Birthright Citizenship -- A Fundamental Misunderstanding of the 14th Amendment

Fox News ^ | January 14, 2011 | Hans A. von Spakovsky

[Mr Rogers]

“Stare decisis” does not apply to legislative intent, and the legislative intent is, indeed, beyond doubt. The folks who wrote it SAID what they meant.

[semimojo]

"Stare decisis” does not apply to legislative intent, and the legislative intent is, indeed, beyond doubt. The folks who wrote it SAID what they meant

And many of the other senators who voted on it said what they thought it meant and the President said what he thought it meant and on and on and on.

As with any legislation the legislators had diverse opinions. We lost the Obamacare exchange ruling but it wasn't based on the intent of that clause's author, and we would have been rightly freaked if it was.

We use the courts to resolve these disputes and they've done so with full knowledge of the legislative record. Let's stop tilting at windmills.

[Mr Rogers]

” Let’s stop tilting at windmills. “

Let’s not. If you choose to worship a decision and think it is final, you can. I think stupid decisions which IGNORE the original intent from those who passed it in favor of made up meanings imposed decades later to push an agenda SHOULD be overturned.

If the left accepted conservative victories, I might be willing to listen to you. But when they lose, they fight and try again the next year. But when conservatives lose, we are supposed to accept it as final and be happy. That is why the courts have been one-way rachets, only moving in the liberal direction. You can accept that if you wish, but I’m not alone on this forum in saying to hell with that!

“We lost the Obamacare exchange ruling but it wasn’t based on the intent of that clause’s author...”

No, it was based on a twisted ruling that refused to accept what the law actually said, AND its intent. Why should we ignore the intent of the folks who wrote and ratified something, but accept the intent of the dishonest frauds who call themselves judges? What is the basis of our government - the consent of the governed, or the will of the unelected?

[Democratic-Republican]

"We use the courts to resolve these disputes and they've done so with full knowledge of the legislative record. Let's stop tilting at windmills."

Man, some of these arguments. It's like a philosophical blender, add John Marshall, "Marbury", a tall cup of Nietzsche, and hit purée.

They're co-equal branches of government by design, yet the Courts have literally elevated themselves to judicial oligarchs and have even acquired groupie cheerleaders to argue their case. Their jurisdiction now includes not just the defined court systems but even the existing English dictionaries.

Next thing we'll hear is that the 13th Amendment was miswritten and needs to be reinterpreted to enslave Chinese and Canadians, but leave Negroes and Hispanics alone. Anything is possible you know.

In this twilight zone there are no truths, even truths spelled out in plain English. Truth does not exist, just interpretations. Ironically though, precedent indeed exists. Falsehoods and errors can become established precedent but not truths. In such a world the game of 'telephone' is king and mistakes and misinterpretations can run unchecked, compounding themselves like dividend reinvestment until at the end of the tale we have ... something else entirely.

The danger of all this should be obvious to everyone. Heck, it lives all around us right now. Roe v Wade, Gay Marriage, and yes, anchor babies. A nation can be overwhelmed by invasion and it's all Constitutional. Who knew that Reagan could have ensured permanent Republican electoral superiority by inviting in the entire citizenry of the subjugated eastern bloc, plus Cuba, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and many others. Damn, why didn't we think of this? Thank God the USA isn't located next door to India, we would have a real mess then. The Constitution *is* a suicide pact after all.

I wonder just how far the Court Worshiping Suicide Pact'ers can stretch reality ...

What if FDR had gotten his court packing legislation through Congress? Could that Court decide if it is Constitutional? Could they reinterpret what the authors meant? Could they rule on their own Constitutionality?

What if we ratify an Amendment that says the Supreme Court must use original intent to the very letter of the law. Can that Court reinterpret that Amendment? Can a lower court rule it unconstitutional and the Supreme Court refuse to hear the appeal? Can the Court even rule on the Constitutionality of an Amendment? ( Of course they cannot ).

Hey, here's a twist. What if we ratify an Amendment that says they cannot rule on a Law's Constitutionality? Can they rule on its Constitutionality? ;-)

Kirk employs the classic Star Trek logic bomb to confound the enemy.

In all seriousness though, what is really being argued here is that the Court lives in a position above co-equality, which of course cannot be allowed. It is acting as a 9-member super-legislature which is really the literal definition of oligarchy. The entire purpose of the Revolution and Declaration and Constitution and The Federalist Papers is usurped and defeated. The anchor baby advocates are by accident or by design engaging in a coup, and their grade for eternal vigilance is ... Fail.

The final net effect of this perversion is to turn the power structure upside down. The Supremes are highest, the Executive and Legislative, then the States and then finally the lowly people. It is completely reversed from the reality that the Founders gave us. Power flows from ...

[ God ] --> People ==> States ==> FedGov ( co-equal Legislative/Executive/Judicial )

This is what must be restored at all costs.

[semimojo]

I think stupid decisions which IGNORE the original intent from those who passed it in favor of made up meanings imposed decades later to push an agenda SHOULD be overturned

Here's my problem. At the time the 14th was drafted and debated there really wasn't illegal immigration to the US. There had been various statutes setting the waiting period for naturalization, but pretty much anyone who made it here was here legally, although they may have had issues becoming naturalized. The debate was mostly about slaves and Indians.

Trying to divine how the legislators and ratifiers would have felt about illegal immigrants, a class of persons that didn't yet exist, is a fools errand.

So we're left with what the amendment says. I argue that we should accept the fact that the amendment may have had unintended consequences and that if the authors were drafting it today it may look very different, but here we are.

I admit that it will be a hard slog to get this changed via amendment, but I think it's a dangerous mistake to try to get the outcome we want by concocting a twisted definition of the word 'jurisdiction'.

[semimojo]

They're co-equal branches of government by design, yet the Courts have literally elevated themselves to judicial oligarchs and have even acquired groupie cheerleaders to argue their case.

I'm not advocating judicial supremacy, just stating the obvious.

How do we resolve constitutional conflicts without elevating one of the branches to the position of tie-breaker? Plebiscite?

[Democratic-Republican]

"Trying to divine how the legislators and ratifiers would have felt about illegal immigrants, a class of persons that didn't yet exist, is a fools errand."

That's a new one. You are almost channeling the thoughts of a Burger Court Justice and many subsequent fools in robes. That very fool's errand is what they in fact perfected. However, implicit in that comment is your agreement that retrofitting a current issue into a clearly defined and understood historical event is an honorable strategy in the first place. It illustrates the modern liberal who looks at the Constitution, rubs their hands together and says "okay, what can we use this section for, what can we do with that sentence, how can we avoid that one, and fix this one.". The Constitution is an etch-a-sketch. Of course people who want this would be freaking out if the terms of their employment contract, lease, or mortgage, or any of a million other real-life things were reinterpreted on the fly by their landlord, banker or other people with their agenda. Yet here we have the single most important contract ever written and we are expected to let it become stealthily modified before our eyes.

"So we're left with what the amendment says. I argue that we should accept the fact that the amendment may have had unintended consequences and that if the authors were drafting it today it may look very different, but here we are."

Wait, what? If the authors were writing Amendments today to free the slaves, acknowledge them as citizens, and guaranteeing their right to vote, you think they should scribble in anchor babies? Nevermind the fact that it was the conclusion to the bloodiest war we ever saw. To say the black right to vote and indeed even be counted as a whole citizen was hard fought is an understatement. How cavalierly the anchor-baby advocates are in appropriating this mechanism for their own personal agenda. It would not look different. Not after *that* Civil War. Most likely anyone that tried to usurp the purpose of such monumental Amendments would be stripped of their citizenship and deported to Timbuktu. More on this immoral theft of the Slavery Amendments later.

"I admit that it will be a hard slog to get this changed via amendment, but I think it's a dangerous mistake to try to get the outcome we want by concocting a twisted definition of the word 'jurisdiction'."

~sigh~ Around in circles and you haven't got a single thing right yet, nor even the smallest understanding. By now you know full well that 'jurisdiction' is NOT geographical, it is plain English. If it was meant to be geographical they would have said so. Geography is mentioned when necessary ( the infamous Article II Section I: "inhabitants of the United States for at least fourteen years." ). The danger here is in what you believe, that it means something other than natural allegiance. You keep failing on this simple point as if English is your second language.

Furthermore, you keep insisting on using an Amendment to correct *your* own ( and others ) obstinate misunderstanding. Chutzpah defined. By tacitly admitting that you are intentionally shaping the 14th Amendment to accept those that did not yet exist you are corrupting the concept of a limited government with well-defined powers - the entire point of the Constitution itself.

Listen, these are the Slavery Amendments. You must have realized that by now. Yet you have beat around the bush to avoid saying that which all liberals believe: "The Constitution is flexible and means whatever the people of a certain time believe it means. The original intent of the 14th Amendment written to make Negroes into human beings needs to be stolen and reinterpreted for other purposes. This is what I believe is a just cause."

Just be honest and stop the slip and fall lawyering. You are Johnny Cochran and Robert Kardashian doing whatever it takes to free a murderer. Stop saying to FReepers that they don't know what the Constitution means, just admit you are advocating for the flexibility of the Constitution ( and its inevitable demise ). This document could no longer be considered a Constitution though, nor the nation a Republic. It would be a 9-member Oligarchy, a "government" worse than The King it replaced ( at least he had a Parliament ).

You know the truth, and that truth is that it is incumbent on YOU to get an Amendment through the Congress and the States and the People that says anchor babies are just peachy, mmmkay. Good luck with that. It is so obscene an idea that no-one else does it, even those allegedly enlightened and liberal nations like France and the UK and Sweden and ... Mexico. Reversing that plain truth is evil and immoral since it involves grand-theft of the Slavery Amendments.

The limited government created by the Constitution, with all its intentional obstructions and checks and balances was a hard enough sell as it was, clearly you haven't read any Federalist Paper or associated history, the mere idea of a strong FedGov, let alone a judicial oligarchy was laughable and would have landed the proponent in a lunatic asylum.

People who want to bend the Constitution are the enemy. The Revolution was a long, hard fought, and bloody slog. The post-war period was a nightmare of inflation and economic collapse. The war to get the Constitution was also long fought. And every day since has seen enemies setting its gaze upon overturning it. The enemy is trying to co-opt the Constitution without firing a shot in anger no less. Swoop in while they are weak and vulnerable and stupid. There are similarities here to Mao swooping in after Japan was defeated while weak advocates like Truman and Marshall were walking point. Eternal Vigilance is truly the price of Liberty.

[Democratic-Republican]

This anchor baby madness has created an opportunity I think. Consider the followng ...

MUST-SEE: Black Woman Rips Council over Illegal Aliens

... When something like this can happen where average citizens are getting angry and demonstrating such strength, it means we have an opening and we should exploit this issue to the maximum extent. I propose that (R)epublicans, not (R)epublicrats attempt to break the obscene stranglehold on black Americans by pointing out that

"... The racist (D)emocrat party which fought for their slavery and segregation and invented the Ku Klux Klan and Jim Crow are at it again by trying to steal the Anti-Slavery Amendments to allow anchor babies to overwhelm taxpayers and let Illegal Aliens take their jobs. Every single Alien allowed to vote erases one from a black American, a repeat of the (D)emocrat strategy of blocking their votes from long before, then after the Civil War in 1865, the 15th Amendment in 1870, and all the way through to 1965. This is what (D)emocrats always do."

Call this ... #BlackVotesMatter

Also ... #NoMoreAnchorBabies

Also ... #RacistDemocrats

Also ... #TimeToComeHome

I suspect only Trump has the stones to touch this. Certainly no (R)epublicrat like Rubio, Graham, Christie, and Bushey. The (D)ummycrats could literally be destroyed if done right. Suggestions? Ideas? What can we do to get this moving?

[semimojo]

However, implicit in that comment is your agreement that retrofitting a current issue into a clearly defined and understood historical event is an honorable strategy in the first place.

No. We're trying to deal with a current situation based on a fixed text drafted at the time that the current situation didn't exist. Not a complicated concept.

The Constitution says that children born here subject to our jurisdiction are citizens. We can accept that and try to change it, come up with some wacky definition of 'jurisdiction' that the courts will buy, or as the knucklehead professor on Levin's show proposed pass legislation that says illegal aliens aren't subject to US jurisdiction. Think about that. We've reached the point where we're proposing illegals aren't subject to our jurisdiction.

You know the truth, and that truth is that it is incumbent on YOU to get an Amendment through the Congress and the States and the People that says anchor babies are just peachy, mmmkay.

Got it. Plain language, every court ruling and over 120 years of stare decisis supports my position yet it's incumbent on me to pass a new amendment.

Whatever gets you through the night.

[Democratic-Republican]

">> However, implicit in that comment is your agreement that retrofitting a current issue into a clearly defined and understood historical event is an honorable strategy in the first place.

No. We're trying to deal with a current situation based on a fixed text drafted at the time that the current situation didn't exist. Not a complicated concept.

The Constitution says that children born here subject to our jurisdiction are citizens. We can accept that and try to change it, come up with some wacky definition of 'jurisdiction' that the courts will buy, or as the knucklehead professor on Levin's show proposed pass legislation that says illegal aliens aren't subject to US jurisdiction. Think about that. We've reached the point where we're proposing illegals aren't subject to our jurisdiction."

Immune to FACTS, the Anchor Baby advocates continue
to spout nonsense until they fall to bloody pieces!

You are just trolling now and it is clear that nothing is ever going to penetrate. This "situation" you speak of is a clumsy euphemism for an Invasion, likely as large as the population of Canada and equal to the 35th largest country total in the world, and greater than 1,700 Army divisions, and twice the size of *all* the people that served in the USA World War II combined armed forces.

I guess "Drafted at the time" is a euphemism for that little Civil War thingie where nearly a million souls were called home and in the aftermath the newly freed, and already freed slaves, and their children were made whole by carefully written specific language. If you cannot realize the immorality of stealing these articles for your own agenda then Lord have mercy on you. It is the single most traumatic event in our national lifetime, and I cannot think of anything more insidious than stepping on their graves. Good luck to you once this connection is made and people figure out just what it is that you advocate.

"Jurisdiction" has been thoroughly defined here and everywhere, for centuries, enough even for the youngest skull full of mush to understand. For the last time, since the Illegal Alien Invaders are NOT subject to our jurisdiction in the first place ( they are foreigners ) they and their offspring cannot be captured and impressed by the 14th Amendment. We simply cannot claim them as citizens no more than we can claim a Martian that lands in Washington D.C. and pops out a little baby Martian. It does not apply to them and it is absurd to think it should, and it is positively evil to corrupt existing law to make it so.

Use your logic. If a pregnant Mexican crosses the border and accidently had her baby and then they ran back because SHE WANTED TO STAY A MEXICAN, then can we go after that baby? Can we take it since it is one of our own? If your pregnant wife delivered while visiting France or Mexico, what would that child be? Should they misinterpret one of their own laws to claim that child as a citizen? In order for geographic citizen-at-birth anchor babies to ever be a viable system, then all countries would need identical laws. Guess who is the only country that actually allows this? USA, despite the Amendment that clearly was intended to NOT allow it.

The clear words of the author are not enough to penetrate, nor is the disgusting fact that you want to hijack and steal the purpose of the Slavery Amendments enough to make you understand. The only answer is that you are trolling. No-one can be this thick by accident. You are either a (D)ummy troll or a (R)epublicrat shill. Since they are the same thing these days it is irrelevant. Even though the country is at stake neither of these groups gives a crap. That is the lesson here. The uniparty in action, both out-of-the-closet domestic enemies of the country.

">> You know the truth, and that truth is that it is incumbent on YOU to get an Amendment through the Congress and the States and the People that says anchor babies are just peachy, mmmkay."

Got it. Plain language, every court ruling and over 120 years of stare decisis supports my position yet it's incumbent on me to pass a new amendment.

Whatever gets you through the night.

No you don't got it, not even in the slightest. There are no cases that question the author of the 14th Amendment because they would be absurd on their face. There have only been dodges and glancing references. List your precedents in a bullet list and then highlight the reference to the Slavery Amendments as incorporating Illegal Aliens. People are looking even as we speak to locate when and where this corruption began. Levin said as much, and you do yourself no favor by slamming Erler LOL! The Supreme Court never ruled on this. It is possible they might, and you might even squeak out a 5-4 political decision and you are welcome to hang your hat on that. But *if* you are honest you must admit that it is no more valid than Roe and many other corrupt decisions. However, today there is no such decision.

Cry and wail and troll if you want to, but the fact is that you are attempting to rationalize the past misuse of a specific Amendment, and it's all you got. But be aware you are currently already living in a practically lawless time, where all the checks and balances are falling to the wayside, e.g., even though the 21st repealed the 18th Prohibition, the entire Government apparatus just ignored that entire history and reimplemented Prohibition again for drugs and a lot of other things, this time with no Amendment.

Allowing the government to be unrestrained by the Constitution is a failure of our duty, period. Of course you need an Amendment to capture the citizenship of Anchor Babies. The fact that an Amendment was required to capture the citizenship of black Americans some who were here for almost as long as the Europeans should be your first clue. You strategy of stealing the Slavery Amendments rather than writing a new specific one is the same as FedGov skipping writing a new one for modern Prohibition. You want to use existing text as a launchpad for future pet projects.

Just say you despise Strict Constructionism and well-defined limited Government. Admit you want a Constitutional etch-a-sketch. Admit that the Government should be unrestrained and allowed to do its thing. Admit that you believe the Founders were completely wrong about everything. At least be honest with yourself and everyone here. But stop trying to say up is down!