Posted on 03/23/2015 8:36:35 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Now that Ted Cruz is officially in the Presidential race, you may rest assured that some of the same people who considered it an insult of titanic proportions to even ask to see President Obama’s birth certificate will be kicking off a similar conversation regarding the Texas Senator. Because, you know… he’s a gosh darn foreigner. For the few of you who may have missed it, Cruz was born in Canada. His father was from Cuba but his mother was a US citizen. As our colleague Guy Benson explained over a year ago, this one isn’t even a question.
For the uninitiated, the Texas Senator and conservative stalwart was born in Calgary, Canada — prompting some to insist that he’s not a “natural born citizen” and is therefore ineligible for the presidency. But there are only two types of citizens under the law: Natural born Americans (from birth), and naturalized Americans, who undergo the legal process of becoming a US citizen. Cruz never experienced the latter proceedings because he didn’t need to; his mother was born and raised in Delaware, rendering Cruz an American citizen from the moment of his birth abroad. Meanwhile, Cruz hasn’t even indicated if he has any designs to pursue a White House run — he’s got his hands full in the United States Senate. National Review has more on this preposterous “debate:”
Legal scholars are firm about Cruz’s eligibility. “Of course he’s eligible,” Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz tells National Review Online. “He’s a natural-born, not a naturalized, citizen.” Eugene Volokh, a professor at the UCLA School of Law and longtime friend of Cruz, agrees, saying the senator was “a citizen at birth, and thus a natural-born citizen — as opposed to a naturalized citizen, which I understand to mean someone who becomes a citizen after birth.” Federal law extends citizenship beyond those granted it by the 14th Amendment: It confers the privilege on all those born outside of the United States whose parents are both citizens, provided one of them has been “physically present” in the United States for any period of time, as well as all those born outside of the United States to at least one citizen parent who, after the age of 14, has resided in the United States for at least five years. Cruz’s mother, who was born and raised in Delaware, meets the latter requirement, so Cruz himself is undoubtedly an American citizen.
This was the same conversation that took place in 2007 and 2008 regarding John McCain. (McCain was born in Panama.) At the time, both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama signed on to a simple resolution (along with the rest of the Senate) declaring that Senator McCain was “a natural born citizen” and eligible for the presidency. Given the current, rather toxic climate inside the beltway, I have to wonder if Ted Cruz will be offered the same consideration?
Perhaps a better question, though we’ve kicked this one around here before, is whether or not the Supreme Court will ever rule on this definition once and for all so we can just be done with it. True, we have some federal laws on the books which cover such things and they are frequently referenced when these discussions come up. And there’s absolutely nothing to indicate that this interpretation is any way unconstitutional.
And why would it be? The prevailing wisdom seems to at least have the benefit of sounding reasonable to the layman. Going back to the writing of the Constitution it was recognized that there are only two types of citizens recognized. You are either a citizen at the time of your birth or you become one later by going through the naturalization process. If we have to pick one of these two classes to be “natural born” it seems a rather easy choice.
But, yet again, that answer won’t be “permanent” (for lack of a better word) without the Supremes weighing in on it. And for that to happen, someone would have to challenge it. And that someone would have to have standing to even bring the challenge. You know… the more I think about it, maybe we should just stick with what we have now.
When we have a sitting president finishing up his second term in office, I would say the issue is dead and the argument done.
'Water under the bridge' is not the procedure for changing the Constitution.
I was one of those trying to educate as to what natural born citizen meant to the founders and why they used that phrase in the Constitution. Most people didn’t seem to care and those who could act refused for reasons unclear to me.
What difference, at this point, does it make?
Actually there were more, like William Blackstone's, but you wouldn't accept that anyway.
RE: ‘Water under the bridge’ is not the procedure for changing the Constitution.
OK, what do we do with all the bills he signed into law as an ineligible president? Let’s start with that first.
And I mean PRACTICALLY... HOW DO YOU DO IT?
Obama’s claim to be a citizen is NOT based on his mother’s citizenship. She was too young to have lived in the U.S. five years. Only after living in the U.S. for five years could she transmit citizenship to “Obama.”
His claim to citizenship depends 100% on the PLACE.
Since the only “Hawaiian Birth Certificate” he has produced is a crudely forged pdf file, there is no evidence that he was born on U.S. soil.
Therefore, “Obama” is an illegal alien.
We are Citizens..... NOT Subjects to a Sovereign.
Natural born is no longer relevant. Barack Hussein has terminated that concept.
Both parties participated in this. Neither McCain or Obama was eligible in 2008. Not one of our elected or judiciary lifted a finger to defend the Constitution.
Bzzzz, incorrect. Thanks for trying.
Please read the first acts of Congress, written by the founders and authors of the Constitution and look for the term “natural born”. That precedent clearly shows that NBC is NOT based EXCLUSIVELY on the LOCATION of birth. Rather, the parentage can be a factor as well. If a person is born abroad to US citizen parents, they are citizens at birth.
Further, SCOTUS has ruled in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898) that parentage is also not the EXCLUSIVE determinate for natural born citizenship. In the ruling, SCOTUS determined that a person born within the jurisdiction of the US, regardless of the citizenship of their parents, is a natural born citizen.
Please stop posting FALSE information. If you don’t like the rulings and precedents, fine, organize people to change the Constitution. I’m sure there are many who would support changes to the current legal status.
do you even read the thing and if so you may be a bubble off
“Precedent” operates in ENGLAND because they have no written Constitution.
This is America. In America, the laws are made by the LEGISLATURE, and Constitutional Amendments are needed to change the Constitution.
NOTHING a President can do or fail to do can establish a “precedent.” The President swears to carry out the laws and preserve the written Constitution.
BTW: In America, there’s no such thing as “a jury of your peers.” That, too, is the rule in ENGLAND. In America, everybody is a peer of everybody else.
Yup. S.A.D-O-S. was too young to confer citizenship to BHO...(that Stanley Ann Dunam-Obola-Soetoro, &c.)
Cruz’s Mother was plenty old and had been a citizen past the age of 18 long enough to easily confer citizenship to Ted.
Right, how can Liberals ask THAT question when we have their ‘boobie prize’ guy in office for going on 8 years?
They made no such ruling. Post the relevant part of the ruling here if you are so certain.
It’s taking a bit for me to sort this out, as Liz is quoting me—as ansel12 aptly notes, only in part—from another thread.
But ansel12, I’m curious, what do you consider to be so “wrong” about my full post?
Subject, citizen. To-may-to, to-mah-to. The intent is the same, and so far as Blackstone is concerned, and James Madison for that matter, it was location of birth and not citizenship of the parents. Now you may not agree with that, and I honestly don't care if you don't, but it does show your claim of a single definition of natural-born citizenship to be incorrect.
Tommoroow will be the past, genius.
The Constitution uses the term “NBC.” Of course, the Constitution does not define the term.
Any person who was a citizen at birth is an NBC. There is nothing in the Constitution, and nothing in any statute, that specifies that this citizenship-at-birth must come about by PLACE of birth and NOT by parental citizenship.
If Congress passes a statue (which they should) eliminating PLACE of birth (i.e., on U.S. soil) as a cause of citizenship, then all NBC’s would be such only on account of parental citizenship.
Why do you think that Liz is using your post to attack Cruz?
She likes your attack and your language.
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