“If the writers of the Constitution wanted to use Vattel as the basis for who was eligible to be President, they would have spelled it out, or at least the early courts would have supported it. They didn’t. They supported English Common Law.”
Oh no no no they did not! The framers DELIBERATELY rejected English Common law, because English common law is based in divine sources, and bestowed by God. The framers wanted to keep religion OUT of our constitution, so as to free the nation from a religious government which would dictate the national religion. Otherwise we would be SUBJECTS, not CITIZENS. The English form of government derived their authority from GOD, not MAN. We derive OURs from MAN.
English Common law has similarities to what is referred to as US Common law, but in reality, there IS NO US Common law. Our laws were created with the Constitution, which in many areas deliberately rejected English Common Law. You are using a Straw Man argument.
Vattel wasn’t writing law, he was describing the common denominators that exist for ALL nations as a consequence of the existence of Nations! Universally, the WORLD in Vattel’s day referred to these common denominators the Laws of Nations, because they ALL have the same basis. It is a consequence.
You are wildly, wildly wrong on this.
English Common law has similarities to what is referred to as US Common law, but in reality, there IS NO US Common law. Our laws were created with the Constitution, which in many areas deliberately rejected English Common Law. You are using a Straw Man argument.
This makes my head hurt. There are so many mixups in that it would be impossible to unwind in a single post. Suffice it to say that English common law was the default rule in the colonies prior to independence, and was/is considered valid within those states except as superceded by statute or subsequent case law. That's only logical, since English common law is what was practiced in all those colonial courts prior to independence, and if you imagine that it vanished overnight with independence, the colonies would have been largely lawless.
You are correct in saying there is no federal common law, as such, because the federal government did not exist during the pre-Constitutional period when English common law was commonly practiced in our colonial (i.e., state) courts.
However, that does not mean that English common law is not considered persuasive in interpreting U.S. Constitutional law, including rights such as habeus corpus, bail, etc. The Supreme Court has routinely looked to how those concepts were understood in England when determining how they should be applied here.
For example, the Constitution says "no excessive bail". But then, how is it that people can be held without bail at all? Well, the Supreme Court found that if you looked at English common law practice, you could see there were occasions where truly vile, dangerous people were held with no bail at all. So despite that clear language of the 8th amendment, people can be held with no bail at all.
That kind of reliance on English common law to interpret what is meant by Constitutional provisions that had a counterpart in the common law is, well, common.
“The framers DELIBERATELY rejected English Common law...there IS NO US Common law”
You are showing your ignorance here.