Posted on 06/30/2009 9:32:47 AM PDT by wbones8765
What might the phrase “natural-born citizen” of the United States imply under the U.S. Constitution? The phrase has always been obscure due to the lack of any single authoritative source to confer in order to understand the condition of citizenship the phrase recognizes. Learning what the phrase might have meant following the Declaration of Independence, and the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, requires detective work. As with all detective work, eliminating the usual suspects from the beginning goes a long way in quickly solving a case.
What Natural-Born Citizen Could Not Mean
Could a natural-born citizen simply mean citizenship due to place of birth?
Unlikely in the strict sense because we know one can be native born and yet not a native born citizen of this country prior to the year 1866. There were even disputes whether anyone born within the District of Columbia or in the territories were born citizens of the United States (they were generally referred to as “inhabitants” instead.) National Government could make no “territorial allegiance” demands within the several States because as Madison explained it, the “powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State.”
Jurisdiction over citizenship via birth within the several States was part of the “ordinary course of affairs” of the States that only local laws could affect. Early acts of Naturalization recognized the individual State Legislatures as the only authority who could make anyone a citizen of a State. Framer James Wilson said, “a citizen of the United States is he, who is a citizen of at least some one state in the Union.”
(Excerpt) Read more at federalistblog.us ...
Apparently none that you could grasp, since your mind is absolutely made up.
The greatest barrier to the truth, is to believe that you already have it. Facts almost never change an opinion, once it is accepted in the opinion holders mind, so I don't bother anymore.
My life long, best friend, in the world, who died a few years ago, hated everything the Democratic party stood for, and yet he voted democratic, I knew him for 60 years, and had zero success pointing out facts to him, I just continued to love him, because their was nothing I could do to convince him that Republicans were anything but robber Barron's.
So I leave you to your delusions.
wbones8765
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Touche!
If it’s been beaten death; you should have figured it out by now. Yet you haven’t. You’ve been beaten by anti-Americanism.
So, you don’t have any sensible counterarguments ...?
If you have figured it out, then why don’t you share your wisdom with us? On the other hand, if you don’t really know what you are talking about, then why don’t you find another thread to pollute?
I occasionally shout at the TV, sensible arguments have absolutely no effect on the outcome of the news program. I predict making sensible arguments with you would have about the same result.
As a matter of fact I do,but I quit shouting at the TV, because it gave my wife headaches. You on the other hand just annoy me. Save the band width, facts have no affect on your opinion.
My opinion in this matter was formed on the basis of extensive reading of the relevant case law, dating back to the 1790’s, that was prompted by several threads on this topic last fall. If you can give me, and many others here, a good reason to change this opinion, then do so. Otherwise, you are just blowing smoke.
That is a specialty I leave to lawyers, since common sense seems to be dead.
cf Vattel. You must also be born to an American citizen to be natural-born. Barry is a natural-born British subject if he’s a natural-born anything. This has been well-covered on FR threads; which you claim you’ve read. Either you are lying about your level of ignorance or you are shilling for pan-national anti-American forces.
You might want to read Thomas Jefferson's Virginia Citizenship Statute (written in 1779), rather than the 1758 writings of a Frenchman, to gain an understanding of what the Founding Fathers had in mind by the use of the term “natural-born” citizen:
” ... all [white] persons born within the territory of this commonwealth and all who have resided therein two years next before the passing of this act, and all who shall hereafter migrate into the same; and shall before any court of record give satisfactory proof by their own oath or affirmation, that they intend to reside therein, and moreover shall give assurance of fidelity to the commonwealth; and all infants wheresoever born, whose father, if living, or otherwise, whose mother was, a citizen at the time of their birth, or who migrate hither, their father, if living, or otherwise their mother becoming a citizen, or who migrate hither without father or mother, shall be deemed citizens of this commonwealth, until they relinquish that character in manner as herein after expressed.”
In this passage, acquiring citizenship by virtue of having a father (or if the father is deceased, a mother) who is a citizen is clearly an alternative route to citizenship to having been born in the Commonwealth of Virginia.
And in discussing the procedure whereby those who want to relinquish their “natural right” to citizenship, Jefferson had this to say:
“And in order to preserve to the citizens of this commonwealth, that natural right, which all men have of relinquishing the country, in which birth, or other accident may have thrown them, and, seeking subsistance and happiness wheresoever they may be able, ... to declare unequivocably what circumstances shall be deemed evidence of an intention in any citizen to exercise that right, it is enacted and declared, that whensoever any citizen of this commonwealth, shall by word of mouth in the presence of the court of the county, wherein he resides, or of the General Court, or by deed in writing, under his hand and seal, executed in the presence of three witnesses, and by them proved in either of the said courts, openly declare to the same court, that he relinquishes the character of a citizen, and shall depart the commonwealth; or whensoever he shall without such declaration depart the commonwealth and enter into the service of any other state, not in enmity with this, or any other of the United States of America, or do any act whereby he shall become a subject or citizen of such state, such person shall be considered as having exercised his natural right of expatriating himself, and shall be deemed no citizen of this commonwealth from the time of his departure.”
In this passage, the “natural right” to citizenship of the Commonwealth is conveyed “by birth or other accident [that]may have thrown them.”
1. The phrase “natural-born” was nowhere in those quotes.
2. Jefferson was in France when the Constitution was drafted, and he had no hand in it.
By this, do you mean he had no influence on it? Certainly, all of the Virginians involved with the framing of the Constitution were aware of and were influenced by Jefferson's extensive, pre-1787 writings, including his 1779 authorship of the various Virginia statutes, most notably on religious freedom and, for present purposes, citizenship.
Perhaps. We do know however, they were influenced by Vattel, who wrote the standard reference text on the subject, a text they had with them in the room when writing the Constitution. And the phrase in question is a phrase from Vattel, not from Jefferson. Your citations and concomitant blatherings are hence irrelevant.
Or something. Query? Was the man then calling himself Senator Obama from Illinois confused at the time of these resolutions and discussions or was he just being less than truthful?
The whole birther issue is insane. But this is a real case. Of course, the Supreme Court won’t touch it. Most courts won’t even grant standing.
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