[PapaBear3625]

14th Amendment: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside."

Why would they have put in the clause "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof", if they didn't want to exclude children of citizens of other countries who are just visiting, or here illegally?

[Architect of Avalon]

Get that reading to the Supreme Court.

[Lurking Libertarian]

Why would they have put in the clause "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof", if they didn't want to exclude children of citizens of other countries who are just visiting, or here illegally?

To exclude the children of foreign diplomats. We have no jurisdiction over foreign diplomats; they can literally commit murder and not be prosecuted because they have diplomatic immunity. We certainly have jurisdiction over illegal aliens; otherwise, we couldn't prosecute them for crimes.

[kaehurowing]

You would be surprised how some foreign countries interpret our 14th Am. For a long time, rich South Korean women have come to the U.S. to give birth, partly so sons can claim that as U.S. citizens they are exempt from South Korea’s mandatory military service. South Korean government doesn’t buy it and takes the position that they are not validly U.S. citizens but instead are Koreans and must serve.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

In 1924 Congress passed the Indian Citizenship Act that granted citizenship to all members of American Indian tribes "born within the territorial limits of the United States".

This was AFTER the 14th amendment passed.

If citizenship was granted just by being born in the territorial limits of the US there would have been no need for this act.

Yet it was.

The logical conclusion is that being born on US soil is not enough.