You would think that some journalist would take a look at what is meant by "natural born" Citizen. To me, natural born simply means that your mother and father were each born in the USA.
I am curious how Obama gets around this basic requirement; his father was a British citizen, and not a citizen of the USA. In that situation, Obama has only one parent born in the USA, and therefore is not a natural born Citizen. How did the lawyers get around that requirement?
CRAIG V. US, Aug. 5, 2009 – 10th Circuit Court of Appeals – Native Born Citizens have no Constitutional right to Natural Born Citizen status.
Steven Craig sued the United States in the Western District of Oklahoma where he argued that he was deprived of a Constitutional Right to be determined a Natural Born Citizen.
Mr. Craig was essentially trying to force the courts into making a judicial definition of Natural Born Citizen by asserting that without such a definition, Mr. Craig is deprived of his status as a Natural Born citizen.
Mr. Craig’s suit was dismissed by the District Court. The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed. The Court rejected the case on the basis that they had no subject matter jurisdiction since there was no injury in fact as none of Mr. Craig’s rights were harmed. It was also held that Mr. Craig did not have standing.
The Court said Mr. Craig had no right to demand the Court affirm or deny his proffered definition of a Natural Born Citizen as a person born within the territorial limits of the United States. The Court also said a Native Born citizen does not have the right be called a Natural Born Citizen. And finally, Mr.
Craig, a US born citizen with both parents who were citizens of the US at the time of his birth, had no right to demand to be classified as a Natural Born Citizen.
Schneider v. Rusk, 377 U.S. 163, 165-66 (1964) (quoting Osborn v. Bank of U.S., 22 U.S. (9 Wheat.) 738, 827 (1824)), ... the rights of all citizens, naturalized or native born, are equal, except only Natural Born Citizens are eligible to be POTUS. The Court is reminding us that not all Native Born Citizens are automatically determined to be classified as Natural Born Citizens.
Only the Court or a Constitutional Amendment can determine which Native Born Citizens are Natural Born Citizens.
There are many legal authorities indicating that the definition of a "natural born citizen" is simply a citizen who became such by birth as opposed to naturalization. Under the 14th Amendment, anyone born in the United States is a citizen by birth. Under the Supreme Court's decison in Wong Kim Ark v. United States, someone born on U.S. soil of two alien parents is constitutionally a citizen by birth.
There are some legal arguments that "natural born citizen" means something more than "citizen by birth," and I concede that the Supreme Court has never definitively determined that question, but I think the argument is a weak one.
More importantly, from a practical point of view: Obama never made a secret of the fact that his father was never a citizen. Everyone knew that. Despite that, not one of his primary opponents ever challenged his eligibility on that basis; McCain and Palin never challenged his eligibility on that basis; not one state election official declined to put him on the ballot; not one member of the electoral college disputed his eligibility; not one member of Congress, from either party, challeneged his eligibility when Vice president Cheney certified his election; and Chief Justice Roberts swore him in. The idea that, after all of that, some court is now going to overturn the election on that basis is just dreaming. (Might be a different issue if someone can prove that he wasn't born in the U.S., but we'll wait until that happens to see.)
The Occidental Obama - A Pawn In The Game
And:
WILL THESE TWO DOCUMENTS THROW PELOSI AND TOP DEMOCRATS INTO FELONY PRISON?