Replies

It also remains the case that Wong Kim Ark was about citizenship as set out in the 14th Amendment. It was not in any way about Article II, Section 1, Clause 5, and as pointing out in Schneider v. Rusk the 14th Amendment did not affect that provision, a fact which you deny without justification. In fact, the term "citizen" was not used in England at the time of the revolution and for seveal hundred years before then. That under the 14th Amendment there is a precise analogy going back to Calvin's case is irrelevant for purposes of Article II, Section 1, Clause 5. The Supreme Court has never ruled that there is a precise analogy between the term "natrual born citizen" in Article II, Section 1, Clause 5 is the precise equivalent of "native born subject" going back to Calvin's case in 1608, where Coke based the decision on natural law and the divine right of kings, concepts alien to our constitutional converntion, whose members were not enamored of the Stuart kings, to say the least. The holding in Calvin's case was rooted in feudalism and legiance, things not greatly admried by the participants in the constitutional convention. Almost everyone who did particpate however was aware of Vattel's work and his use of the specific phrase "natural born citizen." The concerns voiced in John Jay's famous letter to Washington two weeks befor the first use of the phrase by the Committe on Particulars was of foreign influence, a concern not compatible with your interpretation based on an amendment that would nto occur for another four score and some years.

"In fact, the term "citizen" was not used in England at the time of the revolution and for seveal hundred years before then."

How odd then that it took me less than 60 seconds to find an English text from 1774 that not only used the term "citizen," it actually used the whole phrase "natural born citizen."

Quintilian. Quintilian's Institutes of the Orator: In Twelve Books. Translated by J. Patsall. Vol. 2. London: Printed for B. Law and J. Wilkie, 1774. 31-2.

So... it appears that the term "citizen" was used in England at the time of the Revolution after all.

"The Supreme Court has never ruled that there is a precise analogy between the term 'natrual born citizen' in Article II, Section 1, Clause 5 is the precise equivalent of 'native born subject.'"

Ignoring that the term used in Calvin's case was "natural born subject" and not "native born subject" you are close, but no cigar. While absent from any final ruling (since no such ruling has ever been required) the dicta in Wong Kim Ark is quite explicit that they are synonymous terms.

"Almost everyone who did particpate however was aware of Vattel's work and his use of the specific phrase 'natural born citizen.'"

This is not true. As has been repeatedly demonstrated, Vattel never once in his life can be shown to have used "the specific phrase 'natural born citizen.'"