https://archive.org/stream/newcompletelawdi01cunn#page/n504/mode/1up
No matches found. The word "citizen" does not seem to be present in that dictionary. I'm wondering if it was even present in ordinary English dictionaries, let alone a Law dictionary.
"If we pass the present amendment, the construction must be, that an alien, after residing in this country, abjuring his allegiance to his own, offering to become a citizen of, and taking the oath of fidelity to, the United States, is in the possession of the rights of a privileged order to which he may have belonged; and further that their rights are hereditary, unless he shall, agreeably to the amendment, come forward and renounce them. But what will be the consequences of him not renouncing? Most clearly that he retains and possesses them. A nobleman, then, may come to the United States, marry, purchase lands, and enjoy every other right of a citizen, except of electing and being elected to office. His children, being natural born citizens, will enjoy, by inheritance, his title, and all the rights of his nobility and a privileged order he possessed, an idea which ought not, either explicitly or impliedly, to be admitted." Annals of Congress, House of Representatives, 3rd Congress 2nd Session, January 2nd, 1795 page 1046
Great find. I need to stick that somewhere where I can find it down the road. I don't understand how I missed it before. I've searched those archives for the words "natural born citizen".
How can a nobleman come to the United States, not become a citizen but have children who are natural born citizens?
Well I looked up William Giles. He was neither a Constitutional Convention delegate, nor a member of a ratifying legislature. He was 13 when the Declaration of Independence was signed by Congress. Ergo, he could have an uninformed opinion on the topic.
Also, in the case of Virginia, there was a state law that would grant children citizenship in Virginia simply from having been born there.
Given that at the time, the overlap between children born to a Citizen father and children born in the United States is very nearly 100%, I don't believe a great deal of effort was made to draw a distinction between the two.
Actually it was Mr. Hillhouse’s quote. Mr. Giles proposed the amendment (which made it into the final 1795 Act) but it was Rep. Hillhouse who made the comment.
Hillhouse was a Connecticut lawyer and came to congress at the same time as Zephaniah Swift. He eventually replaced Olive Ellsworth in the US Senate when Ellsworth became a Supreme Court judge.
It is not surprising that he understood natural born to mean anyone born in the country. He was from Connecticut after all and that was the law in Connecticut.