Posted on 09/07/2011 4:33:52 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
Edited on 09/07/2011 4:35:41 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
“Remember the Framers who established the Federal Courts expected them to enforce the Law of Nations.”
Birther attorney Mario Apuzzo has said that people who do that — who imply that the use of the words in the Constitution mean Vattel’s book — are actually o-bots knowingly pushing a ludicrous theory to make birthers look silly.
Many of the court decisions are not clouded at all, but very clear cut. See Rogers vs. Bellei, Inglis vs Snug Harbor, etc.
No, it doesn't prescribe the means by which the parents are considered citizens prior to birth, but they do have to be citizens prior to birth, otherwise the child is a citizen of the parents other country of citizenship or the child is stateless.
Sorry, but this is patently false. Enlgish common law is simply a framework Gray uses to give teeth to the 14th amendment. He acknowledged very clearly that the court previously defined natural born citizenship as those who are born in the country to citizen parents. Once Gray affirms the Minor definition, he never uses the phrases NBC again in the decision and INSTEAD uses his own term of "citizenship by birth." He distinguishes these two terms. One is defined OUTSIDE of the Constitution and the other is defined by the Constitution per the 14th amendment. You have to read ALL the words.
Way to take quotes out of context so they say the opposite of what the speaker really said!
It's not out of context. In the Slaughterhouses cases, Justice Miller said, "The phrase, "subject to its jurisdiction" was intended to exclude from its operation children of ministers, consuls, and citizens or subjects of foreign States born within the United States." Gray is noting that Miller did not understand at the time that the Supreme Court was ALSO committed to interpreting the 14th amendment as EXCLUDING children born in the country to CITIZEN parents. This is why Gray, a couple of paragraphs later, refers to the Minor decision that UNANIMOUSLY rejected the 14th amendment as applying to a natural born citizen (Virginia Minor). That IS the context.
One other thing: If you look at how Justice Waite defines NBC in the Minor decision, he uses the term common law. Gray may have assumed that Waite was referring to English common law, hence his "interpreted in the light of" comment. The problem is that Waite did not rely on English common law for the definition of NBC. Instead, it is a near-verbatim citation of Vattel's law of nations. Examine the two definitions side by side. I've highlighted the phrases that match.
MINOR "... all children, born in a country of parents who were its citizens, became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives, or natural-born citizens ..."
VATTEL: "The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens."
You need to read all the words in the decision. Gray is clear.
In Minor v. Happersett, Chief Justice Waite, when construing, in behalf of the court, the very provision of the Fourteenth Amendment now in question, said: "The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that."
Are you comprehending this?? The Constitution does NOT define NBC. Later, Gray says:
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.
The "circumstances" Gray is referring to is the citizenship clause in the 14th amendment, which is IN the Constitution. Read it again. When construing the 14th amendment, the Minor court said that NBC is NOT defined by the Constitution. What Gray calls "citizenship by birth" is a type of citizenship that IS defined by the Constitution, specifically by the 14th amendment. It is dependent on satisfying the subject clause, which is accomplished when the parents have permanent residence and domicil, which he explains here:
It necessarily follows that persons born in China, subjects of the Emperor of China but domiciled in the United States, having been adjudged, in Yick Wo v. Hopkins to be within the jurisdiction of the State within the meaning of the concluding sentence, must be held to be subject to the jurisdiction of the United States within the meaning of the first sentence of this section of the Constitution, and their children "born in the United States" cannot be less "subject to the jurisdiction thereof."
NBCs are not dependent on the 14th amendment for citizenship, which is what the Minor decision said and Gray affirmed, when he said the Supreme Court was:
.. committed to the view that all children born in the United States of citizens or subjects of foreign States were excluded from the operation of the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment ...
The first sentence of the 14th amendment is the citizenship clause. NBCs are EXCLUDED from the operation of this clause."
Absolutely BRILLIANT post! Needs to be posted again. All the Obots and the Freeper non-natural born Citizen cry baby brigade can do is cough and stammer.
Law School damages the brain and destroys common sense. There was a reason the early American settlers banned them from their villages.
Enjoy your world of clouded visions dominated by the idea that winning is everything, right or wrong.
Megan Kelly whom I admire demonstrates the profound damage Law School has done to her intellect, when she defends a stupid president, rather than question how the idiot arrived at the clearly new idea about the meaning of some issue.
I want no part of it.
President = Precedent
Auto spell correct on iPads, I can’t say I love it. helpful and destructive at the same time. Sort of like lawyers in that sense.
It's not out of context.
Before I go any further with your post, are you seriously telling me when you post:Gray affirmed, when he said the Supreme Court was:
.. committed to the view that all children born in the United States of citizens or subjects of foreign States were excluded from the operation of the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment ...You believe it is not out of context and means the same as the original [emphasis added]:
That neither Mr. Justice Miller nor any of the justices who took part in the decision of The Slaughterhouse Cases understood the court to be committed to the view that all children born in the United States of citizens or subjects of foreign States were excluded from the operation of the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment is manifest from a unanimous judgment of the Court, delivered but two years later, while all those judges but Chief Justice Chase were still on the bench...Because if you can't comprehend the difference between (paraphrased) "the Supreme Court was committed to" and "None of the justices understood the Court to be committed to" you can't understand the difference between two opposite positions. In which case either your comprehension skills or intellectual dishonesty disqualifies you from an honest discussion.
I've pinged several others on this thread, so they won't waste their time either if your answer is that you really don't see a difference between the two.
Or can correct his quote taken out of context which reverses the meaning. This is why (some) of the “natural born brigade” make themselves look so foolish. Quotes out of context, repeating comments others have made without checking source material, etc.
I see. So you feel John Adams and Thomas Jefferson had damaged brains and no common sense? And that they were banned from their villages?
When you can prove that in the Constitution, I’ll agree with you.
Nonsense. You've completely ignored the explanation I gave and you're trying to focus on semanatics I've already addressed. You claim there's a difference, yet you don't say what the difference is or how it affects the context. I'll explain this again. Justice Miller did NOT include NBCs in the original slaughterhouse decision. This is why Gray is bringing it up and attributing this point to the Minor decision. While you're bolding sentences, pay attention to this part bolded below:
That neither Mr. Justice Miller nor any of the justices who took part in the decision of The Slaughterhouse Cases understood the court to be committed to the view that all children born in the United States of citizens or subjects of foreign States were excluded from the operation of the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment is manifest from a unanimous judgment of the Court, delivered but two years later, while all those judges but Chief Justice Chase were still on the bench...
The UNANIMOUS judgment from two years later is the Minor decision which exclusively defines NBC (from the Constitution) as "all children born in the country to parents who were its citizens." Justice Waite used this definition to reject Virginia Minor's claim of being a 14th amendment citizen. That's why Gray says Miller did not understand that the court was committed to the view that NBCs are ALSO excluded from the citizenship clause in the 14th amendment. Miller did not mention NBCs as being excluded from the 14th, but the Supreme Court did so unanimously two years later.
Justice Gray AFFIRMS the Minor definition of NBC and follows it as precedence because it bars him from declaring WKA to be a natural born citizen. Instead, Gray resorts to English Common Law to give teeth to the 14th amendment to establish what he calls "citizenship by birth." That citizenship by birth is NOT natural born citizenship. It is a type of citizenship that is defined by the Constitution per the 14th amendment AND it is controlled by the subject clause, which Gray said hinged on the parents having permanent residence and domicil. Therefore, under these two decisions, Obama is neither an NBC nor a 14th amendment citizen ... even IF he could legally prove he was born in the United States.
Limbaugh implodes?
Sad!
You can keep trying to dismiss that you took the quote out of context and omitted the words that reversed the meaning, but that’s what you did.
Primer version:
A. Mom said “go play in the lake.”
B. Mom said “I don’t agree you should go play in the lake.”
Can you see the difference between the two?
If you want to have anything you say looked at seriously, acknowledge your error.
The problem is, professor, that the omitted words do NOT reverse the meaning of anything. You're example does not match what was quoted from the decision. I'll fix it and then let's see how honest you are.
A. "your parents agreed to let you play in the lake ..."
B. "Your Mom, who originally decided to only let smart kids play in the lake, didn't understand that she and your father would agree to let you play in the lake too, as is manifest from a contract they signed two years after her original decision."
You said "Gray affirmed, when he said the Supreme Court was:" .. committed to the view ..."Except that Gray said the opposite, not that the Supreme Court was committed to the view, but rather
neither Mr. Justice Miller nor any of the justices who took part in the decision of The Slaughterhouse Cases understood the court to be committedIf you can't see the difference, I'll break it down for you:
Get the difference? Exact opposites.
You can't be serious.
As serious as a 50 cal.
Nonsense. All you're doing now is being contrary and desperately trying to come up with more denial based on distorted semantics.
Except that Gray said the opposite, not that the Supreme Court was committed to the view, but rather
What you quoted does NOT say the opposite of the court being committed to the view that NBCs are excluded from the citizenship clause of the 14th amendment. All he's saying is that the issue wasn't as fully explored in the Slaughterhouse Cases. Slaughterhouse was a split decision, but the Minor decision was unanimous in rejecting the 14th amendment, saying it did NOT confer citizenship on NBCs. Sorry, but you're trying to read into this statment something that just isn't being said. The full context matters, because Grays says the court was committed to this interpretion, he then gives the passage where NBC is defined and then he affirms the conclusion of the Minor decision:
The decision in that case was that a woman born of citizen parents within the United States was a citizen of the United States, ....
Read it closely. Both jus soli and jus sanguinis criteria are cited in establishing Virginia Minor's citizenship. Her 14th amendment argument was categorically rejected. Wong Kim Ark could NOT be declared a citizen on this same basis because he was NOT a natural born citizen. Gray, who never mentions the phrase natural born citizen from this point forward in his decision, uses a different term and a different interpretation of the subject clause that is dependent on residence and domicil in order to declare Wong to be a citizen.
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