It's already been resolved.
It has been resolved by the 14th amendment - for good or bad.
This just goes to show that no one ..and I mean NO ONE..knows how a ruling would come down from SCOTUS on this issue...despite FREEPERS who claim to know exactly what would happen.
Scalia does talk about it in the oral arguments of Nguyen.
It would seem that many of our FReepers are more qualified to sit on the bench than Scalia.
In the meantime, and for another 140+- days, we have to live with "an empty chair".
Unfortunately, it also goes to show how we are viewed as the crazy uncle in the basement. Despite the plethora of articles and discussion about this topic over the past four years here and in the conservative blogosphere, the concept has not even appeared on the radar of the most conservative of Supreme Court justices that it is a legitimate issue.
Scalia didnt look and sound flumuxed because he didnt know the answer...
he did not want to put himself in the position of having to recuse himself from an Obama Natural Born Citizen case, by taking a side on it, before a decision is to be made.
what a jerk the author is.
The author supposedly asked, “then why are there separate references to ‘citizen’ and ‘natural born citizen’ in the Constitution?”
Am I supposed to believe that Scalia doesn't know there is a difference between a citizen born and one naturalized? My daughter-in-law was naturalized a week ago. She is not eligible for President because she wasn't born in the USA. I find it incredibly hard to believe someone who claims Scalia doesn't know the difference between being born in the USA and being naturalized...
The media is totally disinterested in Obama's past records.
The media is totally fascinated by Romney's past records.
The media is totally fascinated by Todd Akin.
The media is totally disinterested in Paul Ryan's black college girlfriend.
The media is totally disinterested in Obama robo-signing letters to dead and wounded SEALs.
The media was totally fascinated by Bush robo-signing letters to dead and wounded Iraq & Afghanistan veterans.
Are we seeing a pattern yet?
Who is this guy? He's gone from assertion to conclusion with no argument or evidence. The Constitution is not always as clear as the nose on your face. Sometimes it is, but often it is not. It takes diligent research sometimes to uncover the intended meaning and original understanding of the text, sometimes going back to English common law which was much of our framers point of reference.
The point is, the Constitution doesn't mean what somebody WANTS it to mean. It's meaning is found in the understanding of the text which, again, may be clear, but should be verified by looking at the historical context of the intent and understanding of the framers.
Minor v. Happersett, 88 U.S. 162 (1874), was a case about a woman who wanted to vote. It had nothing to do with qualifications for POTUS. It does, however, address the issue of what a natural-born citizen is, but leaves open the question of children born in a U.S. jurisdiction to non-citizen parents. In my quick search, I don't see any subsequent cases that shed any more light on the subject. Relevant part of the opinion below:
The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common-law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives, or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners. Some authorities go further and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction without reference to the citizenship of their [88 U.S. 162, 168] parents. As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first. For the purposes of this case it is not necessary to solve these doubts. It is sufficient for everything we have now to consider that all children born of citizen parents within the jurisdiction are themselves citizens. Minor, 88 U.S. 162.
Nevertheless, there may be an issue because Rubio's parents were not citizens at the time Rubio was born. WorldNetDaily's research shows a native-born citizen born to non-citizen parents may not be what is meant in the Constitution as a "natural-born citizen." http://www.wnd.com/2012/06/rubio-autobiography-proves-hes-not-eligible-for-vp/
There are also those who assert that a native-born citizen IS a natural-born citizen. It almost certainly would have to be decided at the SCOTUS level, if Rubio were to run for POTUS. (What the Immigration Service says is not a deciding factor.)
It seems to me to be a minor point that his parents became citizens two or three years after Rubio's birth in the United States. I guess more research will need to be done to find what was the the intent of the framers was in their use of the term "natural-born citizen". I believe in strict construction of the Constitution by ruling as close as possible to the original intent of the framers, not what a judge or Justice WANTS their intent to have been. My guess is SCOTUS would most likely allow Rubio to be a natural-born citizen for purpose of Article II Section 5 of the Constitution. This may in fact be what the framers intended, but SCOTUS is generally not strict in constructing textual Constitutional meaning, which is why I think they would rule in favor of Rubio, whether or not this was the original intent and understanding of the text of Article II Section 5 of the Constitution.
From my understanding, if Barack Sr. was really his father and he wasn’t born in the US, Jr. isn’t rightly a US citizen at all. (Since his mother was too young at the time to by the laws at the time to pass on US citizenship in those circumstances.)
This is very disappointing.
You can bet it will be resolved if the Republicans attempt a similar stunt
bfl
Scalia would be a fool to answer the question. He’d just get himself disqualified if the issue ever came up.
Shouldn’t this issue have been ruled on long ago, to state who is qualified to be president? The SCOTUS is the most derelict branch of government, and that is saying something.
Resolved? Probably not. Decided? Oh yeah, just like obamacare was decided and Kelo was decided and Roe v Wade was decided.
They'll find and decide what they need to to keep their masters happy and then go back to enjoying their lifetime perks.
They aren't going to decide against obama and that voting block and they aren't going to decide against people like Rubio, the GOPe's counter to obama.
Anchor babies are natural born now, illegal immigrants soon will be. Who cares what a bunch of old dead white men had to say? What did they know? We have Kagan and that wise latina Sotomayor to guides us now.
I don’t see this issue being resolved anytime soon by a definitive Supreme Court ruling. Which is probably a good thing knowing now a little more about Chief Justice John Roberts’ judicial philosophy.
It's already been resolved.