You say: “I trust the words of Thomas Paine from two years after ratification over your words from 221 years later.”
I say. I didn’t offer any words. I quoted congressmen and senators as found in the Congressional Globe. As far as I know Paine had no direct input into the Constitution. While I respect him, he had opinions just like everyone else. He didn’t believe in Jesus either...do you really want to go there?
As far as the rest of your comments, the framers were imbedded in English law and custom. They had love and respect for England but wanted a voice. They didn’t like the taxes. I seem to recall learning in school: Taxation without representation. I do believe that is why our founders broke away from that yoke.
I love my father but I couldn’t stand his rules so I moved out. Same principle.
I should apologize for not providing proper context.
I wasn't posting to you because of what you quoted. I posted to you because you did "offer words." You said:
"I have discovered that you cannot reason with people who have an agenda and these birthers certainly have an agenda. For the life of them they cannot see that they are adding things to the Constitution and the law that isn’t there and never was there."When you say "...and never was there," you are referring to original intent. This entire debate is about original intent. That's why people are scouring through the books that the Framers are known to have read, such as Vattel, Locke, Burke, and others.
As far as I know Paine had no direct input into the Constitution.
Neither did John Adams or Thomas Jefferson, but their letters and actions later in life are used to define original intent elsewhere in the Constitution (see Jefferson's "wall of separation between church and state" as an example). Why refer to the words of these Founders as legitimate sources, but not Paine who was actively writing on the matter at the time?
What Paine wrote about the original intent of the natural-born clause is clear: foreigners and half-foreigners were excluded from the presidency. In opposition to the definition of "foreigner" or "half a foreigner," Paine says that only someone with "a full natural connection with the country" can be president. That's as plain-meaning as it gets, and was the common understanding of the clause at the time. "Half a foreigner" was a person with one citizen parent and one non-citizen parent. A "full natural" person had two citizen parents.
You accuse others of "adding things to the Constitution and the law that isn't there." I'm asking you why you are blind to the contemporary facts that are there?
-PJ