Replies

NOBODY with any authority agrees with your interpretation.

The Supreme Court is all the authority I need. So is the Constitution. Both trump any and all other authorities.

Natural Born Citizen means CITIZEN AT THE MOMENT OF BIRTH and nothing else.

You have no Supreme Court precedent that says any such thing. Nor any Constitutional clause that says it. Nor the words of any Founder. I have all three.

Worse, were "citizen at time of birth" perfectly synonymous with "natural born citizen," then anyone naturalized at birth by Act of Congress—even those born outside the US to parents neither of whom were ever or ever will be citizens—would then be classified as "natural born citizens" and so eligible to be President.

That cannot be what the Founders intended, since those naturalized at birth cannot possibly be "natural" citizens. One is either a natural citizen, or one is a naturalized citizen. It is no more possible to be both at once that it is possible to be a citizen and not a citizen at the same time. The two terms are mutually exclusive.

Also, per Marbury vs. Madison:

“It cannot be presumed that any clause in the Constitution is intended to be without effect; and therefore such a construction is inadmissible.” 5 U.S. 137, 174 (1805).

Every word in the Constitution must be some effect. The fact that the phrase "natural born" precedes "citizen" in Article II, Section 1, Clause 5 must make a substantive difference relative to all occurrences of the word "citizen" without that prefix.

Since the difference between "citizen" and "natural born" citizen cannot simply be the difference between "born a citizen" and "made a citizen after birth," it must be something else. We can infer from the phrase itself that one such difference must in fact be whether or not one was born a citizen. But there's another essential difference: "natural" vs. "naturalized."

Based on that, it could be that the difference is between "citizen from birth without naturalization" and "citizen either by naturalization or else not from birth" (e.g, those who became citizens after birth without any naturalization law when the US came into existence.)

However, it has always been the case that those born in the US to even one parent who was not a citizen became citizens as an act of positive, man-made law, and were not regarded as citizens by nature without need of any such law. Such persons are naturalized citizens, not natural citizens.

Even the 14th Amendment is a law. And it makes no claim to be defining anyone as a natural citizen, by birth or otherwise. It is logically impossible to make a natural citizen by law, since the definition of a natural citizen is one who is such without the need for any legal fiction created by a legislative act. The term "naturalization" means to make someone a citizen by law who would not be one naturally without such positive law.

The 14th Amendment's citizenship clause defines both a) those born in the US and subject to its jurisdiction, and b) those naturalized in the US and subject to its jurisdiction, to be citizens of the US, and does so using a single sentence with a single phrase that is the subject of the sentence and a single phrase that is its predicate. The subject phrase is of the form "<A> and <B>", and the predicate phrase is "are citizens of the United States."

That single predicate phrase, "are citizens of the United States," must intend to apply that exact same meaning of the word citizens to both noun phrases in the conjunctive phrase that is the subject of the sentence, since it's but one predicate phrase applied to but the one conjunctival phrase that is the subject of the sentence. Therefore, the semantics of the word citizens in the 14th Amendment must encompass both those born in the US (and subject to its jurisdiction) and those naturalized in the US and subject to its jurisdiction. That is flat-out impossible unless the intended semantics of the term citizen in the 14th Amendment is that of general citizenship, and is not intended to signify any other, more specialized meaning.

Therefore, the 14th Amendment simply naturalizes anyone who is not already a citizen naturally without need of the 14th Amendment to be one. And per Minor vs, Happersett, the only ones who don't need to be naturalized by the 14th Amendment are those born in the US to parents who were citizens.

You have NO case law that says otherwise. The Case Law you claim to have does not count, since Congress had no Citizenship language in place at that time.

The Minor Court's definition of “natural born citizen” was pivotal to reaching its holding, the Court's definition is part of its holding and is, therefore, also precedent. In addition to Ogilvie (as cited in the essay,) also see Black’s Law Dictionary 737 (Bryan A. Garner ed., 7th ed., West 1999) (see also Id. at 1195 defining “precedent” and quoting James Parker Hall, American Law and Procedure xlviii (1952); see also Black’s Law Dictionary at 465, distinguishing “dictum gratis”).

Congress has no power over citizenship per the Constitution to make any law affecting or defining natural citizenship. By definition of natural citizenship, it cannot have any such power, which is why the Founders pointedly only granted it the power to make rules regarding naturalization (the making of citizens by political law or edict, instead of recognizing citizens by natural principles which require no law.)

So whether Congress had any "citizenship language in place at the time" is irrelevant with respect to the decision in Minor or with respect to the meaning of "natural born citizenship."

But you're also quite wrong on another point: Congress has had citizenship law in place since 1790.