“Therefore every person born within the United States, its territories or districts, whether the parents are citizens or aliens, is a natural born citizen in the sense of the Constitution, and entitled to all the rights and privileges appertaining to that capacity. It is an error to suppose, as some (and even so great a mind as Locke) have done, that a child is born a citizen of no country and subject of no government, and that he so continues till the age of discretion, when he is at liberty to put himself under what government he pleases. How far the adult possesses this power will hereafter be considered, but surely it would be unjust both to the state and to the infant, to withhold the quality of the citizen until those years of discretion were attained. Under our Constitution the question is settled by its express language, and when we are informed that, excepting those who were citizens, (however the capacity was acquired,) at the time the Constitution was adopted, no person is eligible to the office of president unless he is a natural born citizen, the principle that the place of birth creates the relative quality is established as to us.“
And of course Madison said something very similar.
“It is an established maxim that birth is a criterion of allegiance. Birth however derives its force sometimes from place and sometimes from parentage, but in general place is the most certain criterion; it is what applies in the United States”
I prefer the definition by Emer De Vattel the legal treatise in the hands and use by the founders and framers “Principles of Natural Law”. It was used and read by Franklin, Jefferson, Washington, Jay and many others: “ ... natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens ...”
See; https://lonang.com/library/reference/vattel-law-of-nations/vatt-119/
Also this statement by one of the major contributors to the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and subsequent contribution to the 14th Amendment:
“John A. Bingham commenting on Section 1992 said it means “every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen.” (Cong. Globe, 39th, 1st Sess., 1291 (1866))”
Also the holding statement in Minor v Happersett (1874/1875):
The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common-law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives, or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners. Some authorities go further and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction without reference to the citizenship of their parents. As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first. For the purposes of this case it is not necessary to solve these doubts.
The 1898 WKA decision did not overturn this statement in the holding of Minor v Happersett. It only settled the doubt as to who was a 14th Amendment Citizen at Birth, not who was a “natural born” Citizen at Birth. WKA did not touch on changing the founders intent and meaning of the presidential eligibility clause in Article II Section 1 Clause 5.
CDR Kerchner (Ret) — http://www.ProtectOurLiberty.org