Posted on 12/13/2008 11:40:57 AM PST by Red Steel
Contact: Stephen Pidgeon, Attorney at Law, P.S. Tel: (425) 605-4774 Fax: (425) 818-5371 Email: attorney@stephenpidgeon.com
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
12 Washington voters sue to set aside the election of Barack Obama in Washington.
Bellevue, WA, December 10, 2008 — The Washington Supreme Court has set a date for the case Broe v. Reed, to be heard en banc on January 8, 2009.
On December 4, 2008, James (Jim) Broe and 11 other Washington voters sued Secretary of State Sam Reed in the Washington Supreme Court, seeking a Writ of Mandamus to require the Secretary to set aside the votes cast for Senator Barack Obama, because at the time of the election, Senator Obama had failed to establish that he was a “natural born citizen” of the United States, failed to establish that he was an American citizen, and that he was not running under his legal name of Barry Soetoro.
Summary Of Arguments
December 10, 2008
Broe v. Reed Washington State Supreme Court Cause No. 8-2-473-8
Standing
According to Black’s Law Dictionary, “standing” to sue means that the party has sufficient stake – that the party is sufficiently affected - in an otherwise justiciable controversy to obtain judicial resolution of that controversy. “Standing” is satisfied if the plaintiff has a legally protectable and tangible interest at stake in the litigation.
Many of the cases challenging Sen. Obama’s citizenship status have been dismissed for “lack of standing.”
Plaintiffs in Broe v. Reed claim standing pursuant to the authorization given them by the legislature of Washington in RCW 29A.68.020(2). This statute creates standing for Plaintiffs to challenge the election of a candidate who has been elected but was ineligible at the time of his election to run for the office.
The duties of Washington’s Secretary of State
The Secretary of State is declared, under RCW 29A.04.230 to be “the chief election officer for all federal, state, county, city, town and district elections.” The Secretary of State is “required by law” to . . . coordinate those state election activities required by federal law. Read more
He is a fraud. That’s why he spent over a million dollars to protect the info on his original birth certificate. CHANGE???? His cabinet is Clinton 1992.
Senator W. Williams further stated:
” ... In one sense, all persons born within the geographical limits of the United States are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, but they are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States in every sense. Take the child of an ambassador. In one sense, that child born in the United States is subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, because if that child commits the crime of murder, or commits any other crime against the laws of the country, to a certain extent he is subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, but not in every respect; and so with these Indians. All persons living within a judicial district may be said, in one sense, to be subject to the jurisdiction of the court in that district, but they are not in every sense subject to the jurisdiction of the court until they are brought, by proper process, within the reach of the power of the court. I understand the words here, ‘subject to the jurisdiction of the United States,’ to mean fully and completely subject to the jurisdiction of the United States ...”
Rep. John Bingham of Ohio, considered the father of the Fourteenth Amendment, confirms the understanding and construction the framers used in regards to birthright and jurisdiction while speaking on civil rights of citizens in the House on March 9, 1866:
” ... I find no fault with the introductory clause [S 61 Bill], which is simply declaratory of what is written in the Constitution, that every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents [plural, meaning two] not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen...”
Barry Soetoro, aka Barack Hussein Obama, aka Barry Obama, admits on his own website that he held British citizenship at birth due to his Father being a British subject who was in no way an American. Thus Barry is precisely whom Bingham was implying is not a 'natural born citizen' regardless of where he was born, for purposes of Constitutional eligibility.
The body of law supports my position. Nowhere in the Law or in the COTUS or in any of the much debated SCOTUS rulings that have thus far come to light is a statement that supports the extraconstitutional requirements you assert exist. I am not fabricating anything. Whether Bingham meant what he said exclusively or inclusively, that is not what the 14th says nor what the SCOTUS has said it says, nor is it what any of the founders said. You cannot use an original intent argument when discussing the meaning intended by a writer that was never codified that uses the exact language of the original. In other words, if the FFs had a meaning for 'and subject to the jurisdiction thereof' then if the authors of the 14th Amendment meant something different, they should not have used the same phrase. If they failed to codify a different meaning in the Amendment itself then it must be taken to mean what the original usage meant. And the original did not mean what Bingham says the 14th meant, author or not. If he wanted such a strict definition included in the 14th, he should have done so when writing it. What if Jay had said, after the fact, that the 2nd Amendment actually restricted gun ownership to active duty militia members? Shouldn't that have been written in? As for Sen. Williams, his comments support my position, that being that persons not on the short list of exceptions are fully subject to the jurisdiction of the United States regardless of nationality, citizenship, etc. while they are within said jurisdiction.
The Bingham argument is the best one I have seen thus far, but it still doesn't change the large body of law that exists, particularly as an ex post facto reinterpretation. And Bingham was not a FF.
I would be happy to support a Constitutional Amendment that explicitly defined 'natural born' to mean what you say it means, but all we have is the definition that existed at the time the Constitution was written. No matter what Bingham said after the fact, if he neglected to put in language to change the accepted meaning, we must take it to mean what it meant in the beginning. We are dealing with moving goalposts and that is unacceptable. What's to stop the next version of 'natural born' from becoming 'born on US soil to parents that were citizens at birth' and then 'born on US soil to parents that were born on US soil and citizens at birth' until it ultimately becomes 'descended wholly from persons who were citizens at the time of the Adoption of the Constitution and their natural born offspring?'
It's also funny how sometimes the 14th applies and sometimes it doesn't, depending on whether we're talking about the 'born or naturalized' clause or the 'jurisdiction' clause.
Trouble is, I don't think Merriam-Webster provided your preferred definition to the founding fathers, lol.
Maybe you can take a cue from Bill Andersen, and have an amicus brief submitted on your behalf, containing the dictionary definition of natural born. I'm sure that'll be persuasive.
You’re spinning ... and doing it at a professional level. Are you paid to represent a point of view? ... BTW, thanks for the correction ... an “E” instead of an “A” stands out doesn’t it? Your twisting meth’ood’ology why we have a SCOTUS to whom we may address points of law and the Constitution. Perhaps the SCOTUS will deal with this one, now.
Yeah well the justice system is broke all over the place.
And that is not coming from me. That is coming from some really good highly rated trial lawyers who have won cases that no one thought possible.
If I worked for SCOTUS, I would poll the nine Justices and see if there were four that might hear the case on the condition that I was turned down after having telephoned Obama to ask him to release his vault copy of his birth certificate.
IOW, Obama please make this go away. Settle the controversy. People know your half-sister has a COLB from Hawaii but was born outside the USA. Let people know you are not in the same category as your half-sister, etc.
A couple of short phone calls from key persons within SCOTUS to Obama could settle all of this.....or open it up to a crisis.
Settle it one way or the other.
Not trying to fan any flames here, but I’m not a legal beagle and I’ve got a question. I’ve read that a sitting President can’t be sued. Can anyone tell me if that’s true? I read about continual lawsuits on these and other threads, but if this individual is inaugurated on schedule, would they matter? I merely seek information.
It's not completely "too late" until he fudges the oath of office on January 20th. Even then it's not completely "too late", but it gets much uglier after that. It begins to get uglier after Monday, gets a lot more so on January 6th, and after January 20th, it gets really, really ugly.
Unfortunatly, extremely willing to ignore the law and give an election to a dem ... see Gregoire/Rossi 2004
The definition is the one that has existed since the late 16th century. Find another one.
I don't know about proof, but the only way it makes sense if that class of citizen were considered "naturalized at birth". These would be people who did not fit under the definition/understanding of "natural born citizen" at the time the Constitution was written and ratified, but who Congress, through exercising it's power to define uniform rules of naturalization (Under the Articles of Confederation, each state had its own rules), defined them to be citizens at birth as a matter of statute law.
I would say "original understanding" or "original definition" of the term "Natural Born Citizen".
Has that ever been an issue in the cases from which those rulings issued? The only time there is any legal distinction between "natural born citizen" and "citizen" is for eligibility to the Office of President. Thus it's not surprising that the issue of the definition of "natrual born citizen" hasn't been adjudicated.
Spinning, huh? And at a professional level, too. Right. No, nobody is paying me.
"BTW, thanks for the correction ... an “E” instead of an “A” stands out doesn’t it?"
I usually ignore such things if they aren't relevant to the discussion. I was half asleep, and my frustration with your circular arguments got the better of me. I apologize for being petty.
"Your twisting meth’ood’ology why we have a SCOTUS to whom we may address points of law and the Constitution. "
I think I understand what this sentence was supposed to convey, but if you would explain it to me I might understand it better.
"Perhaps the SCOTUS will deal with this one, now."
I sure hope so. At least we can agree on that. If the SCOTUS does deal with it, and after that says your position is correct and mine is not, I will try to figure out where I went wrong. However, if they say that I am right and you are wrong, I suspect that you will try to figure out where they went wrong.
But so was Blackstone's "Commentaries on the Laws of England".
The major difference between "The Law of Nations" (originally in French) and "Blacksone" is that the laws of England (circa 1765) allowed both for persons born in England of foreign parentage, in most cases, to be "natural born citizens", and also for the children of English Citizen parents (either both or just the father) to like wise be considered natural born. In England of the time, as in the US under the Constitution, the distinction between Natural born and naturalized, only mattered if one wanted to hold certain public offices,
An easier to read version of the applicable sections of Blackstone, is at The University of Chicago ironically enough.
From Blacstone:
it was enacted by statute 25 Edw. III. st. 2. that all children born abroad, provided both their parents were at the time of the birth in allegiance to the king, and the mother had passed the seas by her husband's consent, might inherit as if born in England: and accordingly it hath been so adjudged in behalf of merchants. 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.
The children of aliens, born here in England, are, generally speaking, natural-born subjects, and entitled to all the privileges of such. In which the constitution of France differs from ours; for there, by their jus albinatus, if a child be born of foreign parents, it is an alien.
Even under these very loose definitions, if born in Kenya or anywhere else outside the US, Obama would not be a natural born citizen.
Which dictionary? The best would be a legal dictionary, from as close to, but before, 1789 as possible. Even a "regular dictionary" from near that period would be OK. Any dictionary from later than the founding generation, say the death of Jefferson and (John) Adams, July 4, 1826, 50 years after the Declaration of Independence, which both had hand in writing, is not really useful in understanding what Jay and Washington meant by the clause in question.
Very interesting, calenel. Please provide a source for this.
It may come to that, but that language also never appears in anything I've read. However, in PERKINS V. ELG a number of cases are discussed, and there is more than one instance where such language would logically appear. It does not, and further, assertions are made that arguably preclude that interpretation. I suppose that Perkins can be denied in the same way Wong Kim Ark is, that is to say, some people deny the validity of Ark because it opposes their view, so why not the same of Perkins v. Elg?
Random House Unabridged Dictionary as cited on dictionary.reference.com
Have you forgotten already that you went to my FR homepage and quoted out of the posted definition (which has a link)? The origin of the phrase 'natural born' was in the late 16th century (1575-85) according to Random House (well, there goes Random House's credibility). Webster's has has the same definition (well, there goes Webster's credibility) but doesn't indicate an origin.
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