“What the whole world is missing here is that McCain was born in the Republic of Panama and NOT the Canal Zone, U.S. territory.”
This is just ridiculous. We’ve just been through close to 3,000 comments saying that Obama would be “natural born” wherever he was born if his mother had spent 5 years in the U.S. after her 14th or 16th birthday before his birth (which she didn’t). Why wouldn’t the same thing apply to McCain? He, in fact had two U.S. citizens as parents, not one. What difference does it make where he was born?
That is funny. You and I must have been on two different 3,000 comment threads.
David was kind enough to break his explanation of the legal to a summary thread for us.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2040753/posts
Obama and McCain: Citizenship And Eligibility—Legal Issues
No.
If Stanley Ann had been in the US five years after age 16, Obama would be a citizen, even though he was born in Kenya.
There would still be the issue of whether or not he was "natural born" for purposes of eligibility to serve as president under Article II, Sec. 1, Par. 4 of the U S Constitution.
As can be seen from the recent press articles, many Constitutional Lawyers see the natural born test as something other than "citizen when born"--for the most part, the view is that there is a reasonably good Constitutional interpretation that the phrase means citizen born a citizen in the confines of the United States at the time of his birth.
The only wobble on that view came in the Goldwater situation when, even though Goldwater did not meet the test at the time of his birth, the territory in which he was born was ultimately incorporated in the US states. Neither Kenya nor Panama have been so incorporated.
If the argument reaches the courts, there is no conclusive authority on the question.
The Obama/McCain situations are related in that a sole attack directed at Obama is subject to political arguments about racism and political extremism. The case against McCain is sufficiently clear that there are already a number of lawsuits pending seeking the remedy of decertifying his delegates on these grounds. Combining the question as to both candidates affords the courts the opportunity to deliver a result that is completely non-partisan.
“Why wouldn’t the same thing apply to McCain? He, in fact had two U.S. citizens as parents, not one. What difference does it make where he was born?”
It makes not one iota of difference where John McCain was born. He was a US citizen at birth on account of having a US citizen father and mother. The US law *since 1790*(!) grants citizenship at birth in such situationsto children of US citizens born “across the sea” etc. John McCain is a natural-born citizen and the discussions of where he is born is irrelevent trivia.