The 1790 law was overturned in 1795.
The new law is mute on what ‘natural born citizen’ means.
As to being born overseas? One can be a citizen certainly, if he has a certificate of US citizen born abroad filed with the local embassy, AND he asserts his US citizenship when he reaches majority.
As to Constitutional eligibility? That is the subject of a rather lively debate. Sen Claire McCaskill (D) submitted a bill to establish the eligibility of anyone born to a U.S. citizen who is serving overseas as an active or reserve member of the U.S. armed forces.
Why? Because senator McCain’s father was a Navy officer serving in the Canal Zone when McCain was born in Panama (NOT IN THE CANAL ZONE).
The laws was never passed. Whether McCain is eligible is still an open question.
How much worse for Obama if he was born in Kenya (or anywhere outside the US)! Maybe that’s why Obama tried to get a phrase added to the McCaskill bill to allow any descendant of active duty military personnel counted as ‘natural born’
As it stands now, IF Obama was born in Kenya to an American mom, he would only be presumed to be a US citizen ONLY IF she WASN’T married to a Kenyan. Otherwise he would be a Kenyan by birth.
If she wasn’t married, he’d be a bastard, but he’d be an AMERICAN bastard, under current law.
BUT keep in mind that if he is a bastard, under the laws that were in force AT THE TIME OF BIRTH, he wouldn’t qualify as a citizen, due to his mom not satisfying the age and residency requirements.
But that’s OK, because under current law he would be an American by birth if Stanley Ann wasn’t married, and he was born in Kenya.
And if that’s not enough even if he is a citizen by birth, he may or may not meet the Constitutional requirement of being a natural born citizen. Once again, what exactly that turn of phrase means is the subject of a rather lively debate at the moment.
I think that presenting a forged “state” document as legitimate (like a birth certificate) is an illegal act in most states.
I’ve been in the bowels of a few Registers of Deeds... it shouldn’t be all that difficult for someone living in the jurisdiction he claims to be from to check. Even if the original doc has been put aside to discourage snoopers, something about it should be included in the county’s indexing system, not to mention printed in the newspaper of record.