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It is therefore very clear that the whole Supreme Court in Minor v. Happersett was well aware of the Presidential eligibility implications when they explicitly rejected the notion that "natural born citizens" are only the children born on US soil of two US citizen parents.

They didn't "explicitly reject" anything. The court wasn't coming up with anything at all novel in this decision. They discussed that what made a natural born citizen wasn't solely being born within the jurisdiction of the Constitution, within U.S. territory (because the children born of aliens or foreigners on U.S. soil were certainly not natural-born citizens and perhaps not even citizens at all--that was the doubt they didn't feel a need to address in this case) but to parents who were both citizens of the United States, that is, as citizens subject to the jurisdiction of the Constitution, wherever in the world they happened to be at the time of the child's birth.

Based on then-current law, John McCain could have been born anywhere in the world, on or off a U.S. military base and still be a natural born citizen of the United States because he was born to two parents who were both citizens of the United States and, through their citizenship, subject to the jurisdiction of the U.S. Constitution.

This is not a condition enjoyed by Barry Obama because no matter where he was born, he was not born to two citizen parents and, therefore, cannot possibly be a natural born citizen since his parents were subject to the jurisdiction of two different nations. And since there has been no law passed in the intervening time to the contrary and no subsequent Supreme Court decision specifically contradicting the definitions employed by the court in Minor v Happersett, Barry Obama is just plain sh-t out of luck. The best he can hope for is to continue bobbing and weaving and obfuscating.

This does, though, give insight into why Chester A. Arthur was so anxious to cover up the fact that his father was not a U.S. citizen at the time of his birth, making Arthur ineligible to be president, just six short years after the Minor v Happersett decision, because he was not a natural born citizen. As an attorney appointed by Grant as the Collector of the Port of New York betwen 1871 and 1878 and having formerly been involved in civil rights cases, you can bet that he was intimately familiar with a major case on a major civil rights issue in the Supreme Court and the Court's explicit reasoning on the matter of natural born citizenship and how that related to his own history.

They didn't "explicitly reject" anything.

But they did.

TWO SCANT PARAGRAPHS DOWN from where they quoted Article II, Section I of the Constitution: "no person except a natural-born citizen, or a citizen of the United States at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President" - they followed it up by recognizing:

Under the power to adopt a uniform system of naturalization Congress, as early as 1790, [ - A MERE THREE YEARS AFTER THE ADOPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION - ] provided "that any alien, being a free white person," might be admitted as a citizen of the United States, and that the children of such persons so naturalized, dwelling within the United States, being under twenty-one years of age at the time of such naturalization, should also be considered citizens of the United States, and that the children of citizens of the United States that might be born beyond the sea, or out of the limits of the United States, should be considered as natural-born citizens.

In recognizing - TWO PARAGRAPHS DOWN FROM WHERE THEY TALKED ABOUT ELIGIBILITY TO THE PRESIDENCY - "that the children of citizens of the United States that might be born beyond the sea, or out of the limits of the United States, should be considered as NATURAL-BORN CITIZENS,"

The United States Supreme Court in Minor v. Happersett thereby recognized that children born abroad of US citizen parents are eligible to run for President of the United States.

There is ONE REASON, and one reason only to draw a legal distinction between "citizens" and "NATURAL-BORN citizens," and that is ELIGIBILITY TO RUN FOR AND SERVE AS PRESIDENT.

This is therefore an EXPLICIT REJECTION of the birther doctrine that "natural born citizens" are ONLY those born BOTH on US soil AND of US citizen parents.

And if you can't convincingly disprove that, then YOU HAVE NO CASE; the "both-and" definition of "natural born citizen" is DEAD.

They didn't "explicitly reject" anything.

But they did.

TWO SCANT PARAGRAPHS DOWN from where they quoted Article II, Section I of the Constitution: "no person except a natural-born citizen, or a citizen of the United States at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President" - they followed it up by recognizing:

Under the power to adopt a uniform system of naturalization Congress, as early as 1790, [ - A MERE THREE YEARS AFTER THE ADOPTION OF THE CONSTITUTION - ] provided "that any alien, being a free white person," might be admitted as a citizen of the United States, and that the children of such persons so naturalized, dwelling within the United States, being under twenty-one years of age at the time of such naturalization, should also be considered citizens of the United States, and that the children of citizens of the United States that might be born beyond the sea, or out of the limits of the United States, should be considered as natural-born citizens.

In recognizing - TWO PARAGRAPHS DOWN FROM WHERE THEY TALKED ABOUT ELIGIBILITY TO THE PRESIDENCY - "that the children of citizens of the United States that might be born beyond the sea, or out of the limits of the United States, should be considered as NATURAL-BORN CITIZENS,"

The United States Supreme Court in Minor v. Happersett thereby recognized that children born abroad of US citizen parents are eligible to run for President of the United States.

There is ONE REASON, and one reason only to draw a legal distinction between "citizens" and "NATURAL-BORN citizens," and that is ELIGIBILITY TO RUN FOR AND SERVE AS PRESIDENT.

This is therefore an EXPLICIT REJECTION of the birther doctrine that "natural born citizens" are ONLY those born BOTH on US soil AND of US citizen parents.

And if you can't convincingly disprove that, then YOU HAVE NO CASE; the "both-and" definition of "natural born citizen" is DEAD.

Sorry for the double post.

Nathanael, ping to post re: explicit Supreme Court rejection of birther doctrine.

“Based on then-current law, John McCain could have been born anywhere in the world, on or off a U.S. military base and still be a natural born citizen of the United States because he was born to two parents who were both citizens of the United States and, through their citizenship, subject to the jurisdiction of the U.S. Constitution.”

I don't believe this is correct. The 1790 law was replaced and the language extending NBC status to the children of US citizens born overseas was dropped.

Under then-current law and Leo's analysis of Minor, McCain was not only not NBC, McCain was not even a US citizen at birth.

McCain became a nunc pro tunc (retroactive) US Citizen at birth being born to US citizens on foreign soil only due to a law passed shortly after he was born. That makes McCain a statutory citizen and a statutory citizen can never be a natural born citizen, IMO.

They didn't "explicitly reject" anything.

In noting the ongoing dialogue surrounding children born on US soil of alien parents and then explicitly refusing to settle the debate, the Court was saying it explicitly refused to restrict citizenship to only those born of citizen parents.

Beyond that, you have some novel ideas regarding "subject to the jurisdiction" which run directly counter to established case law.