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To: sourcery
Who decided in Minor that it means "born in the US to parents who were citizens."

I've said this before, to no avail, but you seem like a generally smart guy, so maybe you'll get it: have you ever heard of necessary vs. sufficient conditions? Here are a couple of definitions:

A sufficient condition for some state of affairs S is a condition that, if satisfied, guarantees that S obtains.
A necessary condition for some state of affairs S is a condition that must be satisfied in order for S to obtain.
Now, read the "definition" in Minor: "it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also." In other words, being born in a country of citizen parents is undoubtedly enough to make one a citizen at birth--it's a sufficient condition. But for your argument to be valid, you have to construe it as a necessary condition, and the language doesn't support that. For that they would have had to write something like "it was never doubted that only children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also"--a very simple change, and yet wording they didn't choose. Why is that, if the distinction is so important?

To use an example I've used before: it's as though I said "there is no doubt that all the people I work with are invited to my party." Does that mean nobody else can come? No, of course not.

135 posted on 07/05/2011 12:57:11 PM PDT by Ha Ha Thats Very Logical
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To: Ha Ha Thats Very Logical

Legal term definitions use the closed world assumption.


138 posted on 07/05/2011 1:59:26 PM PDT by sourcery (If true=false, then there would be no constraints on what is possible. Hence, the world exists.)
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