Posted on 01/14/2016 8:19:48 AM PST by SeekAndFind
If you thought some in the conservative media lost their minds over President Obama's birth certificate, you were right. But the current brouhaha over Ted Cruz's place of birth -- in which Donald Trump reprises his role as chief instigator -- might be even more compelling, in its own way, because of the civil war it has sparked on the right side of the press.
Witness this week's heated exchange on MSNBC (of all places) between conservative provocateur Ann Coulter and Republican media strategist Liz Mair. Coulter insisted that Cruz -- born in Canada but a U.S. citizen from the moment he left the womb, thanks to his mother's citizenship -- is not eligible to be president. Mair asserted with equal force that Cruz is eligible and at one point charged that Coulter is "in no way conservative." Card revoked!
(Coulter is an ardent supporter of Trump, the GOP presidential front-runner; Mair heads the anti-Trump super PAC Make America Awesome.)
And Coulter -- for those keeping score -- has changed her position on this subject. That's awfully convenient, since no one would stand to gain more from Cruz's disqualification than Coulter's favorite candidate.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
The details, who knows? But the overarching themes of trying to be accepted by the elites, yes. Why do you think he left Fordham for Penn? Why Fordham in the first place? Because he couldn’t get into Penn! But he kept trying! It’s Ivy League! And he’s rather boastful of it. But he doesn’t tell you, he got into Wharton before it was the prestigious institution it is today. He desires the prestige of Ivy League, but doesn’t tell you, Penn is cinsidered a “junior” Ivy, the school you go to if you don’t get into Harvard, Princeton, Yale, or Brown. Elites know this sort of thing.
What do you think the 757 is about, or the constant bragging about his wealth (which is a fraction of the wealth of really rich people)? People who are really rich are aware of the difference and don’t feel the need to compensate with flash and the bragging and the “I’ve got the biggest this,” and “I’ve got the biggest that.”
What do you think the TV show was about, the adulation of millions. This presidency thing is the best gig in the world! Lots more attention! Better than any TV show.
What do you think is going on with the multiple wives, always younger than him, with the bragging about his exploits with many of the “top women” in the world? Who talks like that ?!? He’s a wannabe. He was born to money, made a bit more, and now, he’s looking to validate his life with the ultimate adulation of tens of millions. Melania was in her 20s, and he in his 50s when they got 5ogether. Makes me think of bill and monica. Yech.
The dude’s got problems. Being president isn’t going to fill that hole in his heart. The same hole that prevents him from seeking forgiveness.
> How is it reasonable to require a minor ( Ted Cruz was one ) to fulfill residency requirements when his parents were overseas?
Because he had until he was 23
You’re welcome. I just calls ‘em, like I sees ‘em...
EDIT TO ADD: Rogers v. Bellei
I happen to disagree with the SCOTUS on their INTERPRETATION of their understanding of the term “natural born” vs “naturalized” at birth.
Let’s remember one thing -— The SCOTUS is NOT always right in their decision.
From Roe vs Wade to the Dredd Scott decision to the most recent Obamacare decision to even the gay marriage decision, the SCOTUS can be wrong.
Therefore, I QUESTION their decision in the Rogers vs Bellie case. They referred to a congressional act without even asking whether or not the circumstances of a person’s birth meet the “natural born” requirement.
I prefer to go BACK to the original intent of the framers rather than the more recent case.
All the sources routinely used to interpret the Constitution confirm that the phrase “natural born Citizen†has a specific meaning: namely, someone who was a U.S. citizen at birth with no need to go through a naturalization proceeding at some later time.
And Congress has made equally clear from the time of the framing of the Constitution to the current day that, subject to certain residency requirements on the parents, someone born to a U.S. citizen parent generally becomes a U.S. citizen without regard to whether the birth takes place in Canada, the Canal Zone, or the continental United States.
While some constitutional issues are truly difficult, with framing-era sources either nonexistent or contradictory, here, the relevant materials clearly indicate that a “natural born Citizen” means a citizen from birth with no need to go through naturalization proceedings.
We can presume the term “natural” was not relating to the method of birthing, but rather, birth as RELATES TO CITIZENSHIP.
It’s also important that the text itself does not contain words, such as “native born” citizen, which might have reflected a geographic limitation.
Similarly, there are no words delineating any further limitations, such as requiring that both parents be citizens at the time of birth or excluding those with dual citizenship; such wording could have been inserted, and the LACK OF SUCH WORDS OF LIMITATION IS IMPORTANT.
All we know from the text itself is that to be President one must be a citizen by virtue of birth, not some other method of obtaining citizenship. There is no other reasonable explanation that relies solely on the text, not outside sources.
So, Is there any indication that the Framers meant anything other than what the plain text suggests, that a “natural born Citizen” is someone who acquires citizenship by virtue of birth? No, there is no such evidence.
There is no record of the Framers having explained what was meant by “natural born Citizen.”
Nothing in the history of the debate or drafting sheds light on the subject.
As an alternative to an explicit explanation by the Framers, perhaps “natural born Citizen†was a commonly understood term in the newly independent United States at the time of drafting and ratification of the Constitution, such that they felt no need for explanation. If so, that might shed light on the meaning.
There is no evidence to suggest that the term was in common usage at the time, but there is some evidence that “natural born Citizen” related to citizenship by birth, consistent with the plain text, and did not have some complicated British historical meaning.
What is clear from all the analyses of many legal scholars is that we have no demonstrable basis on which to conclude a specific meaning to the term based on common usage.
In the absence of clear terminology, explanation or common usage, it is appropriate to look to British common law in trying to understand terms in the Constitution. It is presumed that the Framers were familiar with and may have borrowed terminology.
The term “natural born Citizen,” however, was not used in British law at the time. There was a term called “natural born Subject,” but that was a function of both common law and statutory law.
The combination of common law and statutory law supported being a “natural born Subject” based on the location of birth or parentage, although the usage wasn’t entirely consistent across the British Empire, or necessarily adopted in colonies that became the United States. (It likely is for that reason that the attorneys challenging Obama’s eligibility had no choice but to insist that “natural born Subject” could not be the basis for understanding “natural born Citizen”.
One common phrasing of objections to Rubio, Jindal and Cruz being deemed “natural born Citizens” is that, regardless of where they were born, both parents would have had to be citizens.
That argument is devoid of almost any support. The text does not say so. There is no demonstrable evidence that is what the Framer’s intended, or that’s how the term was commonly understood at the time of drafting.
Such a requirement also is not found in the almost contemporaneous Naturalization Act of 1790, or even in British law which was confused and changed over time, but typically followed the father’s lineage for children born abroad.
The treatise by Emmerich de Vattel (1758), frequently is invoked by some FReepers arguing against natural born Citizenship for Rubio, Jindal and Cruz because the term “natural born Citzen” as used by Vattel allegedly requires that the person be “born in the country of parents who are citizens.”
The problem with that argument, however, is that the English translation of the 1758 edition did not use the term “natural born Citizen.”
That term did not appear until the 1797 edition, a decade after the Constitution was ratified.
In fact, Two of the leading attorneys challenging Obama’s eligibility admitted that the term was not in the edition available in 1787, and they make the illogical bootstrap argument that the later change in the Vattel verbiage somehow applies retroactively.
Additionally, Vattel did not purport to explain the meaning of the term in the context of British law or the common understanding in the British American colonies or newly formed United States. It is, at best, highly speculative to assert that the Framers looked to Vattel for the definition of “natural born Citizen.”
Also, There is Nothing Forbidding “Dual Citizens”
To avoid repetition, each of the arguments set forth as to alleged requirement that both parents be citizens applies as well to the argument that a candidate is excluded if a dual citizen.
While one can develop theories of why that might have been a concern, there is nothing in the text, demonstrable intent and common understanding, or British history (assuming it even was clear and applied) which would make such a condition disqualifying.
Therefore, This is a very confusing area as to which scholars acting in good faith disagree, although there is a clear weight of authority. But those disagreements, in a sense, are the solution.
A reasonable reading of the plain text of the Constitution ( AND I DON’T NECESSARILY GRANT THE SCOTUS THE RIGHT TO INTERPRET IT FOR ME BECAUSE THEIR TRACK RECORD IS NOT ALWAYS PERFECT) supports Rubio, Jindal and Cruz being “natural born Citizen[s]” because they were CITIZENS BY BIRTH. PERIOD.
There is no clear, demonstrable intent otherwise from the Framers or clear, commonly understood use of the term to the contrary at the time of drafting the Constitution.
The British term “natural born Subject” as well as concepts of “natural law” were not clearly relied upon by the Framers, and are in themselves not clearly contradictory to this plain reading of the text.
The burden should be on those challenging otherwise eligible candidates to demonstrate through clear and convincing historical evidence and legal argument why such persons should be disqualified. That has not happened so far, and if two hundred years of scholarship is any indication, it never will happen.
The ultimate arbiter on the issue likely is to be voters, not Supreme Court Justices.
It is for these reasons that I believe Marco Rubio, Bobby Jindal and Ted Cruz are eligible to be President.
The SCOTUS in Rogers vs Bellei be damned. The constitution be lifted up.
RE: No. I have got it
You can say it all you want, you might have gotten it only if I accept the premise that the Supreme Court got it right in Rogers vs. Bellei.
I don’t think they did. Just as Blackmun, Roberts and Kennedy did not in their own respective decisions.
I didn't ask if they got it right. I asked what label they attached.
You are either innocently ignorant, or willfully misleading.
For a person who’s never traveled in Trump’s inner circle, been a close friend or family member, etc., you certainly believe you’ve got him all figured out. People who actually do know him give a radically different account. You may discover one day that your grasp of this person is not as transcendently accurate as you currently believe.
RE: I didn’t ask if they got it right. I asked what label they attached.
And if I disagree with the label they attached? What then?
Do I have to for instance. agree with the label Justice Kennedy attached to “marriage” as that including same-sex people?
Do I have to agree with the label attached by Justice Roberts regarding the Affordable Care Act AS WRITTEN?
RE: You are either innocently ignorant, or willfully misleading
I am USING MY HEAD and THINKING FOR MYSELF. I don’t let some guy in a black robe do my thinking for me. I apply my own reasoning.
The original intent of the framers lies paramount, not the SCOTUS, and not especially the SCOTUS that gave us Roe vs Wade and all other atrocities since.
It ain't going anywhere though because Trump really wants to help settle this, and incidentally keep the issue under the spotlight.
Good.
Fine with me because I seriously believe that Cruz is not a NBC and his Presidential campaign is a genuine assault on our Constitution..
-- I am USING MY HEAD and THINKING FOR MYSELF. --
I understand. I was trying to steer a tight discussion to figure out if you are in the innocently ignorant or willfully misleading group. Based on the number of mistakes you made in your analysis of the case (you got the case right, just didn't really apply it to Cruz - you gave the citizenship stripping part attention, and that part is irrelevant to the Cruz situation), and what appears to be a good faith an earnest (and civil) answer, I think it's innocent error.
So long. No hard feelings.
There are citizens who are natural born.
There are/were citizens who were exempted from the NBC requirement if they were alive at the time of the adoption of the Constitution.
There are naturalized citizens.
Exactly what was the distinction between those citizens who were exempted and those who were ‘natural born citizens?’
Few will address that when their opinion is agenda driven.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/quid%20pro%20quo and note the reference to something for something. Trumps political donations need to be investigated, if he donated to some politician and later got a favorable ruling, decision, or law passed, oh-oh! Should we coin the term now, Bribery-Gate?
Maybe.
Consider that, before we started messing with His Plan, our Heavenly Father's rule originally was that it takes two to make one, right?
Therefore, from that natural law of our Creator, it naturally follows that it takes two citizens to make a "natural born" citizen, that is, citizenship as would be determined solely by the law of nature, by parents and birth soil alone, agreed?
This would be so obvious that no lawyers would be needed to explain it. Even the least educated and the poorest of the poor would understand something so basic.
Our Founding Fathers would have considered it to be a "self-evident" truth, once upon a time, in that America now far, far away.
A child born here to citizens can only be a citizen of here. That's it, there are no other options, right?
By nature, and by any law of citizenship you can name, a child born in country, to citizens of that country, is a citizen of that country and no other place on the planet.
That is as original and as it gets, and as self-evident as it gets, so it's likely the FFs didn't see the need to define something so obvious. What's the point?
They weren't writing a dictionary, but fortunately they eventually did realize they needed to define our most basic rights.
Good thing! And people still find loop holes in them in order to limit them and over turn them!
The FFs' descriptive term for a citizen born here to citizens was a "natural born" citizen.
Not a native born citizen, not a born citizen nor a naturalized citizen. A Natural Born Citizen.
AND...the FFs required a NBC for only one position: the single most powerful person in the single most powerful position in their new Republic. Think about it...
Makes sense to me. I see it as self-evident. Verifiable, too.
***Here's a fun test: Be like a lawyer and switch sides to the above point of view, then argue from that side and see how convincing you are.
Can you present the positive?
The Dems will never let go of it.
NY times, Wash Post, LA Times etc will all pile on.
Get it cleared up now.
Declaratory Judgement as has been mentioned in other links.
None of which exist any longer, so there is no third category.
"Exactly what was the distinction between those citizens who were exempted and those who were 'natural born citizens?'"
"Few will address that when their opinion is agenda driven."
It's been addressed plenty of times. It's obvious. Americans who were alive at the time of adoption of the Constitution became citizens of the US when the US was founded. They weren't naturalized, but they weren't born US citizens either. When they were born there was no US. That's all it means. At the moment of adoption there were no "natural born citizens", but the next baby born in the US became one.
The passage is there so that George Washington and Thomas Jefferson and the other people of that generation weren't excluded from being President by the natural born clause.
Before any naturalization acts there were citizens and natural born citizens. How could that be?
Persons joined together and formed a new nation, the United States. These persons became citizens of this new nation. Their posterity became the first natural born citizens of the United States. When the Constitution was adopted citizens and natural born citizens were both eligible provided they met the other requirements of age and residency, at that time no natural born citizen could meet the age requirements. With the passage of time the original citizens died leaving only their posterity - the natural born citizens - eligible. These persons required no statute, they required no grant or dealienage
> “On what grounds?!?”
Seeking Declaratory Relief.
> “... so stop with the circular nonsense and insults”
Circular nonsense?
Is that how you respond when you post trash hearsay and are called on it?
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