I was responding to the assumption by some that “natural born citizen” means being born of natural born citizens as well.
It was near impossible for the immediate generations following the Revolution for capable men needed to govern to NOT have British or other foreign parents.
So a historical rumor has it that a special,and thus temporary,dispensation was allowed—one that no longer applies for present generations.
It's constitutional slight of hand I know,but a valid point when strictly defining what a “natural born citizen" is.
I was responding to the assumption by some that “natural born citizen” means being born of natural born citizens as well.
It was near impossible for the immediate generations following the Revolution for capable men needed to govern to NOT have British or other foreign parents.
So a historical rumor has it that a special,and thus temporary,dispensation was allowed—one that no longer applies for present generations.
Historical rumor? Try the U.S. Constitution:
No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.
Obviously, after the passage of sufficient time there would no longer be any whose U.S. citizenship antedated the requirements in the Constitution adopted in 1789, for those, then the only requirement for citizenship is that of the "natural born Citizen."
To see what was understood by those writing the Constitution by "natural born" it's necessary to go to the literature of the times dealing with the subject of national citizenship. If there were absolutely nothing to be found, then one could say, "Well, it could mean this or it could mean that. We just don't have any evidence either way so we can't claim it means any more than _____." That's not the case, though. And to those who say, "Yes, but the Supreme Court said in
whoever v whoever etc., etc., etc" we say, "Well, the Supreme Court has been wrong or has been reversed on quite a few things of great import and, at any rate, a Supreme Court decision is inherently
not the same thing as the original intent of the original writers." To discover that, you have to go back to the writings of the time. This tendency to twist the language away from its original intent to serve one's exigent need was well known even to the writers of the Constitution who warned about what they already saw happening and what it would mean in the future.