Posted on 04/27/2012 8:24:47 AM PDT by vadum
According to the Constitution, to be eligible for the presidency (or vice presidency), a person must be a “natural born citizen” of the United States. The purpose of this restriction is to prevent a foreigner from becoming the nation’s chief executive.
How can people become U.S. citizens? There are just two ways; either they are born citizens or they become citizens later in life. In the first case, anyone who is a citizen by nature of his birth is a “natural born citizen.” In the second case, anyone who is a citizen of another country at birth, but is granted U.S. citizenship sometime afterward, is a naturalized citizen.
For example, John McCain, though born in Panama, is eligible for the presidency, because he became a citizen at birth. Similarly, had Gen. George Meade sought the presidency, he would have been eligible because, though born in Spain, he was a U.S. citizen by nature of his birth. Any non-naturalized U.S. citizen over the age of thirty-five with fourteen years of residence can be President of the United States.
Sadly, this common-sense, logical approach does not dissuade some conservative pundits from inventing a new constitutional requirement for the presidency. Despite the plain meaning of the text, they claim that, to be eligible, a person’s parents must also be U.S. citizens. A few even assert that one’s parents must also be natural born citizens. I’ll spare you a recitation of their nonsense about “native born” or Emerich de Vattel or whatnot. Finding things in the Constitution that are not there is for Democrats!
Now that Mitt Romney has become the presumptive Republican nominee, there is speculation that the junior senator from Florida will be his running mate. Marco Rubio’s parents were from Cuba and did not become U.S. citizens until he was four years old. Voices from the fringe are claiming that this means Rubio is not eligible – and they’re wrong.
Marco Rubio was born is Miami, Florida. He is, therefore, a natural born citizen of the United States. Per the Constitution, the citizenship status of his parents (or grandparents or anyone but himself) is irrelevant.
Let’s look at U.S. political history for more proof. Were there other instances of a presidential or vice presidential nominee with a foreign-born parent? You betcha!
The first presidential nominee of the Republican Party, in 1856, was John Charles Fremont. He was born in South Carolina to an American mother and a French father. Jean Charles Fremon was born a French citizen, near Lyon, France. He was not a U.S. citizen at the time of his son’s birth and never did become a citizen. Abraham Lincoln campaigned for Fremont. All the founders of the Republican Party campaigned for Fremont. One would be hard-pressed to find any suggestion at the time that Fremont’s birth made him ineligible for the presidency.
The seventh vice presidential nominee of the Republican Party, Chester Arthur, was born in Vermont to an American mother and a foreign-born father. William Arthur was born a British citizen – in County Antrim, Ireland – who did not become a U.S. citizen until his son was fourteen years old.
John Fremont, George Meade, Chester Arthur, John McCain, Marco Rubio – all eligible for the presidency. Republicans should not allow themselves to be distracted away from contesting the 2012 presidential campaign on the real issues.
Michael Zak is a popular speaker to Republican organizations around the country. Back to Basics for the Republican Party is his acclaimed history of the GOP, cited by Clarence Thomas in a Supreme Court decision. His Grand Old Partisan website celebrates more than fifteen decades of Republican heroes and heroics. See www.grandoldpartisan.com for more information.
“Rubio’s parents were born in 1927 and 1931 in Cuba”
*******************IRRELEVANT**************
Were they U.S. citizens when Marco was BORN? They were not, THAT is what is relevant.
Answer: yes, he could have become a citizen of Cuba at age 18.
RE: First, JC Fremont wasn’t elected.
I think the author’s point was that the founders of the GOP ( including Lincoln ) did not find Fremont’s birth circumstances to be a constitutional barrier to his becoming President of the USA.
Bingo!
It should not be surprising that within Vattel’s Law of Nations the term “natural-born Citizen” was defined as: “The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens.” (Emphasis added) Notice the plural use for parentage.
This was based upon the idea of a singularity of allegiance. The position being that if a person whose father was born outside the country and the son inside the country it would put the son in a position of dual allegiance between his birth country and the country of his father. Vattel stated it this way: “I say, that, in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is a citizen; for if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country.”
The implication is that if circumstances placed the country at odds with the country of a president’s father the president may not be able to bring himself to wage war, if necessary, against a nation that he has a direct relationship with. How could a man expect to defend against or wage war with the country of his father?
Which brings us to the issue at hand – how do we interpret the constitutional meaning of “natural-born citizen?” As the Constitution is the basis of our law and is law in and of itself we should look at the Constitution through statutory construction.
First; a review of the “plain meaning” of the text has probably been the greatest contention in determining the meaning as the term is not used in general language today, outside of this context, and obviously being overlooked by those in political power, so it is of little use.
Second; should the “plain meaning” not prevail then one must determine the original intentions of the person or people that wrote it.
Finally we must turn to any legal precedence that may aid us in our determination. In the case of Minor v. Happersett (1874) we find the following:
“At common law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country, of parents who were its citizens, became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners
Some authorities go further, and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction, without reference to the citizenship of their parents. As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first. For the purposes of this case, it is not necessary to solve these doubts. It is sufficient, for everything we have now to consider, that all children, born of citizen parents within the jurisdiction, are themselves citizens." (Emphasis added)
From the Federalist Papers:
House Report No. 784, dated June 22, 1874, stated, “The United States have not recognized a ‘double allegiance.’ By our law a citizen is bound to be ‘true and faithful’ alone to our government.” It wouldn’t be practical for the United States to claim a child as a citizen when the child’s natural country of origin equally claims him/her because doing so could leave the child with two competing legal obligations, e.g., military duty.
The primary author of the citizenship clause, Sen. Jacob M. Howard, said the “word jurisdiction, as here employed, ought to be construed so as to imply a full and complete jurisdiction on the part of the United States, coextensive in all respects with the constitutional power of the United States, whether exercised by Congress, by the executive, or by the judicial department; that is to say, the same jurisdiction in extent and quality as applies to every citizen of the United States now.”
This remark by Howard puts his earlier citizenship clause remark into proper context:“THIS WILL NOT, OF COURSE, INCLUDE PERSONS BORN IN THE UNITED STATES WHO ARE FOREIGNERS, ALIENS, WHO BELONG TO THE FAMILIES OF AMBASSADORS OR FOREIGN MINISTERS ACCREDITED TO THE GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED STATES, BUT WILL INCLUDE EVERY OTHER CLASS OF PERSONS.”
United States Attorney General, George Williams, whom was a U.S. Senator aligned with Radical Republicans during the drafting of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1866, ruled in 1873 the word “jurisdiction” under the Fourteenth Amendment “must be understood to mean absolute and complete jurisdiction, such as the United States had over its citizens before the adoption of this amendment.” He added, “Political and military rights and duties do not pertain to anyone else.”
Essentially then, “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” means the same jurisdiction the United States exercises over its own citizens, i.e., only citizens of the United States come within its operation since citizens of the United States do not owe allegiance to some other nation at the same time they do the United States. This makes arguing the physical presence of being subject to laws silly because being subject to another countries laws while visiting makes no change to an aliens allegiance to their native country.
I read further than I wanted, but definitely stopped at:
“...The Constitution says that the status of parents is irrelevant....”
The Blackstone definition is for “subject,” of course, since that was the English common law equivalent of “citizen.” But it is basically jus solis, determination by location of birth, not by parentage.
Blackstone: 1765
http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_8_4_citizenships1.html
There have been a number of Supreme Court decision with peripheral bearing on the issue, but none are definitive. In particular, the 14th Amendment may have altered the meaning of the terms used in the original constitution.
Personally I wish the Court would take such a case and just define the term. That is exactly what the Court should do, clarify ambiguous points in what the Constitution really means.
“Natural born” as in “vaginal born” not Cesarean Section, right?
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ROFLOL..... I love it. But, now, you have all the NBC fanatics confused.
Bull. Nothing but revisionist history. His explanation had nothing to do with the context of the Constitution. Only people who have never read The Federalist Papers and the Founders' letters would believe this.
Read my tagline. Will not vote for the ineligible Rubio, or the ineligible Obama.
Rubio helps seal Obama’s lack of NBC status issue. We need people that shun CFR and globalist UN agenda. It will only get worse after their summer global warming conference.
That is the big question as what type of citizenship does birth under a protectorate status convey? What if his parents were born in Puerto Rico, also a protectorate?
According to this report by the Congressional Research Service, being born in a Protectorate satisfies the requirement to be born on US soil, so why would it not satisfy the same for his parents?
http://www.scribd.com/doc/74176180/Qualifications-for-President-and-the-%E2%80%9CNatural-Born%E2%80%9D-Citizenship-Eligibility-Requirement
Second, if memory serves me correctly, Chester Arthur burned his records shortly before his death, “cleverly” concealing a lot of things from posterity.
You are not thinking in legal terms. Stealing beer is ALREADY an established crime. Serving as president with a non-US citizen Kenyan father is NOT. Very basic legal factoid.
You’ve identified the whole problem of trying to integrate sovereign Indian tribes: national loyalty.
This NBC stipulation is grossly unfair to those unfortunate babies born from a test tube via anonymous sperm donor. How to prove the father is a citizen?
If you could somehow combine a natural birth thread with a marijuana causes brain damage thread you might have the ultimate FR “discussion.”
If England decided that any U.S. citizen at age 18 was eligible for English citizenship - would that render every American ineligible for the Presidency?
If China made a law that anyone with over 50% Chinese ancestry was automatically a citizen of China - would that render ineligible all Chinese Americans?
1) naturalized, (foreign born)
2) natural, (born in USA, parents maybe or maybe not citizens) and;
3) natural born, (both parents citizens at time of birth, whether naturalized or natural)
If that is not so, there was no reason to differentiate the categories within the Constitution.
There is no wording within the Constitution that differentiates category 2 from category 3.
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