They only rule on the question before them. Whether he was a natural born citizen wasn't the question before them. BUT they could certainly find that he fit the criterion for NBC and use that to conclude that he was a citizen, which WAS the question before them. Why do you think they spent so much time discussing what an NBC was? Just to say after all that, "But he's really not one of those, but he is a citizen for some other reasons, which we won't tell you"?
I don't wish it were so--I don't really care much one way or the other. But it IS so, and that's what I do care about.
You're the presiding SCOTUS judge and you don't find WITH the criteria. Your rulings should confirm the criteria, not contravene the criteria as that ruling did.
The ruling didn't contravene the criteria, obviously, or the dissent wouldn't have made the objection it did.
A better question would be...why discuss NBC at all if it had no bearing on the question at hand?
The ruling didn't contravene the criteria, obviously, or the dissent wouldn't have made the objection it did.
Yes it did! If he had been an NBC then there would have been no need to resort to the 14th amendment!
BTW, don't you think that the question presented was done so on purpose?
Do you honestly believe that if the question before the court had been one based upon Article 2, Section 1, Clause 5 instead of the 14th Amendment that it would have even been heard?