ping...
He could have been birthed in the Lincoln Bedroom and he still wouldn’t be eligible because of his Kenyan/British father.
How is this different from "citizen attorney" Leo Donofrio's previous comprehensive explorations of the definition of natural born citizen, you know, those definitions that have gotten nowhere in court?
I totally agree with this -
(But I sure am curious what all the secrecy is about that birth certificate)
The foundational view of the Natural Born Citizen clause is an interesting legal argument. As an abstract proposition, it ought to have significant merit and it is an argument that certainly ought to be made to the Court if the issue ever gets there.
That said, like it or not, the Supreme Court of the United States is a political quasi legislative body exercising its power in the framework of judicial resolution. Decisions accommodate a wide range of considerations of which historical foundational principals are not any where close to the top of the list.
The prevailing view is that the Natural Born Citizen clause is out of place generally in the modern internationalist environment. It is not viewed as open to the Court to simply hold that the Constitutional provisions does not exist but the interpretation of the provision is going to take place in the context of a national vote that installed Obama without any real inquiry into this issue which was well known at the time of the vote.
The argument simply fails to take account of the fact that since this clause was installed in the Constitution, the 14th Amendment was adopted. The Court is going to hold that whatever conditions other than birth in the geographical territory of the several states were originally incorporated in the Natural Born clause, those conditions were removed by adoption of the 14th Amendment.
I assume the Court will stop short of holding that at this point all that counts is citizenship at birth as defined by Congress. I think if squarely presented with the issue by a litigant with standing, it is reasonable to believe that the Court will see the clause as requiring birth in the geographical territory of the several states but even that is by no means certain.
I can tell you from first hand knowledge that the Obama forces are well aware of the threat posed by this issue and by state action to lay the groundwork for ballot challenge in the event of a 2012 reelection campaign. A case that reached the Supreme Court on any of the related issues other than birth location which was decided against the plaintiffs would be an obstacle to subsequent state action to exclude Obama from the ballot on appropriate grounds.
It should be noted that the track record of the many lawyers who have attempted to pursue this issue in court is not exactly stellar.
Don’t hold your breath on the Supreme Court correcting this problem.
The FightTheSmears website comes right out and confirms that Obama had dual citizenship at birth and then states he is a “native citizen of the United States.” It’s telling that there is no mention of the “natural born” constitutional requirement. They’ve been implicitly threatening to incite race riots should anyone make an issue out of it.
When Donofrio gets published in the Staford or Michigan Law Reviews, perhaps then serious people will start listening. I won't hold my breath.
As it stands, not a single earnest conservative legal group - and there are dozens of such well-respected groups - has taken up this "crusade", not the Federalist Society, not the Thomas More Legal Center, not the Landmark Legal Foundation and not even Judicial Watch. Again, why is that.
bump
Well, good luck to him with that.
serious attempt ping
I have been saying this all along. I can’t be president because my mother was a British subject when I was born...even though my father was a US citizen and I was born in NY.. If I can’t be president...neither can he.
The issue is a waste of time it seems. Nobody can get it going in a court and it seems there are more people interested in the possibilities of UFOs landing on the White House lawn.
Unfortunately the law is what the Supremes deem it to be—period. I don’t see this Court allowing for a major constitutional crises—with huge racial overtones (and a potential for even civil breakdown and war—in every major city in the USA)—because of the natural born clause.
If Obama was fully Caucasian...with the same issues surrounding his birth, maybe. But as the first black president... NO WAY.
Rest assured that the SCOTUS will NOT overturn the health care bill or O’bs presidency, rather they’ll stall off, shuffle their feet and eat watermelon,,,bet on it ?
Certainly hope that someone sometime will actually follow the Constitution as it was written.
We'll see.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2485624/posts?q=1&;page=1#1
Founder and Historian David Ramsay Defines a Natural Born Citizen in 1789