Posted on 05/14/2015 8:44:18 AM PDT by Josh Painter
This should not even be an issue any longer, but there are still some out there who didn't get the legal memo.
First, some history:
The origins of the Natural Born Citizenship Clause date back to a letter John Jay (who later authored several of the Federalist Papers and served as our first chief justice) wrote to George Washington, then president of the Constitutional Convention, on July 25, 1787. At the time, as Justice Joseph Story later explained in his influential Commentaries on the Constitution, many of the framers worried about ambitious foreigners who might otherwise be intriguing for the office. Permit me to hint, whether it would not be wise & seasonable to provide a strong check to the admission of Foreigners into the administration of our national Government; and to declare expressly that the Command in chief of the American army shall not be given to nor devolve on, any but a natural born Citizen, Jay wrote.
Washington thanked Jay for his hints in a reply dated September 2, 1787. Shortly thereafter, the natural-born citizenship language appeared in the draft Constitution the Committee of Eleven presented to the Convention. There is no record of any debate on the clause.
To make a long story short, the question boils down to a matter of intent:
While it is possible to trace the origins of the Natural Born Citizenship Clause, it is harder to determine its intended scopewho did the framers mean to exclude from the presidency by this language? The Naturalization Act of 1790 probably constitutes the most significant evidence available. Congress enacted this legislation just three years after the drafting of the Constitution, and many of those who voted on it had participated in the Constitutional Convention. The act provided that children of citizens of the United States, that may be born beyond the sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural-born citizens. There is no record of discussion of the term natural born citizen, but it is reasonable to conclude that the drafters believed that foreign-born children of American parents who acquired citizenship at birth could and should be deemed natural born citizens.
In conclusion:
What can we expect if Senator Cruz or another similarly situated candidate runs for president in 2016? Undoubtedly, the controversy will continue with passionate advocates on both sides of the issue. A scholarly consensus is emerging, however, that anyone who acquires citizenship at birth is natural born for purposes of Article II. This consensus rests on firm foundations. First, given Jays letter and the language of the 1790 naturalization act, it seems evident that the framers were worried about foreign princes, not children born to American citizens living abroad. Second, the 14-year residency requirement Article II also imposes as a presidential prerequisite ensures that, regardless of their place of birth, would-be presidents must spend a significant time living in the United States before they can run for office.
Concurring:
Two former top Justice Department lawyers say there is no question Ted Cruz is eligible for the presidency, in a new Harvard Law Review article that seeks to put to rest any doubt about the Texas Republican. Despite the happenstance of a birth across the border, there is no question that Senator Cruz has been a citizen from birth and is thus a natural born citizen within the meaning of the Constitution, write Neal Katyal and Paul Clement in an article published March 11. There are plenty of serious issues to debate in the upcoming presidential election cycle. The less time spent dealing with specious objections to candidate eligibility, the better.
[...]
The Harvard Law Review article is notable because it is a bipartisan assessment that Cruz meets the Constitutions requirement that the president be a natural born citizen. Katyal was an acting solicitor general in the Obama administration from May 2010 to June 2011. Clement was solicitor general from 2004 to 2008 in the Bush administration and is, perhaps, best known nationally among conservatives for arguing the case against President Obamas health care law before the Supreme Court in 2012.
Katyal and Clement review the intent and meaning behind natural born citizen, going back to the Founding Fathers. The question about citizenship and presidential eligibility has also affected Barry Goldwater, George Romney and John McCain over the years and all met the constitutional test.
Katyal and Clement conclude in their article:
As Congress has recognized since the Founding, a person born abroad to a U.S. citizen parent is generally a U.S. citizen from birth with no need for naturalization. And the phrase natural born Citizen in the Constitution encompasses all such citizens from birth. Thus, an individual born to a U.S. citizen parent whether in California or Canada or the Canal Zone is a U.S. citizen from birth and is fully eligible to serve as President if the people so choose. Finally, another bipartisan consensus:
Legal scholars are firm about Cruzs eligibility. Of course hes eligible, Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz tells National Review Online. Hes a natural-born, not a naturalized, citizen. Eugene Volokh, a professor at the UCLA School of Law and longtime friend of Cruz, agrees, saying the senator was a citizen at birth, and thus a natural-born citizen as opposed to a naturalized citizen, which I understand to mean someone who becomes a citizen after birth. Federal law extends citizenship beyond those granted it by the 14th Amendment: It confers the privilege on all those born outside of the United States whose parents are both citizens, provided one of them has been physically present in the United States for any period of time, as well as all those born outside of the United States to at least one citizen parent who, after the age of 14, has resided in the United States for at least five years. Cruzs mother, who was born and raised in Delaware, meets the latter requirement, so Cruz himself is undoubtedly an American citizen. No court has ruled what makes a natural-born citizen, but there appears to be a consensus that the term refers to those who gain American citizenship by birth rather than by naturalization again, including Texass junior senator.
Case closed. Bye bye, birthers,
- JP
“And additionally in 2009, the House of Representatives passed a resolution (H. Res. 593, 111th Congress) by a vote of 378-0 which states, in part, Whereas the 44th President of the United States, Barack Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961.
Such passage carries the same legal weight as if the same group of 378 had passed a resolution to declare the 3rd Friday in June, National Pickle Day, or some nonsense similarly situated.
You are correct that a simple non-binding resolution passed by either chamber of Congress carries no legal weight. However that “whereas clause” in House Resolution 593 has carried POLITICAL weight in the House of Representatives. Consequently since the adoption of that resolution, the political effect is that there has never been a congressional hearing or even a speech in the House on Obama’s eligibility/ineligibility as a natural born citizen.
Senate Resolution 511 on John McCain’s Panama Canal Zone birth and his natural born citizenship had the same effect.
I expect similar resolutions will be passed concerning Senator Cruz’s birth in Canada and his status as a natural born citizenship.
Caring has to have limits.
To me, this is about far more than just the rule of law, which is currently used selectively by the lawless. This is the second half of a successful assault upon the Constitution, our definitions of citizenship and our national identity, while undermining and using our integrity against us creating a slow motion suicide.
The solution the self-described Constitutionalists reach for is the easy way and will do irreparable damage, just like the one the other side reached for did even though both men are ideological opposites in every way.
As such, their solution comes with too high of a price in order to temporarily win a few battles only to lose the greater war. But, since there is nothing that can be said or done now to alter the path we're on, caring has to have limits.
Above is the link for the story about Ted’s dad coming to the U.S. on a 4 year student visa, getting asylum when it was up, having a green card, then marrying Ted’s mom, and them moving to Canada thereafter.
http://www.arcadeathome.com/archive.phtml?2008-03
above is the link for the % arabic & % african for 0’s dad.
(clicking on the link at the top of the article gets one here:
http://www.arcadeathome.com/gate.phtml?http://www.diversityinc.com/public/1461.cfm
But it is not there... “error 404 - nothing found”)
That’s the same source I use in the comment that you responded to.
Many thanks for gathering all those links; somehow I missed the part about him getting asylum and a green card in your link labeled “source”, so I went looking and found and posted the link with the original name...
Bingo! Those links have the info :)
People can go to www.scribd.com and read their pages 20 thru 32 ,
Mother had been refused entry to airplanes due to her nine month pregnancy.
It was a hot August day at the festival so the Obamas went to the beach to cool off.
While swimming in the ocean his mother experienced labor pains so was rushed to the Coast Provincial
General Hospital, Mombasa, Kenya where Obama was born a few hours later at 7:21 pm on August 4, 1961(what a sad day for the USA!).
Four days later his mother flew to Hawaii and registered his birth in Honolulu as a certificate of live birth which omitted the place and hospital of birth."
Most of these early "supporters" of the ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT IN CHIEF were party to the Communists "spooks".
There's a great volume of history you have to go through to understand this, and it goes back to about 1850.
Read these three articles on one of my earlier post:
The information at your link is statutory man-made law regarding Citizenship.
positive law
n. statutory man-made law, as compared to "natural law," which is purportedly based on universally accepted moral principles, "God's law," and/or derived from nature and reason. The term "positive law" was first used by Thomas Hobbes in Leviathan (1651).
natural law
the body of laws derived from nature and reason, embodied in the Declaration of Independence assertion that "all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness." 3) the opposite of "positive law," which is created by mankind through the state.
The Law of Nations or the Principles of Natural Law (1758)
The Laws of Nature and of Nature's God: The True Foundation of American Law
Article 1, Section 8 only grants congress the power to establish a uniform rule of naturalization. Read it.
Citizenship Terms Used in the U.S. Constitution - The 5 Terms Defined & Some Legal Reference to Same
Neither the 14th Amendment nor Wong Kim Ark make one a Natural Born Citizen
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