The 14th Amendment dealt with former slaves who were being denied any form of citizenship at all. They were not born citizens and they certainly were not subjects of the English crown. They were made citizens by an affirmative act of law, ergo they were naturalized. How anyone makes the leap that the 14th Amendment somehow altered Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution in the process is beyond me.
Justice Horace Gray, wacky and inconsistent as he was, having reversed his own earlier decision in Elk v. Wilkins under discussion, didn't make that claim in Wong Kim Ark. Mr. Wong's parents were prevented by treaty with China from ever becoming naturalized. They had established a domicil in the United States, conducted business here and had become resident aliens under the law. They were no mere transients.
Wong was denied reentry into the country on the basis of not being a citizen, after having been admitted before. That was the motivation for the lawsuit, and Mr. Wong was determined to be a citizen on the basis of the 14th Amendment. Remember, that Amendment created citizens by an affirmative act of law. Such individuals cannot be natural born.
Authorities in the country did not recognize children of aliens or foreigners as citizens until the father was himself naturalized, whether those children were born here or elsewhere, right up into the twentieth century.
The Ark case established Federal recognition of those born here to non-citizen parents (naturalized or not).