What meaning does it really have in today’s world?
It seems possible to me that a born citizen whose parents were not citizens at the time of his birth, could be just as patriotic and admirable a candidate as one whose parents were citizens.
Conversely, being born here of citizen parents doesn’t in any way guarantee that a candidate would be ideologically pro-American and free of some foreign influences and loyalties.
The world is very different now.
The world is very different now.
It doesn't matter what what people think it means now or the character of citizens now.
The purpose of having a constitution defining and limiting the powers of government and having defined processes restricting the changing of that document is that the meaning of articles and amendments to that constitution will be will preserve the freedom of the citizens of that nation and for generations not yet born.
If the meaning of the constitution can be changed by changing the meaning of the words there in, then the document may well not exist because the judges interpreting that document can read into the words whatever suits their fancy and will assuage their conscience.
Many such judges that held such views have sat on the Supreme Court over the years and the Republic has been ill served by them. They have done great evil by not following the origenal meaning of the framers. Roe v. Wade, the Incorporation Doctrine, and abuses of the 14 Amendment that are too numerous to list. All come about by judges reading into the words of the constitution what they want to read.