 8 U.S.C.A. § 1503 ) on the ground, inter alia, stated by the district court, as follows :

We think the court erred in so construing this act for establishing a claimed existing citizenship. It ignores the provision of Section 503 that its rights are conferred alike on the litigant “whether he is within the United States or abroad”. It ignores the statement of the Supreme Court in Kwock Jan Fat v. White, 253 U.S. 454, 464 , 40 S.Ct. 566, 570 , 64 L.Ed. 1010 : “It is better that many Chinese immigrants should be improperly admitted than that one natural born citizen of the United States should be permanently excluded from his country.”

It also ignores our prior decision in Acheson v. Yee King Gee, 9 Cir., 184 F.2d 382 , where we considered and disposed of the claim of a Chinese born American citizen under Section 503. 2

The district court further held as a ground for dismissing the action:

Concerning this, it appears that before May 25, 1953, the appellants moved the court to substitute Secretary of State John Foster Dulles for Dean Acheson who had ceased to be such Secretary, the court stating:

That is to say, the appellants so moved within the six months after Dulles had succeeded Acheson as Secretary as required by F.R.C.P. rule 25(d), providing:

Thereafter on April 6, 1953, when Acheson was no longer Secretary and Dulles was, the following motion to dismiss was made:

The usual presumption applies that the Attorney General performed his duty and did not violate it. Hence we are required to assume he did not represent Acheson, who no longer was his client, and that he represented Dulles who had succeeded Acheson. Since Dulles thus had appeared and moved to dismiss on the ground above stated, Rule 25(d) is satisfied. It became clear at that point that Dulles intended to follow the policies of his predecessor in respect to this case.

The complaint alleges that:

Of this failure of the State Department to act on appellants’ applications for passports for over a year and three months, the district court held:

We construe the words “right or privilege as a national of the United States” of the first two lines of Section 503 to cover the right to a prompt disposition of a claimed citizens’ application. Here it is an affidavit-application filed on September 6, 1951 with the American Consul General at Hongkong. It was “for travel documents so that they would be eligible to purchase transportation to the United States in order to apply for admission as citizens thereof at a port of entry under the immigration laws,” all as alleged in paragraph IX of the complaint.

Instead of such a prompt disposition of the affidavit-application of September 6, 1951, no disposition had been made in the 15 months to December 22, 1952, when the instant suit was filed and this although the complaint alleges that “the plaintiffs have been steadily available for examination by the American Consul General at Hongkong.”

Dulles contends that we should take judicial notice of the fact that a large number of similar applications were pending on September 6, 1951 when appellants’ was filed and that Congress has not appropriated sufficient funds to -give him the qualified personnel at Hongkong to enable the State Department to dispose of them in the intervening months. He makes no claim that he applied to Congress for such funds. Assuming we can take such judicial notice, we think that the right to a prompt consideration of appellants’ application cannot be denied them for such a reason.

We are not here dealing with one seeking to become a citizen but with the right to establish a claiméd existing United States citizenship. Such citizenship is described by the Supreme Court as re *853 garded by many as the highest hope of civilized man. In Schneiderman v. United States, 320 U.S. 118 at page 122, 63 S.Ct. 1333, 1335 , 87 L.Ed. 1796 , it states; “For it is safe to assert that nowhere in the world today is the right of citizenship of greater worth to an individual than it is in this country. It would be difficult to exaggerate its value and importance. By many it is regarded as the highest hope of civilized men.”

While the Schneiderman case involved the question of deprivation of a prior established citizenship, here a wrongful denial of claim to citizenship is also such a deprivation, and we think the rule of the Schneiderman case, 320 U.S. at page 122 , 63 S.Ct. at page 1335 , that “the facts and the law should be construed as far as is reasonably possible in favor of the citizen” equally applies. Fukumoto v. Dulles, 9 Cir., 216 F.2d 553, 554 ; cf. Judge Healy’s opinion in Acheson v. Yee Ging Gee, 9 Cir., 184 F.2d 382, 384 .

So construing the facts and the law of the instant case we think the failure of Congress to supply funds for employing qualified persons to give such prompt consideration to the applications of claimed citizens does not deprive appellants of their right to such a prompt consideration. 3

Dulles points out the various grounds on which passports may be denied. They are lack of identity of the applicant, lack of evidence, expatriation, and subversive activities and involvement in the foreign affairs of foreign countries. Dulles seems to contend that each would be a denial on a ground other than that the applicant “is not a national of the United States” and hence there is no compliance with the first sentence of Section 503 of the act.

An analysis of this contention shows the contrary. Refusal for lack of identity of the applicant necessarily is on the ground that he is not the person claiming to be “a national of the United States”. Similarly with a refusal for lack of evidence that he is a national, or because in the applicant’s proof of his nationality he committed a fraud and hence had not proved he was such a national.

Denying a passport on the ground that the applicant has been expatriated and has lost his American citizenship is again a denial on the ground that he is not a national.

Denial of such a passport on the ground of “subversive activities and involvement in the foreign affairs in foreign countries” would necessarily mean he had thereby lost his citizenship. One claiming he is such a national in Hong-kong could be denied a visa to come to the United States only on the ground that by such activities or involvement he had lost his American nationality. His possible indictment for such acts would make the greater reason for granting the passport, if he still retained his citizenship. 4

*854 The complaint alleges that Chin Chuck Sang was an adult when it was filed and it is contended that his father is not shown to have been Sang’s agent authorized to file an application for travel documents as alleged, supra, in paragraph IX of the complaint. It is also contended that Sang being an adult, the father has not been shown to have the power to initiate the instant litigation in Sang’s behalf. With regard to each of these contentions the complaint sufficiently describes transactions “attempted to be set forth” to permit amendment under F.R.C.P. 15(c), as follows:

We have so held where there has been a jurisdictional defect cured by a supplemental pleading in the case of Fujii v. Dulles, 9 Cir., 1955, 224 F.2d 906 , our number 14,460, decided July 14, 1955. Sang may seek amendment of the complaint to offer a supplemental pleading in the above respect if he be so advised.

The judgment is reversed and the district court ordered to proceed with the litigation in accord with what is here held.

. The pertinent portion of Section 503 is:

The remainder of Section 503 is omitted since it applies only where a suit has been commenced before the application for the travel documents.

. Since the prior decision there have been several to the same effect, such as Wong Wing Foo v. McGrath, 9 Cir., 196 F.2d 120 , and Mar Gong v. Brownell, 9 Cir., 209 F.2d 448 .

. The following cases are in accord with regard to the delay of the State Department amounting to the denial of a right to prompt action. Lee Bang Hong v. Acheson, D.C.Hawaii, 110 F.Supp. 48, 50 ; Lee Hong v. Acheson, D.C.N.D.Cal., 110 F.Supp. 60 ; Look Yun Lin v. Acheson, D.C.N.D.Cal., 95 F.Supp. 583, 584 .

. State Department Regulation 51.136 specifically provides for a passport to return to the United States one likely to violate laws of the United States, in the boldface matter below: