Posted on 01/14/2016 11:29:42 AM PST by GIdget2004
Marco Rubio's lawyers are defending his eligibility to run for president in a quixotic legal challenge that alleges he isn't a natural-born citizen.
A Florida voter filed the suit, which claims that the senator isn't a true "natural-born citizen" under the Constitution because his parents were not both U.S. citizens at his birth in Miami.
The challenge occurs as 2016 rival Ted Cruz has been thrust into the spotlight by repeated "birther" challenges by party front-runner Donald Trump and other critics because the Texas senator was born in Canada.
So far, only Cruz has faced significant questions from those challenging his natural-born status. But the legal brief shows Rubio's lawyers trying to cut down the accusations at an early level.
The 34-page document, first disclosed by the Tampa Bay Times, casts aside the claim, noting that under the voter's logic "at least six other Presidents of the United States were not natural born citizens and were therefore ineligible for that office."
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
I’ve been wondering when they divorced and whether or not there were earlier separations. In any event one of them had to have been at the very least a Canadian Permanent Resident, because Canadian law required at lest one parent to be that or a Canadian citizen in order for the child to acquire Canadian citizenship at birth.
Until the latter part of the 19th Century the children born abroad with U.S. citizen parents usually did not acquire U.S. citizenship at birth and had to naturalize after birth to acquire U.S. citizenship. This was during the early period when each State was responsible for establishing its own State citizenship and naturalization requirements. The Naturalization Acts of 1790, 1795, and 1802 attempted to address these problems, but they were repealed except for the one in 1802 left many such children without U.S. citizenship for decades to come. S, you certainly cannot use the word “always” to describe something that was usually not the case for many decades.
We haven’t forgotten anything. We remember who done us wrong like an elephant, regardless of which political party they profess to represent.
The constitution isn't as harsh or black and white as is casually discussed. Art IV Sec. 2 citizenship tracks citizenship of a state, which is driven by domicile. Domicile is where you live. Most people wander from where they live, and that doesn't change their domicile.
But it's awkward to talk with those long-phrases, and the history (of the law) and other materials use shorthand of "where you were born," even though that is not exactly what the constitution says.
-- Now sit back and try to view that statement from my perspective and see how arrogant that sounds. --
I understand and agree, and accept the label. I think it would be odd if a person didn't view it as arrogant, or cock-sure, or similar. I get weary of pointless discussions with people who are determined to get to a certain outcome just because it's the one that "feels like that's how things should be." The debate becomes obtuse, pedantic, and sophistic, and I lack patience.
-- I just can't see how it's settled, as you say. --
My sense that it is settled as a matter of law comes from reviewing the precedents. A person born abroad (that's the shorthand I discussed above) is naturalized, period. So says SCOTUS, every time a born-abroad citizenship case is decided. That's the right conclusion if one follows the rules of citizenship set up in the constitution. It's relatively simple logic, needs no reference to statute, and comports with the law of nations where people are a citizen of one country or another.
FWIW, diplomats are carved out - they are are deemed to always be in their home country, no matter where they are in the world.
-- I think that qualifies as a controversy and shows that this issue needs to be resolved in the courts. --
It's a controversy in the public, for sure. The public is confused about almost everything. And the legal scholars are working overtime to condition the public to accept that naturalized citizens should be able to ascend to the presidency. But today, the constitution doesn't allow that. To accept it is a step toward one-world-government. That step WILL be taken. Our national identity is being erased, slow, steady, and sure.
I'm glad I was mistaken, thinking you were pig-headed.
Congress made the US a heterogeneous quagmire, just like Caracalla did Rome,, and the natural born Roman citizens lost their liberty.
Your own words prove you wrong.
Conferred versus acquired.
You did write your statement knowingly, didn't you?
Where? Which specific words do that?
The plainest, simplest, most consistent definition of natural born citizen is a person who receives citizenship at birth. This may be either through being born in the land or being born to a parent who is a citizen, according to the applicable law of naturalization enacted by Congress which is within its Constitutional purview. Being a natural born citizen means he or she does not have to go through a process called "naturalization" in order to become a citizen.
Anyone who uses an "applicable law of naturalization enacted by Congress" is a naturalized citizen automatically...which you say doesn't happen...I have not seen one shred of evidence that a person can be automatically "naturalized" at birth.
ROTFLMAO! Too funny. Do you not know that you contradicted yourself in the manner of a few sentences?
Thank you for your very courteous and professional reply. Thanks to these exchanges, I feel better educated and am very open to a ruling or a very different interpretation from what I would prefer.
“But it’s awkward to talk with those long-phrases, and the history (of the law) and other materials use shorthand of “where you were born,” even though that is not exactly what the constitution says.”
I agree. If there’s something that’s frustrating and complicated, it’s US immigration and citizenship laws. As a personal illustration of this, when I lived overseas for an extended period, I was advised to maintain my ‘American-ness’ by doing things like keeping my passport up to date, maintaining a Social Security number, voting (by overseas absentee) and filing US income tax returns. In other words, do things that show you want to remain an American even though you’re living overseas. I never had any problem or any questioning of my US citizenship (mainly I believe because I am US born), but the vagueness and generalities about all this wasn’t very reassuring. I have now lived back in the United States for years and have had no problems at all, but I can imagine some of the difficulty that an American who was born abroad and then lived abroad would have in trying to maintain their citizenship or wanting to be thought of as a natural born citizen.
“The debate becomes obtuse, pedantic, and sophistic, and I lack patience.”
I fully understand - I also can get impatient!
“To accept it is a step toward one-world-government. That step WILL be taken. Our national identity is being erased, slow, steady, and sure.”
Yes, I know and that’s sad. Like I mentioned to someone else that, after the Obama years of blatant disregard for the laws and Constitution of the United States (as well as the terrible lack of enforcement of our immigration laws mainly because both parties are worried that it will cost them the Hispanic vote), one really wonders if this whole debate about Ted Cruz will really go anywhere and that’s not as it should be. Obama wants us to cease to be an exceptional nation and become a secular liberal country that has little difference from Europe.
However, after discussing this with you and others who know legal precedent better than I do, I now fully agree that Ted Cruz is going to need some sort of clarification or new ruling (most likely from SCOTUS) to fully clear this up. There are simply too many questions, and while I personally think it would be unfair to Cruz to deny him the presidency based on this, I will accept whatever and however the courts rule.
As Donald Trump said last night, there’s a big question mark over Cruz’s head and the Dems will stop at nothing to try to stop the GOP nominee. This would be a problem for Cruz so he better start figuring this out if he wants to continue running.
“I’m glad I was mistaken, thinking you were pig-headed.”
I’m also very glad that I was mistaken in thinking you were arrogant.
Just for interest sake, what do you think of the notion that Marco Rubio is ineligible to be president because while he was born in the US, his parents were not yet naturalized when he was born? That’s one I’d never heard before and would be interested in what you thought.
The point is that no one is a citizen before they are born.
“Do you not know that you contradicted yourself in the manner of a few sentences?”
Show me any evidence that natural born = naturalized at birth. On the contrary, there are two types of citizens — natural born, i.e. citizens at birth, and naturalized, i.e. those who become citizens later through a process determined by Congress (or through an act of Congress to make them citizens).
I will break this down simply. A natural born citizen is one who has citizenship from birth by virtue of either of the parents’ citizenship OR by virtue of where the birth took place. While there may have been a general consensus about who this applied to when those words were penned in the Constitution, there were at least some cases in which they had to be spelled out. So the naturalization act of 1790 did spell out that foreign birth did not preclude natural born citizenship. “Considered as” is a term applied not only to natural born citizens but to the naturalized citizens as well. It simply means that it is legally so.
All of these legalese logical backflips are unnecessary. The Constitution was not meant to be a foreign language document capable of only being deciphered by scholars who spent their entire lives studying laws. It is simple and straightforward. If someone has to go through all of these technicalities to develop their legal theory, it must be wrong.
A simple look at the first law of naturalization supports the simple idea that there are two types of citizens - natural born, i.e. citizens at birth, and naturalized, i.e. made citizens by a process. It also supports the idea that Congress has the authority to determine who is a natural born citizen by statute, as part of its authority to determine processes of naturalization.
No one has put forward an example to disprove this. Instead complex theories have been put forward to reach a different conclusion, and these different conclusions are presented as evidence against the simple, plain explanation.
That's an observation, not a point.
Show me any evidence...
How about your own words?
This may be either through being born in the land or being born to a parent who is a citizen, according to the applicable law of naturalization enacted by Congress which is within its Constitutional purview.
...who become citizens later through a process determined by Congress...
Isn't "at birth" when you said it happened? Congress says it is. Your words indicate it is as well. Why do it later?
You want your cake and to eat it too. Sorry, you don't get it that way.
No it doesn't!
And if it does then simply cite the exact statute that you believe Congress enacted that makes someone a natural born citizen.
I think he too is unqualified, but the argument is much more difficult to sustain than it is in Cruz's case. On this one, there is no parallel precedent, unlike Cruz where we have the Bellei case.
I couldn't do the argument justice, and while I wish I had a link or ten to send you to what I consider reliable sources, I can't even do that.
“Isn’t ‘at birth’ when you said it happened? Congress says it is.”
Naturalization is the process of becoming a citizen through a process specified by law. It CAN be based on when and where someone was born, but it does not make applicable people retroactively citizens at birth. So, for example, Congress amended the Constitution to insure that blacks who resided in the US were unquestionably citizens. They did not have to apply to become citizens, but they were naturalized.
You have got to be kidding me.
That means that those naturalized under the act would have the same protections under the law as a natural born citizen did, not that they became a natural born citizen through the passage of the law.
Please tell me you're not as simple minded as you appear to have been and that you've simply misconstrued what they meant!!!
YES, but what about the Duke of Earl?
“I couldn’t do the argument justice, and while I wish I had a link or ten to send you to what I consider reliable sources, I can’t even do that.”
Rubio is not a natural born citizen for Constitutional purposes due to his acquisition of U.S. citizenship by the authority of the same U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1952 applicable to Ted Cruz, but in a different paragraph. See:
66 Stat. Public Law 414 - June 27, 1952
TITLE III - NATIONALITY AND NATURALIZATION
Chapter 1 - Nationality at Birth and by Collective Naturalization
NATIONALS AND CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES AT BIRTH
Sec. 301. (a) The following shall be nationals and citizens of the United States at birth; . . .
(1) a person born in the United States; and subject to the jurisdiction thereof; . . . .
One of the interesting controversies surrounding this statute concerns its phrase saying: “and subject to the jurisdiction thereof. . . .” Courts previous to the Wong Kim Ark decision often decided a person born in the United States with two alien parents were obligated by their foreign citizenship derived or inherited from their alien parents to share a duty of allegiance to the foreign sovereign as well as the local and temporary allegiance to the United States sovereignty. This circumstance of dual allegiance including a foreign allegiance was sufficient to find the person was not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States and therefore did not acquire U.S. citizenship. Donald Trumps recent remarks about the actual legal status of anchor babies could reopen the debate about the correct application of this restriction due to jurisdiction and allegiance despite immigration and naturalization practices since the Wong Kinm Ark decision (1898).
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