In 1933, the United States delegation to the Pan-American Union's Montevideo conference, Alexander W. Weddell and Joshua Butler Wright signed the Inter-American Convention on the Nationality of Women, which became effective in 1934, legally reserving limitations for domestic legislative review. The Equal Nationality Act of 1934 was the first statute that allowed derivative nationality for children born abroad to pass from their mother. Their nationality was dependent on whether the mother had resided in the United States before the child was born. As the law was not retroactive, children born before 1934 were typically prevented from deriving citizenship from their mother. The statute also provided preferential naturalization for any foreign spouse married to a U.S. national. It stated that eligible foreigners, who met all other requirements of naturalization, could naturalize under reduced requirements forgoing a declaration of intent and needing only three years of continuous residency within the United States, Alaska, Hawaii, or Puerto Rico.