Sen. Ted Cruz Is a Naturalized Citizen, not a Natural Born Citizen

London Telegraph ^ | Jnuary 30th, 2016 | reasonmclucus

[kathsua]

The United States Constitution requires presidents to be “natural born citizens”. The original Constitution doesn’t define “natural born citizen”, but the 14th Amendment states there are two categories of U.S. citizens: those who are born in the United States and those who are naturalized under Acts of Congress.

[kiltie65]

I have not studied Constitutional Law, but I did go to citizenship classes prior to becoming naturalized, and had an excellent teacher, and it is my humble opinion I feel we must look at the big picture. If f’instance an American woman moved to the middle east, had a child by one of their fanatical types, and the child was raised with those beliefs, then that child, claiming statutory American citizenship, and happened to be well prepared and silver tongued, could gain the Presidency and harm the nation. Some would claim it has already happened. It’s a loophole that needs to be put before the Courts and closed. What are your feelings on Rubio, born here of alien parents (I don’t know if his parents arrived here legally or not from Cuba...some say they were escaping Castro’s Cuba, but others say that was after they were already here???)

[freepersup]

I’m not denying Cruz his US citizenship. Pay attention. Canada says- to renounce Canadian citizenship, FIRST- you have to be a Canadian citizen. Well what do you know- Cruz denounced his Canadian citizenship. So- stating the obvious, Cruz was a tried and true Canadian citizen, before he was a US citizen.

It’s impossible for Cruz to be qualified per NBC, if he was born anywhere else, other than the USA, and if NOT born to two US citizen parents AT THE TIME OF HIS BIRTH. Were his parents (plural) (I repeat- plural) BOTH US citizens at the time of his birth? NO.

You can be a citizen by nature (birth) or naturalization (adoption.) The subject country adopts you, as you adopt the subject country. Cruz is a naturalized citizen. Plain and simple. My point in posting Canadian law is to support the fact that Cruz was a Canadian citizen, before he was a US citizen, and THAT is frankly and fully in the realm of naturalization.

[RC one]

yeah, and there's that. Natural born citizenship has always been a matter of allegiance and President James Madison had this to say about allegiance:

It is an established maxim that birth is a criterion of allegiance. Birth however derives its force sometimes from place and sometimes from parentage, but in general place is the most certain criterion; it is what applies in the United States; it will therefore be unnecessary to investigate any other.

James Madison is also known as the Author of the Constitution incidentally.

[kiltie65]

Britain changed their edict that you could not renounce British citizenship around 1958. I was naturalized in 1957 so I am a dual national...Brit and U.S. My older brother naturalized automatically when he completed his Army service in 1958, so he’s 100% American (naturalized)...he can’t run for President, tho’.

[Springfield Reformer]

I read through your post 82, didn't find anything that rose to the level of binding authority. Most of the commentary cites dealt with the less controversial cases, not the edge cases. None of the case law gets out of the dicta trap. And again, the only time we had operative statutory authority on NBC was when the 1790 Act validated an edge case for NBC under jus sanguinis.

BTW, I did appreciate that your citations were not stuck in the Vattell/Law of Nations universe. However, so long as you are willing to consider the influence of the British framework, Blackstone here accounts for some of those edge cases in a manner favorable to the Cruz theory of jus sanguinis citizenship:

But by several more modern statutes these restrictions are still farther taken off: so that all children, born out of the king's ligeance, whose fathers were natural-born subjects, are now natural-born subjects themselves, to all intents and purposes, without any exception; unless their said fathers were attainted, or banished beyond sea, for high treason; or were then in the service of a prince at enmity with Great Britain.

Available here: http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_8_4_citizenships1.html

Also notice here there is no artificial boundary between statutory and common law assertions of natural born status. The common law feeds into the statutory corpus and fills the gaps, which is sort of how a lot of statutory law comes into being anyway.  It's really more of a historical question. When did some emerging pattern of judging cases (common law) get absorbed up into the statutory schema?  And what began in the statutory schema in skeletal form, and migrated down to where judges had to fill those gaps with case-based refinements? At some point it becomes a chicken-versus-egg problem.

In any event, I appreciated your effort on post 82. It was a good read. Thanks for posting it.

Peace,

SR

[gusty]

A guy from my home town was a naturalized citizen born in Scotland. He always kept his UK passport updated so when he was traveling he had both passports. His reasoning was in case the plane was highjacked, he figured he would show the highjackers the passport that would least likely get him killed. He also had a son who was born two years before they immigrated. Though he became a citizen, he did not naturalize his son. The kid could throw 90+ in HS, and the father figured his UK citizenship would take him out of the MLB draft and keep him a free agent for a bigger signing bonus, like guys from the DR. Signed with Atlanta and later made the show with Cleveland, beat the Yankees a few times.

[RC one]

The exceptions that Blackstone references were just that, exceptions arising as a result of the wars of the three kingdoms (the late troubles) and the English Reformation. The exception to the law is not the law, the law is law. You are posting only enough of Blackstone to support your position but ignoring the broader principle so I'll post the full quote here which does not, in fact, support your position of Jus Sanguinis birth citizenship being the law:

When I say, that an alien is one who is born out of the king's dominions, or allegiance, this also must be understood with some restrictions. The common law indeed stood absolutely so; with only a very few exceptions: so that a particular act of parliament became necessary after the restoration, for the naturalization of children of his majesty's English subjects, born in foreign countries during the late troubles. And this maxim of the law proceeded upon a general principle, that every man owes natural allegiance where he is born, and cannot owe two such allegiances, or serve two masters, at once.

[Leto]

WHere is s=that stated? Got a link for your claim?

The constitution gives congress the power to define a citizens status. THe statute defines Cruz as a NBC.

[Leto]

Specifically what case law?

Please provide a citation.

[RC one]

I read through your post 82, didn't find anything that rose to the level of binding authority.

and we all know that no such binding authority exists in US law so we must resort to the historical record which is exactly what the SCOTUS would do.

The fact is, you can not show me anything comparable to what I have provided to support your opinion. My opinion is WELL supported. yours? not so much.

Respectfully. RC1

[Springfield Reformer]

I agree that there are challenging scenarios that should be addressed. I also don’t believe we can protect ourselves from every possible bad scenario by law alone. The law is a crutch for imperfect people. We are imperfect, so we need it. But what if we had a natural born citizen who was a Muslim and secretly a jihadist bent on destroying our country? How do we defend against that? We cannot protect ourselves from such persons except through diligent use of our liberty to vet and prudently choose who we put in power. The law can only take us so far.

As for Rubio, I believe he does not meet the criteria set by Vattell, because his parents were not citizens at the time of his birth, AFAIK. But on the more definite ground of NBC status by being born in the country, regardless of parentage, he is most certainly eligible, assuming all the public facts are true. Someone with standing could challenge him, but it would probably be avoided by the Supreme Court as a political question, meaning it’s up to Congress and the voters to figure out who is eligible.

So again, it comes back to us. Our vote is the last line of defense. If we have issues with the real loyalty of a candidate to America, we need to work to defeat that person. And while we can debate all day long about the Cruz mailers, or the Cruz immigration policy, I don’t see anything in Cruz that suggests we should worry about him backing a Canadian coup against America. Can anybody really see that happening, ay? :) Now if Red Green got naturalized and tried to run for President, that would concern me. Just sayin ...

Peace,

SR

[Leto]

Actually, those are all USSC rulings. Cruz was not born in the US and derives his citizenship from an act of congress. He is naturalized, not NBC, and he knows it or at least he should. If you think a guy that was a citizen of another country until he was 43 and running for president is a qualified NBC than I guess NBC just does not mean that much to you. He also claims he did not know he was a citizen of Canada at 43 until the Dallas Morning News pointed it out. How is that for brilliant lawyering?

______________________________________________________________

Are you saying the act of congress that defined Cruz as a NBC was unconstitutional?

[freepersup]

Who do you mean by -they- ? This particular website was a battlefield and a scholarly research center without equal, in vetting the non NBC Kenyan refugee. Your sign up date is 2005. Weren’t you paying attention?

[freepersup]

Wrong! What act of Congress are you referring to? Citizen is not equal to natural born citizen for the purposes and qualifications to hold the office of president or vice president. No other job in the country has those requirements, and for very good reason. This country could swell to 900,000,000 people, and yet only two jobs would have the criteria of NBC.

[Springfield Reformer]

LOL! There is a great deal of Blackstone out there to post. I provided the link precisely to supply anyone an opportunity to review the full context. The context you bring in is helpful but does not alter the central point at all. If anyone tells you the edge cases are not law, then you have been under very different legal instruction than I have been. The history of how a principle came to be is interesting, but once the principle is there, that’s what you have to deal with, and the fact remains that Blackstone’s use of “natural born” to describe foreign born children is clear evidence that this kind of edge case was not entirely alien (pardon the pun) to the founders’ frame of reference. Which again, BTW, give even greater weight to the NBC language used by the founders in the 1790 Act. It is nearly a perfect symmetry with the Blackstone account.

Peace,

SR

[jospehm20]

No. It is the same act I got my citizenship from.

[Crucial]

Cruz’s mother was a citizen at the time of Cruz’s birth. So he is natural born. That’s it.

[itsahoot]

The Constitution uses a term that is capable of more than one interpretation, depending on one’s view of the history of the document and the men that crafted it

Well there you go. No common sense required when emotions mean so much more.

[Springfield Reformer]

Well there you go. No common sense required when emotions mean so much more

Indeed. The pro-Trump emotion on this board is astounding. I never thought I'd see someone so obviously bad for conservatism get such high praise and such cultic devotion on these august pages. Truly bewildering.

Peace,

SR

[freepersup]

Here’s why-

Voters chose Obama because of the color- black.

Voters are choosing Trump because of the colors- red, white and blue.