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But the fact is that Gray’s ruling is that the 14th Amendment is declaratory . It outlines natural born citizenship since that is what was before them in THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA BRIEF. They were presented an argument that the lower court was in error when THEY RULED: Ark was a natural born citizen.

The term "natural born citizen" has technical application in only one place in the law and that is as a qualification of the eligibility of a person to hold the office of President of the United States under Article II of the Constitution.

Since the Supreme Court has never been confronted with that issue in a case, the issue has never been decided at that level and there is no Decision precedent on the question of what factors (such as citizenship of parents) would dicatate the result.

None of these cases under discussion on this thread, Wong Kim Ark; Minor v. Heppersett; are decisions on that question. To the extent the Court uses the term in those cases, such useage is dicta only and not a part of the holding.

And we should note that among lawyers who are not addressing the Article II question, the term is often used loosely to describe a person who becomes a citizen at the time of birth and as a result of birth, in many cases under circumstances where such person probably would not be held to qualify as a Natural Born Citizen for purposes of Article II (such as the case of a person born outside the United States who becomes a statutory citizen at birth).

Although it is clear the founders discussed the Vittel concept of Natural Born Subject (and its modification to citizenship) in connection with the language in Article II the primary focus of the discussion was, as is set forth in the Congressional Research Service opinion, place of birth.

Under US Law for example, all persons born in the US are citizens--and the US asserts through its sovereignty over such persons at the time of their birth, the power to tax all of their income throughout their entire life. Place of birth is a problem under US Law and a president who is, as a result of his place of birth outside the US, subject to similar assertions of sovereign power over his person and rights, is not an appropriate person to hold the office of President of the US.

And for that reason, I part company with the CRS opinion (as to the last section thereof) on this question because it is my opinion that a person who is born outside the US is not a Natural Born Citizen of the United States and is not eligible to hold the office of President.

However as many of you know, I am also of the relatively firm opinion, which as DiogenesLamp suggests above is consistant with the overwhelming majority view of the Constitutional Law bar, that in the present political context, the Supreme Court is almost certain to hold that a person who is born in the United States is Constitutionally Eligible under Article II to hold the office of President, without regard to what the citizenship of his parents is.

That ought not be the law; reason suggests to the contrary; it is a bad result; but that's how the case will come out if Zero proves to have been born in the USA, no matter who his parents were. Doesn't mean I wouldn't make the contary argument if the opportunity presented itself but a realistic appraisel of the law and the setting helps avoid bad decisions on process.

And once determined that a person is a Natural Born Citizen for this purpose, as the ALJ suggested to Orly, other factors such as dual citizenship, or adoptions by non US persons or loss of Citizenship by parental action or otherwise is not relevant with one exception: If a Natural Born Citizen effectively renounces US Citizenship as an adult through the renounciation process with the State Department otherwise, it would be likely that eligibility would be lost.