100 | Report on the Situation of Human Rights in the Dominican Republic Interior and Police prescribes in order to fill those businesses’ needs and to oversee their entry, temporary stay and return to the country from whence they came.” The Constitutional Court’s understanding was that the language used in the 1966 Constitution, “the [foreigners] in transit in [the country]” referred to “nonimmigrant” foreigners. In the Court’s view, because the parents of Juliana Deguis Pierre had entered the Dominican Republic as “temporary day workers”, they came under this last category. Therefore, the Court reasoned, Juliana Deguis Pierre would fit under the exception articulated in the article of the 1966 Constitution, which meant that she was not entitled to Dominican nationality. 230. The Commission believes it is best to begin its examination of the arguments made by the Constitutional Court in this judgment by reference to the principles, rights and obligations under the Inter-American System and that refer to the central issue in the judgment. As previously observed, under Article 20(3) of the American Convention on Human Rights, it is the obligation of the States Parties to not arbitrarily deprive anyone of his or her nationality. As will be demonstrated throughout the present report, the Commission considers that the arbitrary deprivation of Dominican nationality for persons of Haitian descent in the Dominican Republic is based on the fact that it involves persons who are descendants of persons of Haitian origin, which in turn is closely related to the problems of discrimination based on reasons of race and skin color of persons of African descent. 231. Within the States’ prerogative to grant nationality, States must refrain from taking discriminatory measures and from enacting or keeping on the books any laws that arbitrarily deprives persons of their nationality by reason of race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, economic condition, birth or any other condition, especially when those measures and laws have the effect of converting an individual into a stateless person. Laws or measures that cause a person to lose or be deprived of his or her nationality on discriminatory grounds (i.e., for reasons of race, color, sex or religion, for example) are arbitrary and therefore represent a violation of the right to nationality. 232. The Commission observes that even if established by law, a measure intended to revoke nationality may still be arbitrary. In order for deprivation of nationality not to be arbitrary, the measure in question must serve a legitimate State purpose that is proportional to the end sought and that is not motivated by discriminatory considerations. Measures of this kind are disproportionate when other less intrusive measures are not adopted to achieve a legitimate end sought by the State. Deprivation of nationality is arbitrary when the measure used to deprive a person of his or her nationality is adopted without observing the guarantees of due process, such as denying the affected person the opportunity to challenge the measure, or if the measure is illogical given the circumstances. 233. As a general rule, the loss or deprivation of nationality is prohibited when such a measure would leave a person stateless. That prohibition is expressly set forth in the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, which contains a list of exceptions to these provisions in which the Convention recognizes that there are certain circumstances in which the loss or deprivation of nationality that leaves a Organization of American States | OAS