JUNE 2024 | 23 THE OKLAHOMA BAR JOURNAL Statements or opinions expressed in the Oklahoma Bar Journal are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Oklahoma Bar Association, its officers, Board of Governors, Board of Editors or staff. which seeks to statutorily prohibit an alien from acquiring and owning title to “land in this State either directly or indirectly through a business entity or trust?” In the absence of language in this statutory bar defining a “business entity,” it could be asserted that such targeted entities would include a domesticated alien corporation. This is problematic. A deeper analysis of the Cartwright decision discloses only a very limited instance allowing the state to prevent an “alien” from “indirectly” owning Oklahoma land through a domesticated alien corporation. The Cartwright holding provides (para. 40), “Nothing in our holding today, however, should be taken to mean that such rights [for aliens to own land] would be afforded a sham corporation, set up by individual aliens solely to avoid the restrictions of Article XXII, Section 1, when such entities are not in fact operated as legitimate corporations.” Nevertheless, in the absence of proof that a particular corporation is a “sham” corporation, the holding of Cartwright strongly suggests that the Legislature might not be empowered to bar the “indirect” acquisition or ownership of Oklahoma land by a domesticated alien corporation (or other “domesticated entities”). However (as discussed in detail in the next section of this article), even if the state is constitutionally empowered to enact legislative procedures to bar aliens from acquiring and owning Oklahoma land, there are express constitutional limits (in Art. 22, Section 1) on this process as to timing and procedures. Such constitutional limits on this process do not appear to be properly reflected in the verbiage used by the Legislature in the language they adopted in 1910 for Section 123. Such timing and procedures, set forth in the Constitution, arguably expressly allow any alien to initially acquire Oklahoma land and hold it for at least five years. It is only after the passage of such five-year period that an escheat proceeding can be initiated and then completed to cause an alien to lose the title to their land (after a 30-day advance notice of the intent to file the escheat action). As discussed later, such constitutional language appears to be contrary to the Legislature’s original (1910) attempt in Section 123 to prohibit the initial acquisition of title by a nonresident alien, except when acquired by probate or foreclosure proceedings. Under the Constitution, It Is Arguable That All Aliens, Including Nonresident Aliens, Can Acquire and Own Oklahoma Land, but Such Aliens Must Dispose of It Within Five Years In order to enforce a bar against aliens acquiring and owning title to Oklahoma land, there logically appears to be three possible options: 1) making any conveyance to an alien void ab initio, leaving the legal and equitable title in the grantor (due to no livery of seisin), 2) making any conveyance to an alien act as an automatic conveyance (escheat) to the state or 3) making the conveyance to the alien valid but allowing the initiation of a court proceeding at a later specified point in time to take the title away from the alien (escheating) and give it to the state or sell it. The public policy against aliens owning Oklahoma land is made clear in Art. 22, Section 1 of the Constitution: “No alien or person who is not a citizen of the United States, shall acquire title to or own land in this state.” However, the timing and process to implement this policy is also clearly set forth in this section of the Constitution: “The Legislature shall enact laws whereby all persons not citizens of the United States, and their heirs, who may hereafter acquire real estate in this state by devise, descent, or otherwise, shall dispose of the same within five years upon condition of escheat or forfeiture to the State.” The public policy against aliens owning Oklahoma land is made clear in Art. 22, Section 1 of the Constitution: ‘No alien or person who is not a citizen of the United States, shall acquire title to or own land in this state.’
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