If he became a citizen J. Edgar Hoover would not have been able to banish him like he did when he left the USA.
I believe it may be that to become a U.S. citizen he might have had to renounce his English citizenry. America makes it very difficult to have dual citizenship. I don't know what it was like then.
Maybe he didn't want to be made a citizen of a country where McCarthy-ism was a thing, which pretty much ruined his later career, too. He tried bringing European views on socialism to a country which wasn't ready for it and was heavily criticized for doing so.
shareChaplin probably didn't want the IRS following him back to the UK. They're about to tighten up again on Americans living abroad tomorrow when provisions of FATCA go into effect.
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