RE: Tribal American Indians had treaty and sovereignty rights that were determined to preclude jurisdiction until the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924.
PRECISELY. So my point is this — the 14th Amendment was NOT MEANT for everyone born in American soil. The intent was narrowly tailored for SLAVES and their CHILDREN born in the United States.
Illegals and American Indians were not in the drafters’ mind otherwise, why the NEED for the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924?
So Congress can pass laws deciding under what circumstances a person can or cannot be a citizen. They can do it today.
RE: Ending birthright citizenship is probably going to take overturning the Supreme Court’s ruling in U.S. v Wong Kim Ark (1898) which established the precedent of non-citizen offspring being citizens if born here. Of course Wong Kim Ark’s parents were here legally when he was born.
I don’t have a problem giving birthright citizenship with children of those who are here LEGALLY ( e.g. Wong Kim Ark, Bobby Jindal, Marco Rubio ).
So, the above case is an ENTIRELY SEPARATE ISSUE. Let’s stick to the issue of ILLEGALs.
RE: “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive ANY PERSON of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to ANY PERSON within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
The wording switches from “citizen” to “person.”
OK, so Congress passes a law withholding birthright citizenship from ILLEGALS. I don’t think that deprives them of life, liberty or property.
The law they pass IS DUE PROCESS.
I don’t even have a problem making the law APPLY ONLY AFTER IT HAS BEEN PASSED ( not retroactively ).
Supreme Court rulings since adoption of the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment in 1868 have had the effect of creating four exceptions to “all persons born...and subject to the jurisdiction thereof...”
1) Reservation and tribally enrolled American Indians prior to 1924.
2) Persons with diplomatic immunity.
3) Members of a foreign invading military on U.S. soil.
4) Persons on foreign public ships within U.S. territorial waters.
A person’s legal status can change by congressional action (for example the 1986 Immigration Reform and Border Control Act of 1986 which gave legal status to 2.7 million formerly illegals) so I agree with you that Congress could pass a bill and a president could sign a bill into law that withholds birthright citizenship from the children of illegal aliens.
Whether such a law would be upheld as constitutional is anybody’s guess and would depend on the ideological composition of the Court at that time.