Here are brief excerpts from four federal court rulings.
U.S. District Court Judge John A. Gibney, Jr.: “It is well settled that those born within the United States are natural born citizens.”— Tisdale v. Obama, U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of Virginia, January 23, 2012.
Barnett, Keyes et. al. v Obama, et. al. Judge David O. Carter, U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, 10/29/09:
The Court observes that the President defeated seven opponents in a grueling campaign for his party’s nomination that lasted more than eighteen months and cost those opponents well over $300 million. Then the President faced a formidable opponent in the general election who received $84 million to conduct his general election campaign against the President. It would appear that ample opportunity existed for discovery of evidence that would support any contention that the President was not eligible for the office he sought. Furthermore, Congress is apparently satisfied that the President is qualified to serve. Congress has not initiated impeachment proceedings, and, in fact, the House of Representatives, in a broad bipartisan manner has rejected the suggestion that the President is not eligible for office. See H.R. Res. 593, 111th Congress. (2009) commemorating, by a vote of 378-0 the 50th anniversary of Hawaii’s statehood and stating “The 44th President of the United States, Barack Obama, was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961.
Rhodes v MacDonald, U.S. District Court Judge Clay D. Land: A spurious claim questioning the presidents constitutional legitimacy may be protected by the First Amendment, but a Courts placement of its imprimatur upon a claim that is so lacking in factual support that it is frivolous would undoubtedly disserve the public interest.
U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Georgia, September 16, 2009.
Taitz v. Obama (Quo Warranto) This is one of several such suits filed by Ms. Taitz in her quixotic attempt to prove that President Obama is not a natural born citizen, as is required by the Constitution. This Court is not willing to go tilting at windmills with her.
Chief U.S. District Court Judge Royce C. Lamberth, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, April 14, 2010
I believe that the Ninth Circuit determined that Keyes, et al. could not proceed because they lacked standing to sue. They would argue that because of that determination, any other findings were unnecessary. In other words, there being no standing to even present a case, there is no occasion for the court to consider its merits of what the plaintiffs would present if they had standing.
Similarly, in the Rhodes case, the court seemed to feel that the plaintiff's relief, if granted, would amount to improper "judicial interference in internal military affairs." Obviously, courts have always felt that these are matters almost always best left to the other branches of government. And, there is the language in footnote 3 in which Judge Land thinks it important that Congress was satisfied that Obama was qualified. That sounds like the court has doubts about whether courts should ever be involved in deciding these issues. I am not sure that that case will help anyone, but if I was trying to disqualify Cruz, I would try avoid Judge Land.
In Taitz v. Obama, Judge Lamberth denied Orly's claims for various reasons. For example, a quo warranto claim must be brought by the Department of Justice. He claimed that she lacked standing to pursue her various claims that Obama was not qualified.
The more I read of these cases, the more I suspect that the federal courts really do not want this task of becoming a screening committee for presidential candidates. When federal courts really want to get involved in something, they find a way to do it. With that in mind, compare the way courts approach these eligibility cases with the way (and the speed with which) the U.S. Supreme Court handled Bush v. Gore. In that case, the U.S. Supreme Court really wanted to do something to shut down another court, the Florida Supreme Court, that the Supreme Court believed was improperly favoring Gore.