Ankeny is the most often cited Obama eligibility ruling. While it doesn’t ring true to you, it has been persuasive to several judges.
There are other judicial rulings on Obama’s natural born citizenship that don’t cite Ankeny. There just haven’t been any rulings that have concluded that he is not a natural born citizen. I’m pretty sure it will be the same with Senators Cruz & Rubio and Rick Santorum.
The cite doesn't support the claim - and this is acknowledged and disregarded!The Court held that Mr. Wong Kim Ark was a citizen of the United States “at the time of his birth.”14 14 Id. at 705, 18 S. Ct. at 478.
Based upon the language of Article II, Section 1, Clause 4 and the guidance provided by Wong Kim Ark, we conclude that persons born within the borders of the United States are “natural born Citizens” for Article II, Section 1 purposes, regardless of the citizenship of their parents. Just as a person “born within the British dominions [was] a natural-born British subject” at the time of the framing of the U.S. Constitution, so too were those “born in the allegiance of the United States [] natural-born citizens.”15
14. ^ We note the fact that the Court in Wong Kim Ark did not actually pronounce the plaintiff a “natural born Citizen” using the Constitution's Article II language is immaterial. For all but forty-four people in our nation's history (the forty-four Presidents), the dichotomy between who is a natural born citizen and who is a naturalized citizen under the Fourteenth Amendment is irrelevant. The issue addressed in Wong Kim Ark was whether Mr. Wong Kim Ark was a citizen of the United States on the basis that he was born in the United States. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. at 705, 18 S. Ct. at 478.
15. ^ We reiterate that we do not address the question of natural born citizen status for persons who became United States citizens at birth by virtue of being born of United States citizen parents, despite the fact that they were born abroad. That question was not properly presented to this court. Without addressing the question, however, we note that nothing in our opinion today should be understood to hold that being born within the fifty United States is the only way one can receive natural born citizen status.
Pure jabberwocky
I think that the underlying problem is that the claim that Obama was born in Kenya was not gaining acceptance. It was known that his father was Kenyan. So, if it is assumed that he was born in Hawaii, then the only way to attack his qualifications would be to create a new requirement that the father be a citizen.
I think some people underestimate how distraught some people were that Obama had been elected. There were people who could not accept that reality. They would have believed anything that might change the reality of Obama as president. Believing that the father had to be a citizen was not at all difficult for them under the circumstances. I have seen the arguments about Vattel, etc. They are barely rational and certainly not persuasive. It can be seen what the Supreme Court thought about these arguments. Many of them attended the inaugural ceremony and the Chief Justice volunteered to administer the oath of office.
The Cruz candidacy presents a problem for some of the people who convinced themselves that Obama could not have been the real president. I think that if Cruz gets the nomination, the people who thought that Obama was disqualified will in time reconsider the arguments that led them to that corner. For some it will take longer than for others, but in the end, they will all support Cruz if he is the nominee. None of this was ever real to begin with. It is just the way our psychology tends to play tricks on us.
TED CRUZ - 2016!