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To: AmericanVictory
"Further, here is John Marshall, quoting Vattel in Marshall's opinion in The Venus, a concurring opinion in which he was joined by Livingston:"

But did you read that excerpt before posting it? Because (ignoring that the Venus case was about Admiralty Law and not citizenship) that de Vattel quotation never mentions "natural born citizens" once.

"You may recall tha the French word at issue was actually citoyen and that it became particularly prominent in use, after the fall of the French monarchy and the rise of the French Repuublic. In the use of this term the French revolutionaries reflected precisely its use here by our own revolutionaries."

Certainly you are not suggesting that it was an invention of French revolutionaries? That would be a neat trick, since our revolution came first, and the French learned the universal application of the term "citizen" from us, not the other way around. And looking at a map should remind you how closely England and France have been involved with each other since before the Norman Invasion

According to etymological dictionaries, the word goes back in England to at least the 14th Century.

And again... the Supreme Court has not been ambiguous on the fact that subject and citizen are exactly synonymous. Here are two excerpts from Wong Kim Ark on that issue:

"All persons born in the allegiance of the King are natural-born subjects, and all persons born in the allegiance of the United States are natural-born citizens. Birth and allegiance go together. Such is the rule of the common law, and it is the common law of this country, as well as of England"

and

"The term "citizen," as understood in our law, is precisely analogous to the term "subject" in the common law, and the change of phrase has entirely resulted from the change of government. The sovereignty has been transferred from one man to the collective body of the people, and he who before as a "subject of the king" is now "a citizen of the State."

So... there ya go.

"Somehow, I think that John Marshall, perhaps our greatest and most influential Chief Justice, was a bit better informed than yourself, writing from the bench in 1814."

I agree. I can only chalk it up to my good fortune that he and I concur that de Vattel did not say "natural born citizen."
1,290 posted on 02/22/2010 2:44:17 PM PST by EnderWiggins
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To: EnderWiggins
You continue to ignore that Wong Kim Ark was about the 14th Amendment and its use of the word "citize" is strictly in that context. It has nothing to do with Article II, Section 1, Clause 5's phrase. And Marxhall's quote dirictly refers to the concept in Vattel of the "citizen" who is native born, a phrase used also by Vattel in other parts of his 1756 treatise with which the founders were so familiar and which was the subject of much discussion.

You apparently have not read the actual case of The Venus, not surprisingly, either that our you do not understand what it says. It is much about citizenship as an essential element of the controversy between prize claimant and defendants.

Either you are extemely dense or just stupid. First you cite something Cicero said about the Roman Re;ublic as if it were English common law and then you engage in disinformation by saying that I said, which I did not, that the French invented the term "citizen" at the time of their revolution. As you pointed out it goes back to Rome and classical Greece. You may have heard of the Latin word "cives."

You seem to be historically quite ignorant. Let me point out that the great struggle at the time of our Revolution was between republicanism and monarchism. Under monarchies the law discussed "subjects" as in subjects of the King as lord, dating back to feudalism. By contrast we and the French revoloutionaries looked intitially, before the excesses of the French Revolution, upon ourselves as fellow republicans in an otherwsie monarchistic world, as citizens of a Republic, like all those that Madison studied under Witherspoon and of whose demise at the nands of demagogues and foreign influences they were quire keenly aware and very concerned about. That is the point, which you seem to assidiously miss and misrepresent. It is kind of like misrepresenting that the ancient Roman Republic concept of citizen of Rome is a term of English common law of the 1700's.

Is it beyond your comprehension to see that Marshall was precisely, in the quote from Vattel that he used, quoting Vattel's concept of being a "citizen" who is natural born in the sense of being the child of a citizen father and mother? Perhaps you have dyslexia and cannot comprehend phrasing that means the same in more words than the more concise "natural born citizen."

You seem to take pride in trolling for those who would destroy our Constitution and doing it with such lack of comprehension and delight in misinforming. History will expose the fraud for whom you troll. You must be concerned that he and his Ci-cago gang won't be able to use you and others like you to destroy the Constitution and that it will not only be saved but will save the day as it was designed to do, against essentially foreign influences and demagogues who can, at least temporarily, stir up the masses.

1,302 posted on 02/22/2010 4:13:10 PM PST by AmericanVictory (Should we be more like them or they more like we used to be?)
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