I am confused. I never knew I didn’t have to have a passport to get into the States…Probably so, but there is no way that I know of I can leave Panama without showing a passport. That is to say, I still have to have a passport to leave Panama anyway.
Current law states that US citizens are not required to have a passport to return from Canada, Mexico and a few of the close by islands.
This law may be an artifact of the former canal zone and the movement of people from here to there, including military dependents and PCC dependents...didn't passenger flights arrive at albrook at some point in the distant past?
it may also be that people leaving from Howard on Space-A or chartered flights to charleston didn't have to have anything but a birth certificate and dependent ID, i don't know.
""Probably so, but there is no way that I know of I can leave Panama without showing a passport.""
I didn´t know that either. I have always had to have a passport to come in and out of Panama as well as the states.