Something eludes me here. My question is this: In the 20th and 21st centuries, has the United States government ever differentially classified US citizens on US government-issued visas, passports, military papers, census documents, etc as being either (1) a citizen, (2) a natural born citizen, or (3) a naturalized citizen?
One would assume that if the US government had always intended to maintain a legal distinction between each of three types of citizenship, then it would have established a rigorous system for doing so by now. Yet the US government hasn't. It only keeps track of two types of citizenship.
Why is that?
Looks like you are trying to get “cute”, I don’t buy it! Only applies to the qualifications to hold office as President and V. President.
You are so correct about the govt/Congress & I have compiled all the attempts of the progressives, from both sides of the isle that have attempted to change it, but all attempts died a quick death in committee, well, except S. Res. 511
http://constitutionallyspeaking.wordpress.com/a-congressional-natural-born-citizen-parts-i-ii-iii/
Congressman Candy, 2000
Mr. Candy who is chairing the subcommittee opens by stating:
“The natural-born citizen qualification continues to provide to the political system of the United States a certain level of protection against the influence of foreign nations. In addition to this safeguard, the requirement also secures the ability of the President to make decisions involving domestic and foreign policy that are in the best interests of the United States without an inherent emotional or familial attachment to another nation.”
And Mr. Candy is quite right. The qualification was put in place specifically for national security & sovereignty reasons. It was put in place to protect the citizens of the newly formed Republic from ever becoming ‘subjects’ to foreign sovereigns or an all powerful central Monarchy. Mr. Candy has done his homework and thus is the reason I believe that this never made it out of committee.
I think you'll find that passports only indicate citizenship, although because they include place of birth, they can be used to infer "native born" or "naturalized"... but not reliably, since persons born of parents in the service of the country (such as military or diplomatic) are considered native (and if both parents are citizens, natural) born, yet place of birth might be Nairobi, Kenya, or more likely someplace in England, Germany or South Korea.
Your second and third "classes" are subsets of the first. Both "natural born" and "naturalized" are citizens, as are native born. Natural born is a subset of "native born", while naturalized is a subset that does not intersect the set "native born". Where "native born" has the modern meaning of "born in the United States".
The reason it's not kept track of, is that all citizens have the same rights, so there is no purpose in keeping track. But being elected to office is not a right, and their are eligibility criteria which may restrict naturalized citizens from running for or holding federal elected office. For Representative and Senator, there are residency requirements, and for President a complete ban. Similarly non Natural Born citizens cannot hold the office of President, even if they are native born, and otherwise meet the eligibility requirements.