[jcsjcm]

The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution reads in part:

“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and the State wherein they reside.”

In 1866, Senator Jacob Howard clearly spelled out the intent of the 14th Amendment by stating:

“Every person born within the limits of the United States, and subject to their jurisdiction, is by virtue of natural law and national law a citizen of the United States. This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons. It settles the great question of citizenship and removes all doubt as to what persons are or are not citizens of the United States. This has long been a great desideratum in the jurisprudence and legislation of this country.”

This understanding was reaffirmed by Senator Edward Cowan, who stated:

“[A foreigner in the United States] has a right to the protection of the laws; but he is not a citizen in the ordinary acceptance of the word...”

The phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” was intended to exclude American-born persons from automatic citizenship whose allegiance to the United States was not complete. With illegal aliens who are unlawfully in the United States, their native country has a claim of allegiance on the child. Thus, the completeness of their allegiance to the United States is impaired, which therefore precludes automatic citizenship.

Again statement is still made that they are citizens of the United States. It does not add that they are in fact Natural born citizens as required for the President and Vice President.

[patlin]

rule of law making, the placement of punctuations is critical to the interpretation therefore,

born or naturalized, "AND subject to the jurisdiction" puts both born and naturalized on equal footing in the eyes of the law in regards to allegiance, they both owe but one.

To make your argument and the one Leo keeps tripping himself up on, the 14th would have to read

born, "OR naturalized and subject to the jurisdiction"

In law, punctuation has “GREAT” meaning. The 2 above examples do not render the same meaning

[patlin]

As Waite & Gray discussed, “subject to the jurisdiction” has several meanings and applies either locally when one is in a foreign land or when one is in his home country. Aliens, whether here legally or illegally are not bound(under) by the laws of US citizenship, nor can they be but under the law of nations, they are to adhere to the laws of the country in which they are in for the common peace of all nations.

Thus you are utterly wrong in your interp of the 14th.

[RummyChick]

SCOTUS in WKA could have cared less what Congress meant in the 14th Amendment. They refused to hear evidence of it and made their own interpretation.

So it doesn’t matter what Congress said at this point unless, and until, it makes it back before SCOTUS.