Since the French Revolution in the late 1700s, "le droit du sol" ("the right of the soil") has granted citizenship to anyone born in the country.
But in the wake of the November 13 terror attacks in which 130 people were killed in Paris, Hollande said he would pursue amendments to the constitution under which dual nationals – even those born in France – could be stripped of their citizenship if convicted of terrorism.
The measure has drawn overwhelming support among a tense public, with nearly 90% backing it in a poll for BFM TV.
Hollande's Socialist government has defended the measure. Prime Minister Manuel Valls said it is currently in use in several Western countries including Britain, Canada and the Netherlands.
"Removing French nationality from those who blindly kill other French in the name of an ideology of terror is a strong symbolic act against those who have excluded themselves from the national community," Valls wrote on Facebook.
— François Hollande (@fhollande) November 13, 2015
On the other hand, Patrick Weil, a political scientist at Yale University who personally advised Hollande to avoid the plan, said France would become "the first democracy in the world" to adopt the principle of unequal treatment for dual nationals, Agence France-Presse reported.
"It introduces the idea of a different penalty for the same act, just because of the random chance of their birth. That people – who sometimes don't even know they have a second nationality – can be banned is like the return of banishment as a penalty," Weil said.
Critics of the idea say it recalls France's dark moments in World War II, when the Vichy regime collaborated with the Nazis and stripped Jews and foreigners of French citizenship.
The proposed reforms would inscribe the right to declare a state of emergency into the constitution, including powers to raid homes and place people under house arrest without judicial oversight, AFP reported.
Parliament will begin debating the new measures in early February.
