Chester Arthur lied about his age and burned his documents to make it look as if he was born AFTER his father obtained his U.S. Naturalization.
Please explain why pray-tell this would make any difference since Arthur's father had lived in the U.S. for a decade prior to Chet's birth, plenty of time to become a citizen.
In any case, this motivation doesn't make sense in another respect. Arthur's papers were burned in 1886. He left office in 1885. Again, you have two choices. If he had really done this as part of a devious cover-up, he woudl have burned them in 1880 (or earlier).
Again, you are stuck with two choices. Because they never bothered to even raise the issue from 1880 to 1885, voters from 1880 to 1885 were ignorant trusting sheeple compared to today's voters OR they didn't think this issue had any bearing on his eligibility.
Arthur readily admitted in 1880! that his father was Irish born yet nobody thought that this issue merited a follow-up question.
Oh....the a”lie” was that Arthur said he was born in 1830 rather than 1829. Big friggin’ deal.