Posted on 01/12/2016 10:09:44 AM PST by Behind the Blue Wall
Donald Trump is actually right about something: Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) is not a natural-born citizen and therefore is not eligible to be president or vice president of the United States.
The Constitution provides that "No person except a natural born citizen . . . shall be eligible to the office of President." The concept of "natural born" comes from the common law, and it is that law the Supreme Court has said we must turn to for the concept's definition. On this subject, the common law is clear and unambiguous. The 18th-century English jurist William Blackstone, the preeminent authority on it, declared natural-born citizens are "such as are born within the dominions of the crown of England," while aliens are "such as are born out of it."
. . .
Cruz is, of course, a U.S. citizen. As he was born in Canada, he is not natural born. His mother, however, is an American, and Congress has provided by statute for the naturalization of children born abroad to citizens. Because of the senator's parentage, he did not have to follow the lengthy naturalization process that aliens without American parents must undergo. Instead, Cruz was naturalized at birth.
Non-sequiturs may indeed be true in and of themselves, but often make lies as a product.
In this case, you are arguing against your own apparent point...angrily. Perhaps you misread.
Newly discovered? You expect any thinking person to believe that such a “smart” lawyer would not know he was a Canadian Citizen for over forty years? I have a bridge to sell you.
So far what I see is a lot of so called journalists spewing their typical rhetoric in favor of a politician. None of them want an outsider who is not owned by the cheap labor express to be President. They have to have someone they can control and they can’t control Trump. Red State, The Atlantic, etc. etc. etc.
Sorry you wasted your time. Time better spent by doing your own research instead of depending on some hacks to do it for you.
Pay per view at the debate.
It's a logical fallacy to conclude something is true because many people believe it.
So is my daughter, a law graduate.
SCOTUS Trumps all legal scholars as the final arbiters of ALL laws and constitution. Might as well get familiar with our system.
Exactly.
That was Leo Donofrio's case. Tried to ping him but his account doesn't come up.
So you’re saying that your issue here is divided loyalties? Seems a very valid general concern.
Is there evidence of divided national loyalties with Cruz? In what way do you see having been born in *Canada* and then raised in the U.S. would impact this against the interests of the U.S.? Do you believe he was unduly influenced by Quebec as a three and four year old? Do you see other, non-Canada based divided loyalties that give you pause?
There clearly was such an issue with Obama: regardless of where he was born, there is clear evidence that he viewed himself as a foreigner.
Well it may also be the case that there are some very patriotic people who for whatever maybe even military service or diplomatic service haven’t spent 14 years resident in the states, would then propose dropping that requirement as well?
The term was hardly vague! It was well understood by their study of natural law, in fact to them it was self-evident. Modern sophists would have you believe otherwise, but the logic for the requirement is unassailable. You haven’t seemed to much studied the era, so perhaps you may have nothing but your more modern view.
They knew exactly what they were doing and why they were doing it. They had to defend what they wrote, through 13 state conventions and every clause was scrutinized. The item of the requirement of natural born was not controversial because its meaning was clear and everyone knew what it meant.
You really think after all they went through they would admit to having a foreign born president?
Unchecked delusion is possible in a body politic, but it never ends well.
Respectfully, ...
The point is Canada has every right to determine the citizenship of any human born on their soil. Ted was not born in an embassy so their laws would maintain. They can defer to the wishes of non citizen parent if they chose but they are under no obligation to defer to the non citizen parent.
Not sure what your point was but mine was intended to be a little sarcastic.
Molly, Sorry you wasted your time. Time better spent by doing your own research instead of depending on some hacks to do it for you..You have bought Trump and Alan Grayson’s bridge..So far what I see is a lot of so called journalists spewing their typical rhetoric in favor of a politician.....
Canada may do whatever it wants within Canada. The act of Canada blindly deciding to grant citizenship of its own accord isn’t really relevant to the standing of a foreign (to Canada) citizen outside of Canada. If next Thursday Canada voted to extend its citizenship to you, would you expect to suddenly lose eligibility to become POTUS? I would think not. Your eligibility would depend on actions by you, and the laws of the United States, right?
In the context of your “Anchor babies” argument, Canada decided to make him a sort of anchor baby in their system. If you reject it conceptually for Mexicans coming to the U.S., it would seem consistent to reject it in Cruz’s case as a matter of logic. Is this reasoning wrong?
You reasoning if flawed, yes. But I won’t argue the point with you, because you are not open to reversing your position, and I am not open to reversing mine.
“Well it may also be the case that there are some very patriotic people who for whatever maybe even military service or diplomatic service haven’t spent 14 years resident in the states, would then propose dropping that requirement as well?”
There is a technical legal argument, and there is a functional argument. You sounded like you were making a comment on the functional argument - the application of the reason for the Constitutional requirement - and I was looking for elaboration.
Well my main point was that you can look to the intent of a constitutional provision in order to determine its meaning and the intent of the nbc clause is rather clear, the Founders were concerned about a President with presumably secret divided loyalties owing to their divided allegiances, and as such the rule would then be that anyone born with divided allegiances is ineligible. And Cruz undoubtedly was born with divided allegiances. Having found the rule you can’t then go back and start analyzing whether it’s a particular person really does have divided allegiances, you have to just apply the rule. But for the record, I don’t actually trust Cruz on these questions. The things he’s done that veer from what the conservative base wants have been few but they’ve been things like favoring a huge expansion of foreign workers, giving fast track trade authority to the President, favoring legalization of illegal aliens, allowing the President to go forward on the Iran Deal without treaty authority. Add on top of that the fact that his wife, who’s an active participant in his political career, is a partner at the ultimate Wall Street globalist firm, Goldman Sachs, and in my mind you have a candidate who does in fact show signs of divided loyalties of the sort that the Founders might’ve been thinking about.
That doesn’t answer the question though
Did the founders insist born on US territory to at least one or even two citizen parents ?
I, like you, have the highest respect for Cruz. I have tried to stay out of this debate, because my answer to the query, being clearly ambivalent, might be taken as taking sides, as between Cruz & Trump, which is something I have decided to avoid, at this juncture. (As I have posted, we are going to need both the Cruz & Trump supporters--whose perspectives really do complement--that is to complete--each other--if we are going to turn America back towards her heritage.
But let me offer a perspective, which has clear implications as to the original intent, of the framers of the Constitution. The foremost authority--the best accepted authority--on the Law Of Nations, to the founding fathers was De Vattel. Here is his answer to the query:
It is asked whether the children born of citizens in a foreign country are citizens? The laws have decided this question in several countries, and their regulations must be followed.(...) By the law of nature alone, children follow the condition of their fathers, and enter into all their rights (Sec. 212); the place of birth produces no change in this particular, and cannot, of itself, furnish any reason for taking from a child what nature has given him; I say, "of itself," for civil or political laws may, for particular reasons, ordain otherwise. But I suppose that the father has not entirely quitted his country in order to settle elsewhere. If he has fixed his abode in a foreign country, he has become a member of another society, at least as a perpetual inhabitant; and his children will be members of it also.
I realize that given the various aspects of the Cruz case, this does not necessarily clarify all issues.
If I had never set foot in the USA I could see how the USA may not have original jurisdiction. I might even suspect that I would have to ask permission to leave via a passport which I was not born with.
I am trying to keep my promise here.
I can only tell you this. The First Congress in 1790 passed the first Naturalization Act which defined a natural born citizen to include the progeny of one citizen born outside the borders of the US. Article III courts place enormous reliance on the First Congress and British Common Law in interpreting original intent wher the Constitution is not clearly definitive and for good reason. Many of the founders were in the First Congress.
Vattel was a Swiss philosopher who never stepped foot in the US and despite what some may say his Law of Nations treatise does not bind us in any way. Nor should it.
The Supreme Law of this land is the Constitution, the laws of Congress and the Treaties ratified by Congress and signed by the POTUS.
So if Cruz was natural born in 1790 he is natural born today no matter what philosopher kings have written.
But that is jmo.
This is why I always ask for clarification.....the law that surpassed that was later in 1986 and only required one of either parents to be citizen who if married and both if not married plus a five year residency in country at some time for citizen parent
Has it ever been tested....I don't know.....and I like Trump and Cruz....it's not a weapon for me but I have yet to see it completely dealt with.....Levin just screams it's nonsense and Rush and Sean ape that
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