1. Is this topic personal for you because someone you care about has a foreign parent?
No.
I became involved in the topic because I was interested in finding out for myself whether Barack Obama was actually eligible to be President, or not.
2. Are you aware that prior to 1920, foreign women automatically gained American citizenship upon their marriage to American men?
I've heard the allegation, but offhand, I don't see how it's relevant to the meaning of natural born citizen.
I'll start with those, and work up to the Naturalization act of 1790 which you excerpted to support your argument.
Why don't you do better than that? Why don't you try the following:
1) Read the actual court cases for yourself. See what they actually say. Do so without reference to writings by Donofrio, Apuzzo, etc. to interpret them for you and tell you what they supposedly mean.
You can start with the four Supreme Court cases that supposedly define natural born citizen as being a child born on US soil of two US citizen parents.
Read the entire text of all four cases, and see if you can find any explicit statement in the majority opinion of any one of the four that says:
"A natural born citizen is a child born on US soil of two US citizen parents."
Or, "Persons born on US soil are not natural born citizens unless both parents are US citizens at the time of birth."
Or, "The Founding Fathers relied upon Vattel for the meaning of 'natural born citizen,' and not upon English common law."
See if you can find any one of the above. And don't let the assumption that you're not going to, stop you from looking. Read all of the majority opinions carefully, and analyze what the courts actually said.
2) Answer the question that I asked philman earlier in this thread.
3) Work your way through my reasoning on Minor v. Happersett - not for the purpose of trying to prove me wrong, but for the purpose of understanding what I said, asking yourself whether it makes sense, and seeing whether it seems to match what Minor v. Happersett actually says.
4) Read through the entire majority opinion in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, very carefully, taking notes as you go along, of what Justice Gray actually says - not what you or Leo Donofrio want him to say.
5) Spend at least 3 or 4 hours doing outside research into historical writings regarding the meaning of "natural born citizen." And by "outside," I'm talking about outside of Donofrio's and Apuzzo's blogs, although you can certainly include those as well. There's plenty of material on the internet.
6) Go through Donofrio's post on Minor v. Happersett setting a binding precedent, very carefully and logically. See what logical fallacies you can pinpoint.
If you have any intellectual honesty (which as I seem to recall, I don't believe you do, as I seem to remember you making a statement to the effect that you wouldn't be convinced to matter what - but of course my memory could very well be faulty on that point, so I won't swear to that), you'll get the answers to any questions you would ask of me anyway.
Too much to respond to in one message.
1. Is this topic personal for you because someone you care about has a foreign parent?
No.
Okay, done. I won't ask this again.
I've heard the allegation, but offhand, I don't see how it's relevant to the meaning of natural born citizen.
It is EXTREMELY relevant. Prior to 1920, there was no such thing as a divided citizenship marriage, and no such thing as a divided citizenship offspring. The offspring of a Marriage to an American male was automatically the offspring of two citizen parents. The founders could not ratify an article that tolerates a condition which did not exist at the time, and of which was alien to their understanding. (divided citizenship offspring.)
Why don't you do better than that? Why don't you try the following:
1) Read the actual court cases for yourself. See what they actually say. Do so without reference to writings by Donofrio, Apuzzo, etc. to interpret them for you and tell you what they supposedly mean.
Because I don't think the opinions of founders filtered through the courts are an improvement on the original source material. A judge cannot reach back in time and change what is written, he can only add his own prejudice and agenda.
In science, arguments are made from "first principles." This tends to keep error out of the discussion. Unfortunately the legal system has made a methodology out of the "fallacy of authority." They call it "Precedent."
In my opinion, Subsequent court opinions are the least reliable method of determining original intent.
5) Spend at least 3 or 4 hours doing outside research into historical writings regarding the meaning of "natural born citizen." And by "outside," I'm talking about outside of Donofrio's and Apuzzo's blogs, although you can certainly include those as well. There's plenty of material on the internet.
6) Go through Donofrio's post on Minor v. Happersett setting a binding precedent, very carefully and logically. See what logical fallacies you can pinpoint.
All of your suggestions revolve around the same fallacy; That a court can better tell me what the founders meant than the founders themselves. I reject that notion outright in favor of "first principles." Writings years later by people unconnected with ratification are poor and misleading substitutes for contemporary writings from the founding era.