Except the court in Minor specifically says that it does not.
The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens.
If only you had been there to explain this to him, Chief Justice Waite wouldn't have made this mistake.
Posted on 11/19/2012 2:11:58 PM PST by KheSanh
I’m sorry to hear that you, like most birthers, are incapable of reading paragraphs and pages. The issue was discussed at great length in WKA, as linked. The decision was very clear, which is why there isn’t a single state in the Union that believes your side. There is a reason no member of Congress believes you. There is a reason no court believes you.
But if someone cannot understand the WKA decision, then there is nothing I can do for them.
And PR isn’t a state, so it IS a special case.
For those with the sense God gives a goose:
“II. The fundamental principle of the common law with regard to English nationality was birth within the allegiance, also called “ligealty,” “obedience,” “faith,” or “power” of the King. The principle embraced all persons born within the King’s allegiance and subject to his protection. Such allegiance and protection were mutual — as expressed in the maxim protectio trahit subjectionem, et subjectio protectionem — and were not restricted to natural-born subjects and naturalized subjects, or to those who had taken an oath of allegiance, but were predicable of aliens in amity so long as they were within the kingdom. Children, born in England, of such aliens were therefore natural-born subjects. But the children, born within the realm, of foreign ambassadors, or the children of alien enemies, born during and within their hostile occupation of part of the King’s dominions, were not natural-born subjects because not born within the allegiance, the obedience, or the power, or, as would be said at this day, within the jurisdiction, of the King...
...It thus clearly appears that, by the law of England for the last three centuries, beginning before the settlement of this country and continuing to the present day, aliens, while residing in the dominions possessed by the Crown of England, were within the allegiance, the obedience, the faith or loyalty, the protection, the power, the jurisdiction of the English Sovereign, and therefore every child born in England of alien parents was a natural-born subject unless the child of an ambassador or other diplomatic agent of a foreign State or of an alien enemy in hostile occupation of the place where the child was born.
III. The same rule was in force in all the English Colonies upon this continent down to the time of the Declaration of Independence, and in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution as originally established.”
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0169_0649_ZO.html
Let me repeat:
“The same rule was in force in all the English Colonies upon this continent down to the time of the Declaration of Independence, and in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution as originally established.”
WKA?, really, WKA?...
Rollerfood...
This is it? You are still hanging your hat on WKA?
After 4 years?
I hope Holder is paying you enough for this gibberish. It not worth much but the pay must be good.
Better to hang my hat on the US Supreme Court case that discussed the issue at length than to hang it on a translation of Vattel made 10 years AFTER the Constitution, or to shut my eyes and pretend the ratifiers of the Constitution did not use NBC as the American counterpart of NBS.
So - other than calling names, what IS your response to the simple statements in WKA?
Would you care to cite for us what sources or authorities Justice Gray relied upon to come to that “same rule” conclusion?
On the contrary, Chief Justice Fuller knew the jus soli English common law rule did not survive the American Revolution in America. And he also knew that a “natural born citizen” was not defined by looking to an English “natural born subject.” In his Wong Kim Ark dissent he said:
Obviously, where the Constitution deals with common law rights and uses common law phraseology, its language should be read in the light of the common law; but when the question arises as to what constitutes citizenship of the nation, involving as it does international relations, and political as contradistinguished from civil status, international principles must be considered, and, unless the municipal law of England appears to have been affirmatively accepted, it cannot be allowed to control in the matter of construction.
Nationality is essentially a political idea, and belongs to the sphere of public law. Hence Mr. Justice Story, in Shanks v. Dupont, 3 Pet. 242, 248, said that the incapacities of femes 708*708 covert, at common law, “do not reach their political rights, nor prevent their acquiring or losing a national character. Those political rights do not stand upon the mere doctrines of municipal law, applicable to ordinary transactions, but stand upon the more general principles of the law of nations.”
***
The framers of the Constitution were familiar with the distinctions between the Roman law and the feudal law, between obligations based on territoriality and those based on the personal and invisible character of origin, and there is nothing to show that in the matter of nationality they intended to adhere to principles derived from regal government, which they had just assisted in overthrowing.
Manifestly, when the sovereignty of the Crown was thrown off and an independent government established, every rule of the common law and every statute of England obtaining in the Colonies, in derogation of the principles on which the new government was founded, was abrogated.
***
As to the jura coronæ, including therein the obligation of allegiance, the extent to which these ever were applicable in this country depended on circumstances, and it would seem quite clear that the rule making locality of birth the criterion of citizenship because creating a permanent tie of allegiance, no more survived the American Revolution than the same rule survived the French Revolution.
Doubtless, before the latter event, in the progress of monarchical power, the rule which involved the principle of liege homage may have become the rule of Europe; but that idea never had any basis in the United States.
As Chief Justice Taney observed in Fleming v. Page, 9 How. 603, 618, though in a different connection: “It is true that most of the States have adopted the principles of English jurisprudence, so far as it concerns private and individual rights. And when such rights are in question, we habitually refer to the English decisions, not only with respect, but in many cases as authoritative. But in the distribution of political power between the great departments of government, there is such a wide difference between the power conferred on the President of the United States and the authority and sovereignty which belong to the English Crown, that it would be altogether unsafe to reason from any supposed resemblance between them, either as regards conquest in war, or any other subject where the rights and powers of the executive arm of the government are brought into question. Our own Constitution and form of government must be our only guide.”
And Mr. Lawrence, in his edition of Wheaton (Lawrence’s Wheaton, p. 920), makes this comment: “There is, it is believed, as great a difference between the territorial allegiance claimed by an hereditary sovereign on feudal principles, and the personal right of citizenship participated in by all the members of the political community, according to American institutions, as there is between the authority and sovereignty of the Queen of England, and the power of the American President; and the inapplicability of English precedents is as clear in the one case as in the other. The same view, with particular application to naturalization, was early taken by 711*711 the American commentator on Blackstone. Tucker’s Blackstone, Vol. 1, Pt. 2, Appx. p. 96.”
United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649, 707-11 (1898) (C.J. Fuller, dissenting). Chief Justice Fuller was absolutely correct in what he said. The historical record proves him right. Note that at the end he focused on the Office of President and said that the English common law could never provide any rule of decision that pertained to the political office of the United States. Hence, the English common law could not and did not provide the rule of decision on defining a “natural born Citizen” which was the national political character that any person wanting to be President and Commander in Chief had to have.
Would you be so kind as to quote for us the holding in Wong Kim Ark in which as you claim the Court held that Wong was a “natural born Citizen.” And when I say holding, I do not mean some statement of dicta or some statement as to what the colonial English common law provided at one time.
That's right. The 14th amendment IS the U.S. Constitution, and the SCOTUS said in Wong Kim Ark that the Constitution does NOT say who shall be natural-born citizens. IOW, the 14th amendment does NOT say who shall be natural born citizens. They based this conclusion on the Minor decision after it specifically rejected the idea of the 14th amendment conferring citizenship to natural-born citizens. They said it does not. You've just shot your own arguments in the foot.
Wong Kim Ark does NOT say that place of birth makes anyone a natural born citizen. The only definition of NBC that it gives is when it quotes Minor v Happersett: all children born in the country to parents who were its citizens.
“Would you care to cite for us what sources or authorities Justice Gray relied upon to come to that “same rule” conclusion?”
It is in the decision, which I have linked to.
Bottom line, particularly for a thread titled:
Petition Asking Supreme Court To Define “Natural Born Citizen”
The US Supreme Court HAS ruled already, and did so over 100 years before Obama ran. Saying you prefer the DISSENT isn’t going to win you any court cases, nor convince any states or anyone else. Saying “The losing side agreed with me” just isn’t very convincing...
Do you know what a holding is?
Why do you quote an out of context sentence in Minor, and ignore an entire decision in WKA? Why do you rely on the DISSENT and ignore the opinion?
Yes, that rule was in effect that made children born to British subjects natural-born subjects. What you quoted says nothing about natural-born citzens.
Let me repeat:
What you quoted says NOTHING about natural-born citizens.
What part of “...down to the time of the Declaration of Independence, and in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution as originally established” do you not understand?
Let me help you:
III. The same rule was in force in all the English Colonies upon this continent down to the time of the Declaration of Independence, and in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution as originally established.
In the early case of The Charming Betsy, (1804) it appears to have been assumed by this court that all persons born in the United States were citizens of the United States, Chief Justice Marshall saying:
Whether a person born within the United States, or becoming a citizen according to the established laws of the country, can divest himself absolutely of [p659] that character otherwise than in such manner as may be prescribed by law is a question which it is not necessary at present to decide.
2 Cranch 64, 119.
In Inglis v. Sailors’ Snug Harbor (1833), 3 Pet. 99, in which the plaintiff was born in the city of New York about the time of the Declaration of Independence, the justices of this court (while differing in opinion upon other points) all agreed that the law of England as to citizenship by birth was the law of the English Colonies in America. Mr. Justice Thompson, speaking for the majority of the court, said:
It is universally admitted, both in the English courts and in those of our own country, that all persons born within the Colonies of North America, whilst subject to the Crown of Great Britain, are natural-born British subjects.
3 Pet. 120. Mr. Justice Johnson said: “He was entitled to inherit as a citizen born of the State of New York.” 3 Pet. 136. Mr. Justice Story stated the reasons upon this point more at large, referring to Calvin’s Case, Blackstone’s Commentaries, and Doe v. Jones, above cited, and saying:
Allegiance is nothing more than the tie or duty of obedience of a subject to the sovereign under whose protection he is, and allegiance by birth is that which arises from being born within the dominions and under the protection of a particular sovereign. Two things usually concur to create citizenship: first, birth locally within the dominions of the sovereign, and secondly, birth within the protection and obedience, or, in other words, within the allegiance of the sovereign. That is, the party must be born within a place where the sovereign is at the time in full possession and exercise of his power, and the party must also, at his birth, derive protection from, and consequently owe obedience or allegiance to, the sovereign, as such, de facto. There are some exceptions which are founded upon peculiar reasons, and which, indeed, illustrate and confirm the general doctrine. Thus, a person who is born on the ocean is a subject of the prince to whom his parents then owe allegiance; for he is still deemed under the protection of his sovereign, and born in a place where he has dominion in common with all other sovereigns. So the children of an ambassador are held to be [p660] subjects of the prince whom he represents, although born under the actual protection and in the dominions of a foreign prince.
3 Pet. 155. “The children of enemies, born in a place within the dominions of another sovereign, then occupied by them by conquest, are still aliens.” 3 Pet. 156.
Nothing is better settled at the common law than the doctrine that the children, even of aliens, born in a country while the parents are resident there under the protection of the government and owing a temporary allegiance thereto, are subjects by birth.
3 Pet. 164.
In Shanks v. Dupont, 3 Pet. 242, decided (as appears by the records of this court) on the same day as the last case, it was held that a woman born in South Carolina before the Declaration of Independence, married to an English officer in Charleston during its occupation by the British forces in the Revolutionary War, and accompanying her husband on his return to England, and there remaining until her death, was a British subject within the meaning of the Treaty of Peace of 1783, so that her title to land in South Carolina, by descent cast before that treaty, was protected thereby. It was of such a case that Mr. Justice Story, delivering the opinion of the court, said:
The incapacities of femes covert, provided by the common law, apply to their civil rights, and are for their protection and interest. But they do not reach their political rights, nor prevent their acquiring or losing a national character. Those political rights do not stand upon the mere doctrines of municipal law, applicable to ordinary transactions, but stand upon the more general principles of the law of nations.
3 Pet. 248. This last sentence was relied on by the counsel for the United States as showing that the question whether a person is a citizen of a particular country is to be determined not by the law of that country, but by the principles of international law. But Mr. Justice Story certainly did not mean to suggest that, independently of treaty, there was any principle of international law which could defeat the operation of the established rule of citizenship by birth within the United States; for he referred (p. 245) to the contemporaneous opinions in Inglis v. Sailors’ Snug Harbor, [p661] above cited, in which this rule had been distinctly recognized, and in which he had said (p. 162) that “each government had a right to decide for itself who should be admitted or deemed citizens,” and, in his Treatise on the Conflict of Laws, published in 1834, he said that, in respect to residence in different countries or sovereignties, “there are certain principles which have been generally recognized by tribunals administering public law” [adding, in later editions “or the law of nations”] “as of unquestionable authority,” and stated, as the first of those principles, “Persons who are born in a country are generally deemed citizens and subjects of that country.” Story, Conflict of Laws, § 48.
The English statute of 11 & 12 Will. III (1700). c. 6, entitled
An act to enable His Majesty’s natural-born subjects to inherit the estate of their ancestors, either lineal or collateral, notwithstanding their father or mother were aliens,
enacted that “all and every person or persons, being the King’s natural-born subject or subjects, within any of the King’s realms or dominions,” might and should thereafter lawfully inherit and make their titles by descent to any lands
from any of their ancestors, lineal or collateral, although the father and mother, or father or mother, or other ancestor, of such person or persons, by, from, through or under whom
title should be made or derived, had been or should be “born out of the King’s allegiance, and out of is Majesty’s realms and dominions,” as fully and effectually, as if such parents or ancestors “had been naturalized or natural-born subject or subjects within the King’s dominions.” 7 Statutes of the Realm, 90. It may be observed that, throughout that statute, persons born within the realm, although children of alien parents, were called “natural-born subjects.” As that statute included persons born “within any of the King’s realms or dominions,” it, of course, extended to the Colonies, and, not having been repealed in Maryland, was in force there. In McCreery v. Somerville, (1824) 9 Wheat. 354, which concerned the title to land in the State of Maryland, it was assumed that children born in that State of an alien who was still living, and who had not been naturalized, were “native-born citizens of the [p662] United States,” and, without such assumption, the case would not have presented the question decided by the court, which, as stated by Mr. Justice Story in delivering the opinion, was
whether the statute applies to the case of a living alien ancestor, so as to create a title by heirship where none would exist by the common law if the ancestor were a natural-born subject.
9 Wheat. 356.
Again, in Levy v. McCartee (1832), 6 Pet. 102, 112, 113, 115, which concerned a descent cast since the American Revolution, in the State of New York, where the statute of 11 & 12 Will. III had been repealed, this court, speaking by Mr. Justice Story, held that the case must rest for its decision exclusively upon the principles of the common law, and treated it as unquestionable that, by that law, a child born in England of alien parents was a natural-born subject, quoting the statement of Lord Coke in Co.Lit. 8a, that,
if an alien cometh into England and hath issue two sons, these two sons are indigenae, subjects born, because they are born within the realm,
and saying that such a child “was a native-born subject, according to the principles of the common law stated by this court in McCreery v. Somervlle, 9 Wheat. 354.”
In Dred Scott v. Sandford, (1857) 19 How. 393, Mr. Justice Curtis said:
The first section of the second article of the Constitution uses the language, “a natural-born citizen.” It thus assumes that citizenship may be acquired by birth. Undoubtedly, this language of the Constitution was used in reference to that principle of public law, well understood in this country at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, which referred citizenship to the place of birth.
19 How. 576. And, to this extent, no different opinion was expressed or intimated by any of the other judges.
In United States v. Rhodes (1866), Mr. Justice Swayne, sitting in the Circuit Court, said:
All persons born in the allegiance of the King are natural-born subjects, and all persons born in the allegiance of the United States are natural-born citizens. Birth and allegiance go together. Such is the rule of the common law, and it is the common law of this country, as well as of England. . . . We find no warrant for the opinion [p663] that this great principle of the common law has ever been changed in the United States. It has always obtained here with the same vigor, and subject only to the same exceptions, since as before the Revolution.
1 Abbott (U.S.) 28, 40, 41.
The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, speaking by Mr. Justice (afterwards Chief Justice) Sewall, early held that the determination of the question whether a man was a citizen or an alien was “to be governed altogether by the principles of the common law,” and that it was established, with few exceptions,
that a man born within the jurisdiction of the common law is a citizen of the country wherein he is born. By this circumstance of his birth, he is subjected to the duty of allegiance which is claimed and enforced by the sovereign of his native land, and becomes reciprocally entitled to the protection of that sovereign, and to the other rights and advantages which are included in the term “citizenship.”
Garder v. Ward (1805), 2 Mass. 244, note. And again:
The doctrine of the common law is that every man born within its jurisdiction is a subject of the sovereign of the country where he is born, and allegiance is not personal to the sovereign in the extent that has been contended for; it is due to him in his political capacity of sovereign of the territory where the person owing the allegiance as born.
Kilham v. Ward (1806), 2 Mass. 236, 265. It may here be observed that, in a recent English case, Lord Coleridge expressed the opinion of the Queen’s Bench Division that the statutes of 4 Geo. II, (1731) c. 1, and 13 Geo. III (1773), c. 21, (hereinafter referred to) “clearly recognize that to the King in his politic, and not in his personal, capacity is the allegiance of his subjects due.” Isaacson v. Durant, 17 Q.B.D. 54, 65.
The Supreme Court of North Carolina, speaking by Mr; Justice Gaston, said:
Before our Revolution, all free persons born within the dominions of the King of Great Britain, whatever their color or complexion, were native-born British subjects; those born out of his allegiance were aliens. . . . Upon the Revolution, no other change took place in the law of North Carolina than was consequent upon the transition from a colony dependent on an European King to a free and sovereign [p664] State; . . . British subjects in North Carolina became North Carolina freemen; . . . and all free persons born within the State are born citizens of the State. . . . The term “citizen,” as understood in our law, is precisely analogous to the term “subject” in the common law, and the change of phrase has entirely resulted from the change of government. The sovereignty has been transferred from one man to the collective body of the people, and he who before as a “subject of the king” is now “a citizen of the State.”
State v. Manuel (1838), 4 Dev. & Bat. 20, 24-26.
That all children born within the dominion of the United States of foreign parents holding no diplomatic office became citizens at the time of their birth does not appear to have been contested or doubted until more than fifty years after the adoption of the Constitution, when the matter was elaborately argued in the Court of Chancery of New York and decided upon full consideration by Vice Chancellor Sandford in favor of their citizenship. Lynch v. Clark, (1844) 1 Sandf.Ch. 583.
The same doctrine was repeatedly affirmed in the executive departments, as, for instance, by Mr. Marcy, Secretary of State, in 1854, 2 Whart.Int.Dig. (2d ed.) p. 394; by Attorney General Black in 1859, 9 Opinions, 373, and by Attorney General Bates in 1862, 10 Opinions, 328, 382, 394, 396.
Chancellor Kent, in his Commentaries, speaking of the “general division of the inhabitants of every country under the comprehensive title of aliens and natives,” says:
Natives are all persons born within the jurisdiction and allegiance of the United States. This is the rule of the common law, without any regard or reference to the political condition or allegiance of their parents, with the exception of the children of ambassadors, who are in theory born within the allegiance of the foreign power they represent. . . . To create allegiance by birth, the party must be born not only within the territory, but within the ligeance of the government. If a portion of the country be taken and held by conquest in war, the conqueror acquires the rights of the conquered as to its dominion and government, and children born in the armies of a State, while [p665] abroad and occupying a foreign country, are deemed to be born in the allegiance of the sovereign to whom the army belongs. It is equally the doctrine of the English common law that, during such hostile occupation of a territory, and the parents be adhering to the enemy as subjects de facto, their children, born under such a temporary dominion, are not born under the ligeance of the conquered.
2 Kent Com. (6th ed.) 39, 42. And he elsewhere says:
And if, at common law, all human beings born within the ligeance of the King, and under the King’s obedience, were natural-born subjects, and not aliens, I do not perceive why this doctrine does not apply to these United States, in all cases in which there is no express constitutional or statute declaration to the contrary. . . . Subject and citizen are, in a degree, convertible terms as applied to natives, and though the term citizen seems to be appropriate to republican freemen, yet we are, equally with the inhabitants of all other countries, subjects, for we are equally bound by allegiance and subjection to the government and law of the land.
2 Kent Com. 258, note.
First, you really evaded my request, telling us that the sources and authorities about which I inquired are in the Wong decision rather than telling us what they are. I do not need a whole explanation of them, just list them.
Second, you are some hypocrite. You and your coterie are always citing the Wong dissent to try to convince us that the Court ruled that Wong was a “natural born Citizen” and now you complain about me referring to the Wong dissent.
Third, I do not just rely on the Wong dissent. I also rely on all the historical sources, case law, reason, and logic that are contained in my arguments, including the Wong Kim Ark majority opinion.
No, I did not evade your request. I told you where to find them. Unless you start paying me, I’m not going to type EVERYTHING for you.
Second, I do NOT use the dissent because I agree with it, but to show that the others fully understood what the majority was saying in the opinion. It WOULD be stupid to rely on its reasoning, which is what YOU are doing.
And third, you have offered nothing except YOUR opinion. Where are the Supreme Court decisions? And remember, I won’t let you take one sentence out of context, as is your normal style.
What part of "The Constitution does NOT say who shall be natural-born citizens do YOU not understand??" What you have quoted is a series of dicta and assumption, not established law and rule. For example:
In the early case of The Charming Betsy, (1804) it appears to have been assumed by this court that all persons born in the United States were citizens of the United States
"appears to be assumed" is not proof of any rule being in force. Let's continue:
In Inglis v. Sailors’ Snug Harbor (1833), 3 Pet. 99, in which the plaintiff was born in the city of New York about the time of the Declaration of Independence, the justices of this court (while differing in opinion upon other points) all agreed that the law of England as to citizenship by birth was the law of the English Colonies in America.
Right. This doesn't say anything about natural-born citizenship, but a different term: "citizenship by birth" a a law of English colonies. This doesn't say what the U.S. law was after the Declaration of Independence. A further reading of Inglis shows that the child in question was considered a British subject even if born AFTER the DoI. IOW, NOT a natural-born citizen of the United States.
It is universally admitted, both in the English courts and in those of our own country, that all persons born within the Colonies of North America, whilst subject to the Crown of Great Britain, are natural-born British subjects.
Again, NOTHING about natural-born citizens, but simply a repeat of a rule that isn't being questioned.
Nothing is better settled at the common law than the doctrine that the children, even of aliens, born in a country while the parents are resident there under the protection of the government and owing a temporary allegiance thereto, are subjects by birth.
This quote above introduces the residency requirement that the court would lean on to make Wong Kim Ark a citizen, but as you fully know, this court did NOT declare Ark to be a natural-born citizen ... AND as you fully know, Obama's father was not a resident alien.
The incapacities of femes covert, provided by the common law, apply to their civil rights, and are for their protection and interest. But they do not reach their political rights, nor prevent their acquiring or losing a national character. Those political rights do not stand upon the mere doctrines of municipal law, applicable to ordinary transactions, but stand upon the more general principles of the law of nations.
Whooopsiess. Rogers, did you NOT read this before you quoted it?? This completely contradicts your argument. It's citing the LAW OF NATIONS and NOT English common law for establishing national character. Shanks v. Dupont, as has been shown to you many times relies on the Treaty of 1783 which PRESERVED British subject status for persons born IN THE UNITED STATES to British subjects. IOW, it's the very doctrine that makes Obama a British subject and NOT a natural-born citizen.
In United States v. Rhodes (1866), Mr. Justice Swayne, sitting in the Circuit Court, said:
All persons born in the allegiance of the King are natural-born subjects, and all persons born in the allegiance of the United States are natural-born citizens. Birth and allegiance go together. Such is the rule of the common law, and it is the common law of this country, as well as of England. . . . We find no warrant for the opinion [p663] that this great principle of the common law has ever been changed in the United States. It has always obtained here with the same vigor, and subject only to the same exceptions, since as before the Revolution.
Above is the SAME doctrine from Shanks v Dupont. In fact, U.S. v Rhodes was citing Shanks v. Dupont and the persons who it says are natural-born subjects refers to persons born IN THE UNITED STATES and who are EXCLUDED from being natural-born citizens.
In McCreery v. Somerville, (1824) 9 Wheat. 354, which concerned the title to land in the State of Maryland, it was assumed that children born in that State of an alien who was still living, and who had not been naturalized, were “native-born citizens of the [p662] United States,”
Whooopsies again. This uses the term "native-born citizens" and NOT "natural-born citizen" ... but worse yet is what the Chief Justice says after this:
whether the statute applies to the case of a living alien ancestor, so as to create a title by heirship where none would exist by the common law if the ancestor were a natural-born subject.
IOW, the justice is saying the child in question would NOT have a right to inherit if his father was a subject of Great Britain ... which is because that child would be a subject of Britain and NOT subject to statutory U.S. law.
Here's the next major hole in your argument through what you've quoted from WKA:
To create allegiance by birth, the party must be born not only within the territory, but within the ligeance of the government.
IOW, it's NOT enough just to be born on U.S. soil to be a natural-born citizen. To be in the "ligeance of the government" requires a determination on the allegiance of the parents, because if they are not adhering to the local government, their child is considered an alien. Your own quote say this here:
and the parents be adhering to the enemy as subjects de facto, their children, born under such a temporary dominion, are not born under the ligeance of the conquered.
Do you see the part above about temporary dominion. Obama's father had at best, temporary dominion, thus his child was NOT burn under the ligeance of the United States.
What you miss in all of this is that there was no clear, definitive and DECISIVE law upon which the court could make Wong Kim Ark a U.S. citizen ... and Gray had a unanimous precedent from Minor that prevented him from declaring Ark to be a natural-born citizen. To solve this, Gray used a secondary term "citizenship by birth" which is defined ONLY by the 14th amendment AND Gray interpreted "subject to the jurisdiction" to mean that the parents had permanent residence and domicil. He ONLY applied the 14th amendment to the children of resident aliens because natural-born citizens were EXCLUSIVELY defined in Minor as "all children born in the country to parents who were its citizens."
WKA has been declared the worst ruling SCOTUS ever made. It is considered the worst law to ever come from the court by some historians.
For good reason.
But the real issue is that WKA never, ever was declared a ‘natural born Citizen’. Its not there. Its a lie.
Also I never quoted Vattel. The elements of citizenship have always been heritage and location. Call it blood and soil or sanguinis and soli. It does not matter the terms. These elements are the two that can be considered when looking at citizenship.
Congress made it very clear, unmistakably clear what was considered the dominant of these 2 in 1790. Location of birth was considered the weaker, far weaker of the two. So weak that they were willing to toss it aside and have those born overseas ‘considered as’ natural born Citizens if they were born to citizen parents (note - plural). This was codified law. Some argue it actually defines natural born Citizen and makes it dependent only on blood and parentage. But that is not the case it clearly says ‘considered as’ and does not say ‘are’. They knew exactly what they where doing in 1790. And they put the emphasis on blood and parentage - not soil and location. In 1795 the clause was dropped. Likely due to fact that is is clear Congress attempted to change the Constitution via the act.
We do not need British law to interpret the meaning of natural born Citizen.
“WKA has been declared the worst ruling SCOTUS ever made. It is considered the worst law to ever come from the court by some historians.”
Not a chance! Ever hear of Dred Scott?
In fact, WKA is a widely RESPECTED and often cited case. It has been referenced in numerous Supreme Court cases since.
“We do not need British law to interpret the meaning of natural born Citizen.”
We DO need to know what the framers and ratifiers thought the phrase meant when they wrote and adopted it. And that legal meaning is found in English common law. You can deny it all you want, and you and your birther band of brothers can post on the Internet about how wise you are and how stupid everyone else is, but remember - you are 0/50 in convincing any state, and 0/535 for convincing any Congressman, and have never convinced any court anywhere that you are anything other than a pathetic band of fools.
“Location of birth was considered the weaker, far weaker of the two.”
Yeah, that is why those born in the US are citizens, and why you don’t need to show who your parents are when applying for a passport. Don’t you feel really STUPID claiming that parentage controls citizenship in the US, when it has NEVER done so?
And if you would read the WKA case, you would see WHY having two citizen parents makes a child abroad a US citizen, but having two foreign parents in the US does not block you from citizenship. In America, location dominates totally.
Group A, to which I referred, was "Those who were citizens at the time of the adoption of the Constitution."
I assume you will agree these are all dead?
“”appears to be assumed” is not proof of any rule being in force”
It means there was no one saying otherwise anywhere. You only get a court case if someone disagrees. If all the folks living in the US when it was founded agreed that birthplace controls, then there is no court case because there is no dispute.
“This doesn’t say anything about natural-born citizenship, but a different term: “citizenship by birth” a a law of English colonies. This doesn’t say what the U.S. law was after the Declaration of Independence.”
Except the ruling DOES say that principle continued after the Declaration, and on after the Constitution. But you ignore that, because you only deal in sentence fragments.
WKA makes a two-prong argument: that WKA was a citizen by both the NBC clause and by the 14th Amendment. It then discusses both in detail, and answers objections raised by the government lawyers. It takes a very blind person to read it and not see that.
However, it seems this thread had died down to the point where the only people still on it are me and the birther nutjobs - and I see no value in debating people who cannot read, or who are dishonest about what they read. I thhink my point has been made well enough for anyone reading this thread to see the truth, or to at least have the truth available to them.
So I’m quitting the thread, because arguing with two year olds isn’t very productive.
Except the court in Minor specifically says that it does not.
The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens.
If only you had been there to explain this to him, Chief Justice Waite wouldn't have made this mistake.
He became fluent only after living in France. So it seem he, as just one example, did not study almost exclusively in French.
And who do you suppose he lived with for several months while he was in Europe? If you said "Charles W.F. Dumas" then go to the head of the class.
Yes, John Adams was the long time house guest of the very man who published and sent the copies of Vattel to Benjamin Franklin. Over the several months/years that John Adams stayed with and worked with Charles Dumas (Who became a paid agent for the US Government.
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