I assume you meant “imputed” not reputed.
Good response.
No Vendome (one of my favorite fountain pens was called “Vendome”), I wrote what I thought I meant, but that doesn't mean I knew what I was saying! Here is where I got it. The use of the term, as with many terms, may have changed over time. That, after all, is why Morrison Waite reminded readers of Minor v. Happersett, that the definition of “natural born Citizen” was "from the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar." I stole the word and phrase from Vattel, Book 1, Paragraph 217:
“For the same reasons also, children born out of the country in the armies of the state, or in the house of its minister at a foreign court are reputed born in the country:”
This phrase has, of course, held the interest of many of us who know that Obama is not a natural born citizen, but wonder why no court or constitutional amendment has chosen to add this of Vattel’s principles, which would have made McCain a natural born Citizen, and obviated this mess? Surely McCain would have denounced Obama as ineligible because of his alien birth/alien father if he were not also ineligible!
I interpreted “reputed” as meaning “assumed to be.” But my Latin scholars are off tonight at a Latin convention. Reading through Vattel’s sections 215-217 it appears that his reputed citizens are not called “natural born Citizens,” or the “natives” or “indigines” of the original French editions. That is an issue our Supreme Court should have addressed, but has sadly evaded.
There are some consequences associated with including foreign born children of military citizens because the child may then have been raised in and incurred some allegiance to the country of his/her birth. Our framers could not put the nation at risk by creating an exception to an otherwise clear and ancient requirement. But we should perhaps look again at the wisdom of amending Article II Section 1.
Still, I appreciated your question. Free Republic is demonstrating more critical thinking than American Thinker. I just copied Vattel. I didn't appreciate the linguistic implications of the word, and am anything but a linguist or expert in English grammar. Should Vattel’s translator, Thomas Nugent, have used “imputed?”
Please do be critical. Free Republic, even including the Obots James and Mr. Rogers, has provided a forum from which I have begun to really understand the problems our founders faced, how and why they chose certain solutions. I'm also beginning to learn how to write. If I misuse terms I much prefer to know about it. Goodness knows I've misused equations on more than one equation, and mathematics is just another language.