The first Congress, and President Washington, passed the Naturalization Act of 1790 which specifically added those born abroad or at sea to citizen parents were also "natural born citizens" so if this first congress believed a simple statute could alter who and when a person is a "natural born citizen," the idea a constitutional amendment cannot is beyond lunacy.
Among the weakest foundations of Birther logic is they have no single legal theory. For some, Santorum is not a "natural born citizen" because his father was an immigrant. For others Romney is not because his father, who was never anything except a US citizen, is not a "natural born citizen" because his father was not born inside the US.
It's as "simple" as naturalized vs. birthright citizenship. Marco Rubio's citizenship was by birthright (born in FL) so he's a "natural born citizen" just like the governor Puerto Rico (born in PR to PR-born US citizens).
I wish birthers would find elsewhere to troll their crackpot theories. Some are probably from the DU or elsewhere aiming to make FR look as nutty as possible.
You’re just winging it, too, newzjunkey. I’d directed you to The Insular Cases not very many days ago, regarding Puerto Rico being an unincorporated territory, with all the attendant consequences of that for putative VP candidates, but you’re still touting a falsehood.
For starters, see:
Balzac v. Porto Rico, 258 U.S. 298, 66 L.Ed. 627, 42 S.Ct. 346 (1922): The Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, requiring that in all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury did not apply in Puerto Rico. The right was not required in territories that had not been “incorporated” into the United States, as distinguished from territories merely belonging to the United States. “[W]e find no features in the Organic Act of Porto Rico of 1917 from which we can infer the purpose of Congress to incorporate Porto Rico into the United States with the consequences which would follow.”
Don’t make me rub your nose in it and embarrass you, newzjunkey.
Well the crackpots in the Senate put forward their ridiculous "birther" beliefs by passing a resolution to declare McCain a natural born citizen after much discussion.
They held the crazy position that two citizen parents were necessary to qualify as natural born. Of course it was a smokescreen.
In fact one of the most whacked-out birther crackpots was cosponsor Senator Obama.
Actually, this is incorrect. Vattel does NOT require the birth to take place in county [sic], but that citizenship naturally follows the status of the father. The place of birth is incidental and it is only presumed that the father is a citizen where his child was born because that is where his settlement is (unless he has no permanent settlement). And when Vattel equates "native" and "natural-born," both require birth to a citizen father.
In 1795 the Naturalization Act from 1790 was changed and children born abroad to US citizen parents were considered as citizens (at birth). It is obvious that early legislators made distinction between the two terms (citizen at birth and natural-born citizen).
US government (INS) published the following document: http://www.uscis.gov/ilink/docView/SLB/HTML/SLB/0-0-0-1/0-0-0-45077/0-0-0-48575.html
This document makes a distinction between a native-born and a natural-born citizen (in three places):
1) "The repatriation provisions of these two most recent enactments also apply to a native- and natural-born citizen woman who expatriated herself by marriage to an alien racially ineligible to citizenship, a category of expatriate not covered by the earlier 1936 legislation..."
2) "The words "shall be deemed to be a citizen of the United States to the same extent as though her marriage to said alien had taken place on or after September 22, 1922", as they appeared in the 1936 and 1940 statutes, are prospective and restore the status of native-born or natural-born citizen (whichever existed prior to the loss) as of the date citizenship was reacquired...."
3) "The effect of naturalization under the above statutes was not to erase the previous period of alienage, but to restore the person to the status if naturalized, native, or natural-born citizen, as determined by her status prior to loss. "
The NBC definition is simple: person born in the USA of US citizen parents. Therefore, there is no dual allegiance at birth. This is the guiding principle.
For a child to be NBC, it does not matter where parents were born - as long as they were US citizens at the time when child was born in the USA.