Vattel and the Founders meaning of the term Naturels (Natural Born)

Journals of the Continental Congress 1781 ^ | 1781 | The Founders

[bushpilot1]

In the Journals of the Continental Congress there is a translation of the French word naturels to natural born. Meaning the Founders understood Vattel's naturels to mean natural born.

The document and its translation by the Founders must have been overlooked over the years by the courts, congress and the news media.

In French.

ARTICLE III Les consuls et vice consuls respectifs ne pourront être pris que parmi les sujets naturels de la puissance qui les nommera.

The Founders Translation.

The respective Consuls and Vice Consuls shall only be taken from among the natural born subjects of the power nominating them.

[PA-RIVER]

It seems your argument stands that a Foreign citizen can drop a baby here (or fabricate documents asserting to that place of birth), raise in him in a foreign country and train him to hate America, and then have him qualified to run for president for the intended purpose of destroying it.

You, Sir, are correct as of today. That is now happening.

[jamese777]

WRONG! There are many instances where people, especially the lamestream media covered up the fact by calling Obama’s father an immigrant INCLUDING the day of the INNAUGURATION! And they still try to cover to this very day! My father in law who has always been a strict conservative, both practicing & political got sucked in by the “WON”. He was lied to and he is now embarrassed but mostly disgusted that he was lied to by a charismatic politician he thought was telling the truth. We went to our elected officials both at the state & federal level & we were brushed off thanks to McCain’s little overseas birth(topic for another day). If you want to be taken seriously, then at least get your facts straight. He won taking 53% of the popular vote. Hardly a landslide victory. Reagan took 51% in his 1st term & 54% in his second term but he too over 90% of the electoral vote in both elections taking over 97% in 1984. So I’d hardly call Obama a record setter, his numbers are merely mediocre as were Clinton’s & Bush W’s where partisan politics were more important than the best interest of the nation as a whole. Obama is the epitome of partisan politics, he knows know other than his own person ideology in which he clamored at us again today by politicitzeng the war in Afghanistan.

OBAMA RELEASE YOUR RECORDS!

---

“Immigrants” aren’t necessarily citizens. A person can be a “Permanent Legal Resident” and not be a citizen, so the use of the term “immigrant” to describe Obama’s father was not inappropriate. The dictionary definition of an immigrant is one who takes up permanent residence in a new country.

I wasn’t talking about the media, I was talking about what was actually stated in the book “Dreams From My Father” which was written in 1995. What the media said or didn’t say is irrelevant to what was in the book.

Obama announced his candidacy for president in February of 2007. His Democratic primary opponents and his Republican and third party opposition in the general election had nearly two years to make the case that he was ineligible. They failed.

As actual judges and justices who have looked at the eligibility issue have said, there is no judge and no Court in America that is going to invalidate the results of a national election AFTER the fact. The Constitution does not give the Courts that authority and the more conservative and originalist a judge or justice is, the less likely they will be to invent judicial powers that are not explicitly spelled out in the Constitution.

Once Vice President Cheney certified Obama’s 365 Electoral College votes and once Chief Justice John Roberts swore him in, he became the 44th President of the United States and the methods to remove him are via forcing his resignation, impeaching him, trying him, and convicting him or the American electorate can fire him in the 2012 election.

As we all now know from the 2000 election, whether you lose the popular vote and win by one Electoral College vote matters not. The person whose electoral votes are certified by the President of the Senate and who is sworn in, IS the President of the United States, period. Obama got enough popular votes and enough electoral votes to win the electoin. That’s the relevant fact not comparing his totals to Ronald Reagan’s.

Your father-in-law has the option of voting against Obama in 2012 and voting against his political party in just 4 more months! Isn’t living in a democratic-republic Great?
;-)

I have no problem at all with searching for evidence of a crime committed by Obama and indicting him criminally if the evidence is there. But continuing to use the civil lawsuit route after already failing 69 separate times is just foolishness. Only the McCain-Palin ticket would have had legal standing to sue Obama and that would have to occur BEFORE certification of his electoral college votes and swearing in.
“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.”—Albert Einstein

Anyone politically naive enough to think that Obama is just going to hand over any incriminating evidence to his political opposition is being really silly. It is the job of Obama’s political opponents to UNCOVER that information in spite of Obama’s attempts to keep his past hidden.

[PA-RIVER]

We are in a public court of opinion now Mr. Rogers. I refine my arguments and brief my fellow citizens on a daily basis. As I see it, my side is growing in numbers every day.

Was it Galileo who was thrown on jail for saying the earth revolved around the Sun? His absurd and undocumented facts were heresy not allowed in court either. But the Obvious facts remain. The court could not make the sun revolve around the earth, no more than you can document Obamas Birthplace. I can take you to the very room where Reagan, Clinton or Kennedy were born. Why cant you show me the exact location where Obama was born? Why? I was born in the hallway of a hospital in New Jersey, and I can take you there today and show you the exact spot. I'm sure you must know where you were born. But no, Obamas place of birth must never be disclosed. There is only one reason to hide the facts. It either qualifies or disqualifies him. If it qualifies him, he need not hide, yet he hides them. Its become obvious he is a fraud.

[jamese777]

It seems your argument stands that a Foreign citizen can drop a baby here (or fabricate documents asserting to that place of birth), raise in him in a foreign country and train him to hate America, and then have him qualified to run for president for the intended purpose of destroying it.
You, Sir, are correct as of today. That is now happening.

---

The scenario you fabricate above has never occurred in American history.
I have no interest in debating fairy tales.

[PA-RIVER]

So you deny that a man raised by foreigners in Indonesia as a Muslim now leads the USA, a country founded in christian principles that run counter to his core Islamic beliefs.

If you continue to deny this documented reality, you are correct, we have no way to have a discussion going forward. Good luck to you.

[jamese777]

And the best of luck to you as well. Take good care.

[jamese777]

Please do tell, give the specifics of ANY case that actually entered a court room. Give me an example of 1 case that had a fair hearing on the merits of the case in an open court room? Dismissal for lack of standing does not equal no merit to the foundation of the case. Congress has the authority to naturalize aliens/immigrants and say which aliens/immigrants may be citizens, which includes the immigrants children. Any child who acquires their citizenship because of an act of Congress acquires it through a form of naturalization. PERIOD! Natural born(born to 2 citizen parents) need no act of congress or law because at birth they owe allegiance to one & only one nation. The nation of their birth.
Again, might I suggest you open a book prior to 1800 where it defines the definition of subject, born on soil regardless of parentage & citizen, born to citizen parents.

I challenge you to find me 1 book that defines the 2 as the same. And I do not want opinions in law, I want actual law dictionaries or scholastic dictionaries because even Webster’s 1825 dictionary defines them as 2 different things. One being under the rule of a master & the other a free & sovereign member of society. Free members consent to participation, subjects have no say or right to participation unless it is granted to them by the rulers.

I won’t hold my breath for you to actually take the challenge as you have already shown your ignorance of history & the law. But one can still hope for the oppressed & ignorant to finally see the light & become informed & free.

---

This was a trick question, right? When a legal position gets summarily dismissed over and over and over and over again (more than 50 times) for lack of standing, that means IT HAS NO MERIT.
You are not going to find a trial on the merits if lawsuits have no merit. If a lawsuit has merit then plaintiffs are presented who have standing to sue.

Let me give you an example: let’s say you run a red light and hit another car. The accident is clearly your fault.
A spectator to the accident who is standing on a street corner tries to sue you for having had an accident that he/she had the misfortune to witness.

Judge after judge after judge is going to dismiss the suit against you by the bystander on lack of standing.

A bystander has no right to sue you because the bystander suffered no injury in fact as a result of your actions.
THERE WILL NEVER BE A TRIAL “ON THE MERITS” when there is no standing to sue. It is the responsibility of the attorneys who are pursuing a particular issue to present a plaintiff who will be granted standing.

If you’re going to sue BP for the oil spill, better have plaintiffs who suffered direct injuries from the oil spill.

There is probably only one potential plaintiff who could have sued Obama for getting elected when he was (allegedly) ineligible, that plaintiff would have been Senator John Sidney McCain, the only person to suffer an injury-in-fact DIRECTLY, NOT INDIRECTLY, from the election of Barack Hussein Obama II.

Plaintiffs who suffered no injury-in-fact from Obama’s election have their lawsuits summarily dismissed for lack of standing because those are frivolous lawsuits filed by attorneys who should know better if they ever stepped inside a REAL law school.

[patlin]

blah blah blah, you still didn't answer the question, when did dismissal for lack of standing mean the case has a FULL hearing on the merits? It's a simple question, so why are you avoiding it?

Why will you also not answer by giving specific legal references, not law case opinions, where the definition of citizen & subject are equivalent. Here is the list of references the framers of the constitution used to help you get a running start:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2539663/posts?page=182#182

[bushpilot1]

“Let us appeal to enlightened and disinterested judges. No one is more so than Vattel.” Thomas Jeferson

“Vattel is one of the most zealous and constant advocates for the preservation of good faith in all our dealings” Jefferson

The two Jefferson statements differ with your opinion of Vattel.

You state Vattel is nothing more than an opinion..seems his opinion was held in high regard by the Founders since they used his opinions to assist forming our Constitution.

The natural born citizen clause is based on Vattel, it is not jus soli.

[patlin]

If I am stupid, then so is the Supreme Court Justices who gave these deciding opinions:

Justice Story, concurring opinion, “Inglis v. Sailors’ Snug Harbor,” 3 Pet. 99, 155,164. (1830)<.i>
Interesting case, thanks for bringing it to my attention.

http://supreme.justia.com/us/28/99/case.html

The facts disclosed in this case, then, lead irresistibly to the conclusion that it was the fixed determination of Charles Inglis the father, at the declaration of independence, to adhere to his native allegiance. And John Inglis the son must be deemed to have followed the condition of his father, and the character of a British subject attached to and fastened on him also, which he has never attempted to throw off by any act disaffirming the choice made for him by his father...

It cannot, I presume, be denied but that allegiance may be dissolved by the mutual consent of the government and its citizens or subjects. The government may release the governed from their allegiance. This is even the British doctrine in the case of Doe v. Acklam, before referred to.

It seems that Justice Thompson affirmed the US law of citizenship through descent, not soil in the DECIDING OPINION. He clearly states that the child FOLLOWED the CONDITION of the FATHER! The words of the LAW OF NATIONS of Grotius, Puffendorf, Vattel, Locke, etc that are spoken of by the framers during the debates when discussing the citizens & the states being in a state of nature.

Justice Story: 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. If he was born after 15 September, 1776, and his parents did not elect to become members of the State of New York, but adhered to their native allegiance at the time of his birth, then he was born a British subject...Vattel considers the general doctrine to be that children generally acquire the national character of their parents, Vattel, B. 1, ch. 19. sec. 212, 219, and it is certain, both by the common law and the statute law of England, that the demandant would be deemed a British subject. .

[El Gato]

This is something I have been saying all along! Just like the illegals who come here and have a kid - their children are NOT citizens, because their parents are NOT citizens!

They could be citizens if their parents were subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. Children of legal permanent resdient aliens, ie. those with green cards, are citizens by that criteria, IMHO. (Courts have disagreed with both of us, since they have the child of a woman who gets 10 yards north of the Rio Grande and has her baby, being a citizen at birth, even if she grabs the baby and runs back accross the river.

But in any event, just being a citizen from birth is not the same as being a Natural Born Citizen. For that, your parents must be citizens, and you must be born in the country ... with some exceptions for the children of diplomats and military abroad in the service of the nation. NBC is the Constitutional eligibility requirement for the office of President.

[El Gato]

The Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, in the declaration that ‘all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside,’ contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two only: birth and naturalization. Citizenship by naturalization can only be acquired by naturalization under the authority and in the forms of law. But citizenship by birth is established by the mere fact of birth under the circumstances defined in the Constitution. Every person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, becomes at once a citizen of the United States, and needs no naturalization.

I don't see "natural born citizen" in there anywhere. Naturalization is the act of making someone who would otherwise be a foreigner, a citizen. Doesn't matter if it happens at birth or after. Those born abroad of citizen parents are citizens at/by birth. But they are naturalized for Constitutional purposes. (again with exceptions for children of military and diplomats serving abroad). Or at least that is what the Supreme Court has ruled, as recently as the early 1970s. The effect of that ruling is that "Citizen at birth" is not equal to "natural born citizen", or even "non naturalized citizen". So if "citizen by birth" can be naturalized at birth (due to Congress only having power over naturalization) then logically "born in the country" can not by itself define "Natural Born Citizen".

Everything the courts have said or written about Natural Born Citizenship has been dicta. This is because the only time it matters is eligibility for the office of President, and they have not ruled on any eligiblity cases.

[El Gato]

AND the phase translated NB is NOT naturels, but indigenous...

The French word "indigenes" does not appear in that section of the Convention with the French. Only "naturales". So only "naturales" can have been translated as "natural born".

"indigenes" may be translated as "natives" or "indigeonous ones".

Interestingly, I just put the 1797 translation into an on line translator. It was having trouble going from French to English, but when I put in the English sentence

"The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens"

I got:

"Les indigènes, ou les citoyens naturels, sont ceux nés dans le pays, des parents qui sont des citoyens"

So clearly "natives" was translated as "indigènes" and "natural born citizens" was translated as "citoyens naturels".

That compares very well to the original French that the 1797 translator was working from:

Les naturels, ou indigenes, sont ceux qui sont nés dans le pays de parents citoyens

[Mr Rogers]

In the conventions with the French, the phrase was (and I’ll transliterate since I don’t want to look it up) ‘subjects natural’ - which was translated into the equivalent English common law phrase ‘natural born subject’. The born was added to make it the equivalent English LEGAL phrase, showing that the translators were thinking of English common law. Otherwise they would have translated it ‘natural subjects’.

Based on language, there was no reason to add born to either document - it is only if the translator is trying to get the equivalent phrase from common law that ‘born’ appears. After all, the French DO have a word for born, which does NOT appear in either text.

Now, if they are trying for the equivalent common law phrase, then a combination of Vattel AND common law COULD be the origin of the phrase in the Constitution - but that leaves you with having to decide which is dominate - Vattel or common law. Since common law is driving the addition of new words, I’d say common law - a position the courts have traditionally agreed with.

[Plummz]

Why are you lying about Wong Kim Ark?

[Plummz]

Are you retarded? Obama Sr was not a permanent legal resident, or any kind of permanent resident.

He was a British subject traveling on a temporary student visa. Any children of his would be natural-born British subjects under British common law and statutory law and universal natural law. Hope this helps.

[jamese777]

Are you retarded? Obama Sr was not a permanent legal resident, or any kind of permanent resident.

He was a British subject traveling on a temporary student visa. Any children of his would be natural-born British subjects under British common law and statutory law and universal natural law. Hope this helps.

---

I never said that Obama Senior was a permanent legal resident. He stayed in the United States for six years. He got married here and had a child before returning to Africa.

Barack Hussein Obama II lost his automatically conferred British citizenship when he was 3 years old and Kenya became an independent Republic and he lost his automatically conferred Kenyan citizenship when he reached the age of majority and didn’t chose Kenya as his nationality.

The time to challenge Obama’s eligibility through the civil court system was before his election, the certification of his electoral votes and his swearing in. Those who still want to challenge his eligibility need to use the impeachment process in Congress, the next presidential election, or try to force his resignation. A criminal indictment for any high crime or misdemeanor could work wonders.

No, I’m not retarded.

[jamese777]

“Let us appeal to enlightened and disinterested judges. No one is more so than Vattel.” Thomas Jeferson

“Vattel is one of the most zealous and constant advocates for the preservation of good faith in all our dealings” Jefferson

The two Jefferson statements differ with your opinion of Vattel.

You state Vattel is nothing more than an opinion..seems his opinion was held in high regard by the Founders since they used his opinions to assist forming our Constitution.

The natural born citizen clause is based on Vattel, it is not jus soli.

---

From your post it looks like at least one Founder was a fan of Vattel’s.
I would agree that jus sanguinis was more important than Jus Soli at the founding of the nation. However in 1868, the 14th Amendment changed the equation and jus soli became more important than jus sanguinis in terms of the number of citizens-at-birth who were created by that constitutional change.
What to the best of my knowledge has never been specifically adjudicated in any court ever, is whether there is any constitutional difference between a citizen-at-birth and a natural born citizen.
Since the ratification of the 14th Amendment the Supreme Court has tended to equate and use interchangeably the terms “native citizen,” “born citizen” and “natural born citizen.”
What modern day courts have said is that the time to challenge natural born status eligibility is BEFORE an election, not after. Once a candidate is elected, impeachment is the only legal means to remove that person.
Quite a few of the Obama eligibility lawsuits have been dismissed on grounds of “lack of subject matter jurisdiction” which is legalese for “we don’t have the power under the Constitution to do that.”

[patlin]

Now, if they are trying for the equivalent common law phrase, then a combination of Vattel AND common law COULD be the origin of the phrase in the Constitution - but that leaves you with having to decide which is dominate - Vattel or common law. Since common law is driving the addition of new words, I’d say common law - a position the courts have traditionally agreed with.

But then one would have to assume that you have actually STUDIED the subject from the ancient philosophers who 1st wrote the common law. nature = natural = children born to citizens parents is the word according to Plato & Socrates who 1st put the common law in writing. It began at the simplest level with family tribes, then expanded to a city level, incorporating/naturalization(1st immigration laws) then state, then nation but at the core unless you were born to citizen parents, you were considered an alien/foreigner. Natural citizenship from its beginning was either inherited through blood by being born to citizen parents. PERIOD!

http://books.google.com/books?printsec=titlepage&pg=PA196&id=w-ktAAAAIAAJ#v=onepage&q&f=false

[El Gato]

Based on language, there was no reason to add born to either document

Apparently there is. Otherwise why would a modern day translation program, which surely knows nothing of English common law, translate "natural-born citizen" as " les citoyens naturels" ?