[DiogenesLamp]

Bellei’s problem was that he did not meet the residence in the U.S. requirement of an 1874 law that applied to his birth circumstances.

And what you deliberately refuse to acknowledge is that "Natural born citizens" existed before 1874, and for that matter before 1868, and therefore such laws are immaterial to the meaning of the term.

[Nero Germanicus]

I acknowledge that natural born citizens existed before 1874. The first president who was not born as a British subject was Martin Van Buren, elected in 1837, a natural born citizen.