The implication of Article 9 of the Constitution, that citizenship shall be acquired and lost "in accordance with law", does not mean any old law that the Oireachtas puts in place on a given day, but a law which is mandated and compatible with the Constitution. It would certainly have to take into account the valuable rights of voting in our elections and referenda that are conferred in citizenship, that residents' rights are available to citizens and that it is an obligation of every person who becomes an Irish national to owe a duty of loyalty and fidelity to the Irish nation and State. Clearly, if something was available to a person who had absolutely no connection with the country and was excused by ministerial fiat even from declaring their loyalty to a District Judge, as happened in many of these cases, and even from the requirement to reside in Ireland for any appreciable period, it is arguable, at the very least, that such a law would do violence to the Constitution because it would effectively allow the State to barter citizenship for money.