Birthers like to present charts to explain how they see citizenship. Here’s a chart that explains how the courts see citizenship:
The naturalized citizen has as much right as the natural born citizen to exercise the cherished freedoms of speech, press and religion…
Baumgartner v. United States (1944)
However, the rights of someone who is born a citizen outside the United States differ from those born in the United States or naturalized in the United States under the 14th Amendment because the 14th Amendment specifically refers to persons “born or naturalized in the United States.” See: Rogers v. Bellei, 401 U.S. 815 (1971). This leads to the question of whether or or not those born citizens outside the United States are natural born citizens or naturalized citizens. Most authorities say that they are are natural born citizens, and the following chart depicts that view:
The minority position is represented:
And that is all I have to say.
What’s amazing is how you couldn’t comprehend the point of a common fallacy.
Wow. That’s a really sad attempt at justification. Shameful.
“If A, then B” is not the same as “B=A”. That’s most basic logic. Not “human” logic but mathematical logic.
The point is that Minor vs Happersett only gives you “If A, then B”. It does not give you “A=B”. That’s the (false) conclusion, but it appears you’re applying circular logic by starting with the assumption that “A=B” and then conclude “If A, then B, therefore A=B”.
That “encrustation of legalisms” is our law that governs us all. Not what some whack job on the internet dreams up after a little too much reefer.
It has less to do with logic, than the fact that nothing you wrote has any basis in reality.
You didn’t post any facts. That’s the problem. You posted your wild fantasies that have no basis in law. You see, when people who actually know how the law works discuss the law, they cite to accepted sources of the law (those evil footnotes you don’t like, or “encrustation of legalisms” as you called it). You might as well have said “the purple unicorns that fly out my butt told me the President is not an NBC” and it would have the same legal value.
You’re right. This isn’t even a debate, because you don’t understand how the law works on the most basic level.It’s about on par with Einstein having a discussion about relativity with a high school student.
Hate to break it to you, but it does not exist as you portrayed. And there is no tooth fairy either. And your rights to life, liberty and free speech aren’t unalieable. There are limits to all of them, and you can be deprived of all of the with due process of law.
Which is why our founding fathers, in their great wisdom, gave us a consitution, with checks and balances, so some nutter can’t just dream up the law, call it natural law, and have it matter. We are a nation bound by laws…not the wild fantasies that some random nutter dreams up.
None of whom matter, as they are not the source of US law.
Not that it can’t be true (that’s another debate). Just it’s not the law of the United States….and guess what…the writings attributed aren’t US law.
Until you decide to take part in the real world, we will never have anything to debate. Until then, I will have to resign myself to arguing the law with other real lawyers, before real judges, and actively participate in the real legal world….not the drug induced (or perhaps induced by a failure to take one’s meds) fantasies of some random nutter on the internets.
very clear, but not clear enough for a Birther!
I’d say your last chart is invalid, Doc. My reasoning is simple. Naturalization requires an effort on the part of the person who becomes a citizen. Being born a citizen outside of the United States still means you are a citizen and you go through no naturalization process, ergo, you are a natural born citizen.
As to those born outside of the United States to one or more American-citizen parents, I think that under modern interpretations and case law, you would have to put them in the “natural born” circle of citizenship, even though they may or may not have been put there under strict English common law. However, the Supreme Court in Tuan Anh Nguyen v. INS, 533 U.S. 53, 72 (2001) recognized and agreed that federal law now specifically defines “naturalization” as the “conferring of nationality of a state upon a person after birth ….” (citing 8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(23)). Since that person would be a U.S. citizen at birth (and not after birth), he/she would appear to be “natural born” and not naturalized.
I don’t think naturalization necessarily requires a process. The Court has not been clear on what catagory that foreign born children of citizens fall under other than they can only be citizens by statute. Of course, Congress only has the authority to pass naturalization law. The Court has said there are two types of citizens, by birth and by naturalization, both under the original Constitution and under the 14th Amendment. Justice stevens in Miller v. Allbright includes foreign born children of citizens in the “by birth” category. Justice Scalia seems to put them in the naturalized category. Here is how the court has divided citizenship:
“Additions might always be made to the citizenship of the United States in two ways: first, by birth, and second, by naturalization. This is apparent from the Constitution itself, for it provides [n6] that “no person except a natural-born citizen, or a citizen of the United States at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President,” [n7] and that Congress shall have power “to establish a uniform rule of naturalization.” Thus new citizens may be born or they may be created by naturalization.” Minor v. Happersett, 88 US 162 (1875)
“The distinction between citizenship by birth and citizenship by naturalization is clearly marked in the provisions of the Constitution, by which “No person, except a natural born citizen or a citizen of the United States at the time of the adoption of this Constitution shall be eligible to the office of President,” and “The Congress shall have power to establish an uniform rule of naturalization.” Constitution, Article II, Section 1; Article I, Section 8….. The main object of the opening sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment was to settle the question, upon which there had been a difference of opinion throughout the country and in this Court, as to the citizenship of free negroes and to put it beyond doubt that all persons, white or black, and whether formerly slaves or not, born or naturalized in the United States, and owing no allegiance to any alien power, should be citizens of the United States and of the state in which they reside. This section contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two sources only: birth and naturalization. The persons declared to be citizens are “all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” Elk v. Wilkins, 112 US 94 (1884)
“The Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, in the declaration that “all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside,” contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two only: birth and naturalization.” US v. Wong Kim Ark 169 US 649 (1898)
“The Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution . . . contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two only: birth and naturalization. Citizenship by naturalization can only be acquired by naturalization under the authority and in the forms of law. But citizenship by birth is established by the mere fact of birth under the circumstances defined in the Constitution. Every person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, becomes at once a citizen of the United States, and needs no naturalization.” Rogers v. Bellie, 401 US 815 (1971)
“There are “two sources of citizenship, and two only: birth and naturalization.” United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649, 702 (1898). Within the former category, the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution guarantees that every person “born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, becomes at once a citizen of the United States, and needs no naturalization.” 169 U.S., at 702. Persons not born in the United States acquire citizenship by birth only as provided by Acts of Congress. Id., at 703. Miller v. Allbright, 523 US 420 (1998).
“The Constitution “contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two only: birth and naturalization.” United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649, 702 (1898). Under the Fourteenth Amendment, “[e]very person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, becomes at once a citizen of the United States, and needs no naturalization.” Ibid. Petitioner, having been born outside the territory of the United States, is an alien as far as the Constitution is concerned, and “can only become a citizen by being naturalized, either by treaty, as in the case of the annexation of foreign territory; or by authority of Congress.” Id., at 702—703; see also Rogers v. Bellei, 401 U.S. 815, 827 (1971). Here it is the “authority of Congress” that is appealed to–its power under Art. I, 8, cl. 4, to “establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization.” If there is no congressional enactment granting petitioner citizenship, she remains an alien.” Miller v. Allbright, 523 US 420 (1998)(Justice Scalia, concurring).
The last chart represents a minority view. I personally waffle on a regular basis between the last two charts.
The first chart, however, represents my opinion.
If I recall correctly, the minority view Doc refers to is that those born under certain circumstance are “naturalized” at the moment of birth….which, for the reason Xyxox refers to, is one of the dumbest things i have ever heard. Citizen by birth in one class, citizen by action in another. It really is that simple. A citizen by circumstance of birth is a natural born citizen.
Still waiting for some nuit to toss out the possibility of an artificially-born citizen … oops, I just did. 😉
You’re point being? Congress can and has passed statutes saying who was considered a citizen at birth. And, since there’s only two kinds of citizens, I’m at a loss as to the point you’re trying to make.
But of course. I was simply pointing out why the minority view is in error. 😉
I think this is like those essay tests in high school-there is no right answer. Under the 20th amendment, Congress decides if a president-elect is qualified and unless it were absolutely beyond a doubt, they would not overturn the will of the voters. So, had McCain won the election, I would say the odds are >90% he would be in the White House today. Given that under the 20th, if they found him ineligible the offiice would go to Palin, make that 99.99999%.
The point is that the court has not said which category statutory citizens at birth fall into. Scalia clearly implies they are naturalized as does most of the earlier case law he is citing as they say the foreign born “can only become a citizen by being naturalized, either by treaty, as in the case of the annexation of foreign territory; or by authority of Congress.” Stevens says they can be citizens “by birth” even though they depend upon Congressional statute to become citizens. However, since Congress only has the power to naturalize by statute, this seems suspect as such persons would seem, by definition, to be naturalized.
Nobody in their right mind would have questioned McCain’s eligibility in the Congress as it would have destroyed their political career forever. McCain was born outside this nation due to the fact that his father was a serving naval officer. Dissing the troops on that kind of level would be absolute political suicide.
But on the other hand, nobody ever claimed birthers were in their right mind, either, thus I must agree it is not 100% and would be your 99.99999%.
I take the majority opinion and go with the first (middle) chart.
how i charted it a while back.
Those born outside the US, i.e., not covered by the 14th Amendment, remain subject to the common law with respect to the power of Congress to extend natural born status to them, just as it did back in the late 1700’s-early 1800’s.
It has been by opinion that the third diagram holds, but that the second diagram is the one that should hold.
Congress pretty much established the second diagram as precedent when the voted unanimously to accept McCain should he win the Electoral College vote. And I find that a good thing.
I find it extremely unlikely that any future Congress would disagree with that precedent.
I had one with two NBC circles which were side by side in a box of citizens. I do think the ones born overseas are naturalized at birth, by Congressional law. Which the courts do not seem to have a problem with. The problem is that you can’t hardly say “naturalized” around the Birthers or they start spinning like Dervishes.
In Kerchner’s Venn Diagram, he doesn’t seem to admit the possibility of foreign born NBC’s.
Speaking of Kerchner, I have done a flyer, like you see on all the Birther sites. I hope you guys here do some, because my “software and me” is pretty limited.
http://birtherthinktank.wordpress.com/2012/03/09/the-common-sense-american-flyer/
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
LOL! Good one. That would be really funny to see in some newspaper next to Kerchener’s crap advert page…
I wrote this article in response to the 7-category diagram over at the Daily Pen (link under Ugly below).
Somehow I understood “citizens” but envisioned “box of citizens” like “box of cereal.” Like “one free citizen” on each box, or “charts inside” or something.
Reminded of the time I put Corsi’s “Where’s the Birth Certificate” copies in Count Chocula.
Now this is an interesting thread. Most of the birther hullabaloo is stopped at the President being born in Hawaii, but the Presidential eligibility of someone born outside the US to only one American parent is intriguing. My niece is less than a year old, yet she has 2 passports. 1 US and 1 not US. She was born in a foreign country. The way it has been explained, and looks according to the Embassy website, is that she chooses her citizenship before her 20th birthday.
I am interested to know if she can change her mind at 21. Can my niece be President, or should I start plotting now for a spectacular takeover of the office by a usurper? Does anyone know Soros’ personal e-mail?
I did mine in response to Kerchner because I ran into that stupid flyer about a half dozen times in one day. Those Daily Pen guys made a flower out of theirs and have 3 requirements, not 2. I am also going to do some more flyers to post around the Intertubz. Maybe they will help.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
You have it a little backwards; what’s clearly false is B=A (nbc=domestic birth to citizens)
But why are you arguing my side of the Minor argument? I’m the one whose written more debunking Apuzzo and Donofrio that anyone else. Have you not read a single one of the essays that I’ve provided links to? There’s about 4-5 of them. Start here if you really want some primo ammo: http://h2ooflife.wordpress.com/erroneous-nbc-definition/ and here: http://h2ooflife.wordpress.com/dissection-of-nb/
You and Zeppy are encamped among the trees, oblivious to the fact that there is a forest of legal constructs because you can’t see it since you are inside it. You’re in The Matrix of a mental construct composed of man-made law and ignorant of the fundamental principles upon which that law is based. To understand how lame that viewpoint is just try to imagine the very first Supreme Court deciding any issue or view that you deem to be legitimized or settled via Supreme Court rulings many years and generations later. What would the first court have ruled, and based on what principles?
You are oblivious to the princples because you reject the view of our founders that all rights proceed from the natural order instituted since the creation of man, and the rights granted to man have existed unchanged since he was first made in the image of his creator. That view is the view upon which the nation was founded, -a theistic view, not an atheistic view. An atheistic view provides mankind with no rights whatsoever and therefore the revolution was not legitimate from the prespective of reasons stated in the Declaration of Independence because no one is endowed with any rights which one can claim are being violated. In such a world, law exists in a vacuum of weightlessness with no up or down other than what lawmakers decide. In such a world slavery is a legitimate institution, because no one has an unalienable right to liberty. To claim that no one has an unalienable right of liberty, or property, or life, is to live in a fantasy world because our legal world is founded on those rights. Lower courts can decide things based on what the Surpeme Court has decided in the past, but the Supreme Court does not rely on lower court rulings, but on principles of natural law, the Constitution, precedent of previous Courts, and their own political feelings. If there is no precedent already set, and they have no feelings on a matter, and the Constitution is silent, then guess what they have to turn to? That’s right, Natural Law. But not in your world. Instead they turn to nothing because nothing exists. Your world is amoral because even moral law does not exist and human beings have no intrinsic worth. If not, then what is morality and personal worth based on? You can’t answer such questions, nor the facts that I’ve presented in what I’ve written. Hence no attempt to argue any point because no logical counter-argument exists which doesn’t end in an amoral universe in which anarchy is just as legitimate as obedience to social and legal limitations.
Here’s some links that my sister sent me today, which look very interesting: Walter Williams homepage: He’s a remarkable man. http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/
Should *Laws* Be Obeyed?
econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/articles/97/should-*laws*.htm
The moral principle undergirding our Declaration of Independence is *natural law*. The essence of *natural law* (those “unalienable rights”) is that each person *…*
Bogus Rights
econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/articles/06/bogus.html
Feb 8, 2006 – Philosopher John Locke’s vision of *natural law* guided the founders of our nation. Our Declaration of Independence expresses that vision, *…*
3. Attacking Western Values
econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/articles/04/values.html
Dec 27, 2004 – The idea that rights precede government was John Locke’s *natural law* philosophy that had a significant influence on our nation’s founders but *…*
Your analysis is naive. Scalia allows Congress the power, and restrains the judiciary. Overall the courts have deferred to congress on the issue, within the limit of the language of the 14’th Amendment granting citizenship to those born in the United States. In Barnett v. Obama, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California explained:
“The Complaint conveniently chooses to ignore Congress’ long history of defining citizenship, whether naturalized or by birth. See Charles Gordon, ‘Who Can be President of the United States: The Unresolved Enigma,’ 28 Md. L. Rev. 1, 7-22 (1968) (contrasting 150 years of active Congressional legislation against judicial restraint).”
Congress has broad power here. There’s the last clause of the 14’th Amendment, and more importantly to our issue, the 12’th Amendment. Congress, not the judiciary, certifies the election of a president and vice president. Congress also has power over the order of succession, including confirmation of any replacement vice president.
Who are the most respectable members of this minority? I mean courts or scholars who actually advance the idea that only the native-born are natural-born, not just say it’s interesting or that some other people take the view.
I note one who does *not* take this minority view: University of Arizona law professor Gabriel “Jack” Chin. Chin published a paper arguing that Panamanian-born candidate John S. McCain III was not eligible, but Chin’s held that statutes did not grant McCain citizenship at the time of McCain’s birth. Chin granted *if* McCain gained citizenship upon birth, then McCain’s eligibility would be on strong ground.
I don’t get what point you are trying to make. Scalia, quoting Wong Kim Ark, makes clear that someone not born in the US is an alien unless naturalized by an act of Congress. A person naturalized by an act of Congress is a naturalized citizen. Can such a person also be a natural born citizen? Perhaps. I agree most scholars equate “at birth” with natural born. However, it is simply true that the Supreme Court has never said anything to remotely support the notion that someone born outside the US can be natural born. Doesn’t mean they wouldn’t if they were asked directly. It just isn’t that easy to get there based upon past precedent as they would have to rule that Congress can make natural born citizens through naturalization.
The Constitution gives Congress sole power over deciding whether a President-elect is qualified. In my view that is a non-reviewable power, equivalent to deciding whether a given offense meets the standard of high crimes and misdemeanors for impeachment. Congress can take Supreme Court rulings into account when making their decision , but does not have to. Therefore, Congress is entirely within its right to decide someone born abroad is qualified to be President.
Now under that standard, could they decide that a pure naturalized citizen like Schwarzenegger is qualified? I believe they could, but that doesn’t mean they would or should. I would argue this way: when the question is close (US citizens at birth, born abroad), then Congress should err on the side of respecting the voters and the rights of that individual. Only where there is no doubt (Schwarzenegger) is there good reason to overturn those.
I’m not sure that is correct. I know many people who hold dual citizenship in adulthood and throughout their entire lives. Current US law does not require you to select between different citizenships. If one is US citizen, whether through birth or naturalization, one can only lose it by renouncing it at a US embassy or consulate (and they will generally attempt to discourage that). So, your niece could run for President if she returned to the US and lived there for at least 14 years. Of course, an opponent could use her foreign birth and citiizenship as a campaign issue if they chose.
Now, the laws of her birth country might require such a choice to keep that citizenship. However, even if she chose that citizenship, the US would still consider her American unless she renounced her US citizenship at an embassy or consulate. A consequence of her being a US citizen is that will have to file US taxes even if she never sets foot in the US or earns any money here.
If this becomes important at some later date, she or her parents should contact an attorney experienced in this area, since IANAL.
Exactly. And I contend that is exactly what they did for McCain.
Reading natural born citizen to include McCain is far less of a stretch than reading high crimes and misdemeanors to include lying about consensual sex. In fact, even reading natural born citizen to include Schwarzenegger would do less violence to the intent of Founders (some of whom had very “busy’ sex lives)..
Well, McCain’s birth was given the imprimatur of citizenship retroactively shortly after he was born, along with the births of others in Panama at the time. Which is another layer beyond the military base issue.
Scientist, I know the process in place for certification of the election, but in researching it just now, I am unable to find any constitutional basis for Congressional authority to deny a president in such a citric action. The elector process is spelled out, but not the acceptance by Congress. There also is a Congressional Report saying that it’s opinion is that the candidate officially becomes President-elect once the votes have been cast, not later once the joint session occurs.
As you have been the main voice on this point, do you have revenues at hand? I have thought similar thoughts and was going to consider the implications,but don’t want to do so without being clear on the chain of authority.
Better to see real trees, than imaginary faces in the clouds. I think that analogy fits since your entire premise is that you can see underlying principles invisible to other lesser mortals. “Self-evident” is a very revealing choice of words as you describe the truth you believe, with the emphasis on “self.”
References, not revenues
I believe the ‘imprimatur’ of which you speak was only retroactive as far as 2 years after McCain’s birth. And it was a Congressional act.
Since he was born overseas, before the act you refer to was specified to be in effect, he get his citizenship from his two citizen parents. The debate is whether this is good enough for NBC as the citizenship granted to the children born overseas to citizen parents, while more or less automatic at birth, is never-the-less accomplished by Congressional act.
Thus it is a gray area (citizen at birth = natural-born/ citizen by Congressional action = natural-ized) and could go either way. As Doc points out most people go with NBC, but that hardly makes it settled law.
However, Congress has established a precedent in the McCain situation that will be hard to overturn in the future. So while it isn’t law, it can be referenced in future situations to add weight to the NBC call.
I’m not sure what a “citric” action is. Lemons? Oranges?
The 20th Amendment says the following: ” If a President shall not have been chosen before the time fixed for the beginning of his term, or if the President elect shall have failed to qualify, then the Vice President elect shall act as President until a President shall have qualified; and the Congress may by law provide for the case wherein neither a President elect nor a Vice President elect shall have qualified, declaring who shall then act as President, or the manner in which one who is to act shall be selected, and such person shall act accordingly until a President or Vice President shall have qualified.”
“failed to qualify” would imply not meeting the eligibility requirrements, as well questions about the validity of the Electoral College votes of a sufficient number of states to affect the outcome (in 2004 the votes of Ohio were challenged). The US Code sets out a procedure to challenge the EC votes, which requires a written objection from at least one member of each body of Congress. If a valid objection is made, then Congress decides what to do.
So suppose McCain had won and one member of the House and one Senator had challenged. Congress would then have voted. Had they denied McCain, Palin would have become President (God help us).
The Senate resolution essentially was a non-binding comittment that no Senator would have signed such a letter. I see no reason to doubt that they would have kept that commitment.
I believe that authority is derived from the 20th amendment that says, in part,
The problem is one cannot get citizenship from one’s parents without a statute saying so and there was no statute making McCain a citizen at his birth. The Court has been consistent on this point since Wong Kim Ark. This is why we have had a bunch of equal protection cases revolving around our statutes denying citizenship to certain children of citizens while granting citizenship to others. Hence, the confusion as to McCain’s status.
Or in my experience Einstein, having a discussion with my High School physics teacher.
There is an argument that could be made that such persons are born citizens through the same common law principles that made someone born in the country a citizen before the 14th Amendment. The question is whether jus sanguinis was part of the English common law or whether it was more correctly identified as statutory. At least some of the English colonies had provisions in their charters (Georgia comes to mind).
I understand the issue about Congressional act/statute. But to clarify, McCain’s citizenship was clarified in the 1930s, the law in question being retroactive back to 1904.
So McCain’s citizenship by birth is not just tied to his birth on a military base, or from a serving military parent.
See:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1403
(a) Any person born in the Canal Zone on or after February 26, 1904, and whether before or after the effective date of this chapter, whose father or mother or both at the time of the birth of such person was or is a citizen of the United States, is declared to be a citizen of the United States.
(b) Any person born in the Republic of Panama on or after February 26, 1904, and whether before or after the effective date of this chapter, whose father or mother or both at the time of the birth of such person was or is a citizen of the United States employed by the Government of the United States or by the Panama Railroad Company, or its successor in title, is declared to be a citizen of the United States.
As I just posted, the law was [assed shortly after McCan’s birth, and specifically made retroactive to 1904. So, you have a distinction between constitution/common law vs. statute, and then the question of retroactive application.
The 20th amendment gives Congress the sole, non-judicially-reviewable power over qualifying a President. They could have used that power to qualify McCain despite any other laws (and would have). Doing so would not affect the citizenship status of anyone else.
Congress can also grant citizenship to a single individual if they choose. Punishing particular individuals is verboten, but not granting benefits.
iPad burp, and I’m rushing before going to work.
I think I was typing certification.
All true. However, Wong Kim Ark rejected that theory and since then we have a whole body of case law built around the rejection of such doctrine. Recently, the question is the extent Congress can decriminate between foreign born children of citizens like last year’s Flores-Villar case. In the oral arguments of such case, petitioner’s suggestion that there was jus sanguinis without statute was rejected out of hand.
I had been re-reading that amendment, and that may be how it was considered at ratification and is implemented/interpreted currently. I just was looking for a *direct* and clear authority. It doesn’t say the Congress determines that failure to qualify, just if there is such a failure, this is what Congress shall do. I am interested in digging into this, but I need to go soon. So, I’m interested in how you consider that point.
In the meantime, I’ll post below what I think is an important implication if Congress clearly has such authority.
That is a possible interpretation, but it is far from clear. There has been a number of law review articles on this and I don’t think any came down that this issue was clear. The 20th Amendment doesn’t say who determines eligiblity. Unless the Constitution expressly states such is solely in the power of Congress, the Court has not construed it to be. It may be that after the electoral collage, Congress is the only one with authority. However, if there was a ballot challenge prior to the election, it clearly would be before the courts like we are seeing now with Obama.
My reading of the language is that the power to determine who is qualified rests with Congress. In a number of the birther cases the courts have hinted that if the birthers could get by all the other stuff, they would consider the entire matter a political question anyway, so that supports the idea that it’s up to Congress.
“High crimes and misdemeanors” is a similar situation. What does the term mean? Whatever Congress says it means, even oral sex with a willing intern.
Here’s the thing. “Natural born citizen” has only one use or value in the constitution. We can discuss the distinction between citizen at birth vs. naturalization, and how Congress is given the power over naturalization. That’s an intriguing distinction to explore. But. None of that matters practically speaking except for the eligibility clause for presidents.
So, just consider that Congress does have the authority to decide and certify the eligibility of a president. Combine that tidbit with the notion that the *only* place “natural born citizen” matters is for a president, and you arrive at the conclusion that Congress has the power to determine who is a natural born citizen.
Thus, the distinction becomes moot, about Congress only being able to determine naturalization by statute. Because regardless Congress determines the final eligibility of the president, and thus the meaning of “natural born citizen.” Certainly where there is ambiguity, because that ambiguity falls within the scope of determining eligibility.
It mentions only Congress.
In several cases the courts have suggested that there is no power to keep someone off the ballot on putative ineligibility. They seem to lean towards it being a political question. But it isn’t completely certain.
I only mentions Congress, but doesn’t say define eligiblity. I believe the political question doctrine generally requires express statement of sole auathority.
I think some courts have suggested that after the election, Congress has the only authority. I do not believe any said Congress had authority over who is on the ballot. Some courts have raised the political question issue, but I don’t think any have actually ruled on it. If you listen to the ninth circuit oral arguments, the judges were very sceptical of the political question argument as such is very narrow doctrine.
Here is a law review on the subject that concludes the authority of Congress is unclear and rather thinks it should be a matter for state courts.
“The uncertainty over Congress’s power vis--vis the federal courts in this sphere magnifies the importance of state courts being open to those challenging a presidential candidate’s qualifications. There is little doubt that state legislatures have the power to define a process to adjudicate a presidential candidate’s qualifications, either through a denial of ballot access or through some type of post-election proceeding. Given the legal uncertainty regarding Congress’s authority not to count the electoral votes of a candidate it believes ineligible, state-court litigation seems like the most appealing path for the resolution of such a dispute, with the possibility of review in the U.S. Supreme Court. Neither standing nor the political question doctrine should serve as a barrier to such review.”
http://www.michiganlawreview.org/articles/the-justiciability-of-eligibility-may-courts-decide-who-can-be-president
So the election proceeds to Congress. Eligibility determined by Congress.
Thus, courts might likely say such a situation breaks out like so:
born on American soil = natural born citizen no matter what
born off American soil = citizenship (and thus ultimately natural born citizenship) determined by Congress, as it has been since the beginning of the country
courts could very possibly say: we need not make a distinction between naturalization and natural born status, as Congress determines final eligibility of a President-elect, and thus the final definition of natural born citizen for any citizen born elsewhere than American soil.
What a bunch of quasi-religious pompous claptrap! Your attitude and off-the rails screed full of imaginary strawman conclusions comes across very similar to all the other smug wanna-be Cult preachers out there, like Geir Smith. I see very little difference between him and you and the types of delusions of grandeur on display. Doc C’s post pretty much summed up my impression of your latest screed:
So, you can stick to playing with constructs of your own imaginary creation. I’ll stick with the reality we actually live in. And on that, the Courts have been consistently clear.
El Putzo loved to use the term “axiom” in his screeds. The things he was talking about were axiomatic only to his fevered brain and could be disproven by anyone with a bit of knowledge, therefore not axiomatic.
And that’s the route the birthers have been taking, with obvious failure. Of course in their case they are trying to bar an ELIGIBLE candidate. But even if you had an ineligible candidate, the outsome isn’t totally clear. My understanding of the Superior Court ruling in Georgia is that the parties decide who gets on the ballot (and hence the Maliki hearing was without real weight). I remember in California the court said the Secretary of State lacked discretion to keep anyone off the ballot (was that Bowen?).
My opinion (unlike birthers, i don’t claim my opinion to be fact) is that in a democracy the will of the voters in filling electoral offices has to weigh very, very heavily. When it comes to laws that affect basic individual rights, protecting minority rights is hugely important. But choosing leaders in elections is, by definition, an exercise in majority will.
Adrian Nash:
You said:”You and Zeppy are encamped among the trees, oblivious to the fact that there is a forest of legal constructs because you can’t see it since you are inside it. You’re in The Matrix of a mental construct composed of man-made law and ignorant of the fundamental principles upon which that law is based.”
Where you are going wrong might be better explained using the Macro and Micro distinctions in Economics. MACRO deals with the GENERAL principles of economics while MICRO deals with SPECIFIC individual and business level issues.
While MACRO Natural Law may underlie the various legal systems of all societies, it does not really touch the Bloppville Indiana Dog Catcher Code Annotated.
Similarly while MACRO Natural Law may contemplate general ideas of citizenship as membership in a society’s political life, it does not control the individual decisions made by political units across the globe as to how they effect that membership. Each country has to enact specific laws applicable to its own perceived best interests.
A nation in Continental Europe, which is surrounded by many other nations, and presumably has much traffic between them, and much interaction on its border areas, may opt for a parentage derived citizenship. That way Spanish parents in the Basque area don’t get to make French citizens. People can walk between most paces in mainland Europe.
On the other hand, an island nation like England, might be better served by a “place of birth” form of citizenship. England does not have as many contiguous borders, and presumably less cross border traffic. The same with the United States. Gypsies pretty much didn’t just meander across our borders in those early days. They had to catch a boat.
There is no right or wrong in the choice of how a country decides who are citizens and who may run for office. There might be better or worse. But, each nation gets to make it’s own laws. There is no Natural Law trump card which can be played down at this level.
You don’t get to resort to GENERAL (Macro) Natural Law to over-rule SPECIFIC (Micro) statutes and court decisions in the United States. You may argue its principles, as you view them, in court or before the legislatures. But natural law has no precedental value.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Where is the real “Squeeky Fromm, Girl Reporter” and what have you done with her?
Here’s an actual state appellate court on the issue:
“the presidential nominating process is not subject to each of the 50 states’ election officials independently deciding whether a presidential nominee is qualified, as this could lead to chaotic results. Were the courts of 50 states at liberty to issue injunctions restricting certification of duly-elected presidential electors, the result could be conflicting rulings and delayed transition of power in derogation of statutory and constitutional deadlines. Any investigation of eligibility is best left to each party, which presumably will conduct the appropriate background check or risk that its nominee’s election will be derailed by an objection in Congress, which is authorized to entertain and resolve the validity of objections following the submission of the electoral votes.”
http://www.scribd.com/doc/40107522/KEYES-et-al-v-BOWEN-et-al-3rd-Appellate-District-Court-of-Appeals-Sacramento-Opinion-Affirming-Lower-Court-Decision-in-Full-C062321
You see the difference is that I’ve read many of those early Supreme court decisions. They based those ruling on the Constitution, and the Common Law. What those early Courts didn’t do was to pull something out of the air, and call it “natural law.” But actually having studied the law, I actually know that.
But of course, while they may have philosophically stated that in the Declaration of Independence, as reason to part with Great Britian, when it came down to actually forming a government, they still felt the need to create the bill of rights? Perhaps because they didn’t put as much weight in the “natural order” as you think?
You haven’t read our Constitution, have you? Did you miss those two parts are no faith tests for office and no establishment of religion? Don’t you find it odd, that the only two references to religion in our Constitution are negative? Strange for a group of people founding a nation on a theistic point of view, dont’ you think?
You do know what “unalienable” means? From the very founding of our nation, there has never been any doubt that the government, with due process, can deny you your life (death penaty), property (eminent domain)), or liberty (slavery, imprisonment). I think it’s very clear who is in the fantasy world.
You do realize that the institution of slavery was protected in our Consitution before the post civil war amendments. It was a legitimate insitution for almost the first half of our country’s existence….what does that say about your ‘theories”?
Actually, no they don’t. But hey, since your whole intial diatribe was free from actually looking at anything, why should you start using sources now/
Is there are reason why I should care what an ecominics professor has to say?
You are consistent.
Your posts are consistently composed of sticky piles of verbose, self-important crap.
Good post. Well put!
I was going to explain to Adrian how he was wrong on Natural Law, especially in terms of citizenship. Your explanation was better.
Do you understand the point that the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California made in the quote I provided?
Don’t miss the forest for a few twigs. The important result of your precedents is that, within the specific language of the Constitution, Congress has broad power over citizenship.
Yeah, that is what I was trying to say.
Yes, thank you for correcting me. The law was passed in 1938, McCain was born in 1936. The law was made retroactive to 1904.
Correct.
In 1936, the Canal Zone was not considered American soil. Period. McCain was not born on American Soil. However, his parents were both American Citizens, and children born overseas to American Citizens are granted Citizenship at birth by a much older law (1796 if I recall correctly).
So in 1936 and 1937 McCain was no less a citizen than in 1938 after the Panama Canal Zone was considered U.S. territory.
In 1938, the law was made retroactive to 1904 to cover the entire official involvement of the U.S. in Panama. However that law did not make McCain a citizen, he was already a citizen from the day he was born.
But the crux of the matter is that that citizenship is completely dependent on an act of Congress. Whether you consider the operative act to that of 1796 or 1938 makes no difference. McCain is a citizen because Congress made him one.
Pay attention to this bit because it is the nexus of the argument:
And that is the dichotomy that the Doc is pointing out with the two Venn Diagrams.
There is no question about folks born on U.S. Soil, they are citizens from birth and there is no legislation required to make that so.
There is an question about those, like McCain, that were born overseas. Congress has chosen to answer that question for the purposes of Military (perhaps all Government) personnel who have children while posted overseas. They have stated that they will consider these children to be Natural Born Citizens for the purposes of Presidential Eligibility.
That is not a law, and it doesn’t necessarily guarantee that every such case will be treated the same way in the future. And it doesn’t necessarily apply to civilians on holiday overseas. But it is a powerful precedent, and, in my opinion, a good one.
And you know what, sometimes that is how legal systems work. It is nearly impossible to anticipate every little nit and cross purpose. Sometimes people to whom we entrust with the authority to decide (in this case the Congress) just have to look at the situation and decide what is fair. It would not be fair for McCain to be denied eligibility because his parents were serving their country overseas, at their country’s request, so Congress made a promise that it would not accept a challenge to McCain’s eligibility based on that technicality; that is, they chose to apply the Doc’s middle diagram.
Oopsy.
Should be
2) A person who is a Citizen from birth is called a Natural Born Citizen. Natural Born Citizens are not Naturalized Citizens.
What Congress has done for those born of citizens, but not in one of the states or DC is to define what “United States” means. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_nationality_law
Can anyone comment whether SCOTUS has made any rulings about this.
Keith, I am all good about McCain being natural born. I have no issues with it. I have no issues with practicality. I’m just exploring the gray area.
In terms of the naturalization side, there have been a number of conversations here over time, and I don’t remember exactly where you came out on it before, though you do seem to be on the side that citizens at birth born abroad are actually naturalized, because they only get that way through an act of Congress.
My opinion/preference is that natural born citizen = citizen at birth (no matter where in the world). Thus, I would disagree with your point #1. As such, I note that the original statute passed by Congress used the term “natural born citizen” in just this way, for citizens born abroad.
However, I also note that it only matters in one precise situation (presidential eligibility). Other than that, it doesn’t seem to matter what you call the process by which citizens born abroad are acknowledged as citizens. They don’t have naturalization papers. But they are citizens only because Congress says so. There is no need, however, to bother trying to resolve it, except for potential presidents.
We could say that Congress only has the power to naturalize from its enumerated powers, and so insist these are not natural born, except in some sort of let-it-slide way, as you discuss. That is one angle. Another angle is that all citizens at birth are natural born, whether on soil or as set out in Congressional statute.
But I would go further. I note the term “natural born” has only one indicated reference in the constitution, presidential eligibility. Plus, Congress has the final say on whether or not any particular presidential-elect is qualified.
Thus, I am arguing that that power is not just a power to measure the President-elect against the qualifications, but also a power to independently decide who, beyond being born on American soil, is a “natural born citizen” and to do so by statute, which is its tool for expressing its will. In other words, whoever Congress decides is a citizen at birth is also a natural born citizen and is eligible to be president.
Now, if my argument is wrong, or gets deep-sixed someday by a court, that’s fine. It’s something I raised here (earlier above) because I find it provocative.
Except that, as Sef has pointed out, the only effect Congress can have on the definition of who is a Natural Born Citizen is to define what is American Soil.
They do that whenever they admit a new state, territory, or other dependency.
Except that, as Sef has pointed out, the only effect Congress can have on the definition of who is a Natural Born Citizen is to define what is American Soil.
They do that whenever they admit a new state, territory, or other dependency.
From a purely technical point of view, yes. From a ‘what is right’ point of view, my position is more nuanced than that. Kids born in Canada while their parents are on a skiing trip are not, IMO, natural born. Kids born in the Canal Zone while their parents are there on long term active military duty should be considered so. That particular point is moot anyway since the 1938 law defined the Canal Zone as American Soil in that instance.
Haven’t had my coffee yet, so I’m not sure if I am missing something, because all I see Sef talking about Is the status of U.S. Nationals, which is a different conversation, and does not bear on U.S. citizens at birth born, say, in Germany, or India.
There are two conversations here, one about McCain and a broader one about citizens at birth born in foreign countries. In case the two are getting confused…
In response to Squeeky, this addresses most or all of your points. It’s from “The Unwritten Law of Natural Citizenship” http://h2ooflife.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/the-unwritten-law-of-citizenship.pdf
Our forefathers understood that there exists no justification for men to proclaim or bestow a right that is already universally, naturally, incontestably, and equally possessed by all. That is the truth that underlies all legitimate government. Citizenship is nothing more than membership in a national family, and natural members do not need the permission of a government (which the members have created) in order to be members because they are already members by birth.
They are the natives of the country and they are the source of the legitimacy of the government. The government is not the legitimizer of the membership of its natural native members. They, the members, created the government, -it didn’t create them or their natural rights or their natural membership.
Their natural rights are passed from parents to children with their children being new natural members by birth. Outsiders are not natural members nor are they natives of the natives’ land and country. They are natives of a foreign land and people. If they happen to bring a child into the world while visiting the natives’ homeland then their child is nevertheless the natural possessor of their parent’s membership in the parents’ land and country. Children share the nature of their parents, -they’re from their parents and of their parents, and their parents are a part of their own homeland and people, as are their children. That is the law of natural membership.
They therefore need positive law in order to be granted permission to be new members of a people, land, and country that is not their own. That positive law, whatever its form, makes them “legal” members. Any one who is a legal member of American society is a member by naturalization, whether it be in the form of the naturalization process, or constitutional naturalization at birth via the first clause of the 14th Amendment, or traditional statutory automatic naturalization in the form of “derivative citizenship” via the naturalization of one’s parents, or husband.
All forms of naturalization produce “legal citizenship”. Legal citizens are the same as natural citizens in all respects with but one single exception, -they are not allowed to be the Commander-in-Chief of the United States Armed Forces and head of all of the departments and agencies of the federal government. They are not allowed to command the CIA, DIA, NSA, FBI, Justice Department, Homeland Security, Delta Force, Special Operations Command, Strategic Nuclear Defense Command, etc. In other words, they are not allowed to be the President.
That position and responsibility was reserved by the founding fathers for only natural, mature, male, Caucasian citizens, although society and law has evolved to the point of making women and minorities equally eligible to serve in all political offices. However, we have not “progressed” to the point of banning (via a constitutional amendment) age discrimination when it comes to the office of the President. We are still so backward as to not allow 21 year olds to serve in that office, nor naturalized foreigners, nor the children of foreign nationals. The President must still be 35 years old and the off-spring of American parents.
Natural citizens are not “legal” citizens because their citizenship is not derived from any law, Supreme Court legal ruling, Constitutional Amendment, or Administrative Policy. It is instead an intangible unalienable right, one of many Natural Rights that natives are born possessing. It is as much their unquestionable right as is the right to life.
Just as they are human by their inherited biological nature, so they are citizens by their inherited political nature. Their citizenship is based on a principle that is as immutable as the natural world itself. That principle is the principle of natural membership by which one is a natural member of their parents’ group, -whether the group is a genus, species, breed, clan, tribe, or nation. Their membership in the American nation is due to the fact that they are Americans by nature, -not by law. There is no law that makes them Americans. They are Americans by a law that was never written because it didn’t need to be written.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As for unalienable rights being over-ridden by law and courts, that occurrence is due to the natural right of individuals and nation to pursue JUSTICE. Justice is also an unalienable right and it trumps the liberty and life of one who violates the rights of others. But that is not the case with citizenship. Nothing trumps it. It can’t be rescinded or withdrawn, -it can only be rightfully deemed to have been abandoned or rejected. I wrote a whole essay on the permanence of natural citizenship a few days ago;
UNLIMITED & UNTOUCHABLE CITIZENSHIP for LIFE pdf http://h2ooflife.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/unlimited-citizenship.pdf
Allow me to correct the circular citizenship diagrams to reflect reality. The Naturalized Citizen circle remains as is, but there should be two other additional circles. One circle should be labeled “Natural Citizens”, while another circle should be labeled “Born Citizen”. The two should overlap almost 100%. A sliver of the Natural Citizens circle would be on the outside of the overlapped center and that area would represent natural citizens born outside of US boundaries. On the other side there’s an opposite sliver from the Born Citizens circle and it represents those who are citizens at birth but not citizens by birth because they were born not to American parents but to one or two foreigners. The explanation is: Nearly 98%+/- of Born Citizens are Natural Citizens and vice versa, but some Born Citizens don’t have American parents because they are born to legal immigrants who are covered by the 14th Amendment, while some Natural Citizens don’t have an American birth location since they were born abroad.
Some birthers erroneously argue and believe that only the center section represents natural born citizens but that is philosophically false. No baby has any kind of magical connection to the location or land where its mother delivered it. All feelings of allegiance and national loyalty spring from how one is raised, -which is related to what one’s parents’ attitude is and what one is taught by them and in school while growing up. Natural citizenship is something one is born with regardless of the location, and that is why John McCain is a natural American citizen. He was the product of American citizens and American citizens always produce American citizen children . Their citizenship nature isn’t bestowed by government because its the product of the political nature of the parents.
“Paper” wrote: “it doesn’t seem to matter what you call the process by which citizens born abroad are acknowledged as citizens. They don’t have naturalization papers. But they are citizens only because Congress says so.”
Actually, it’s the exact opposite. Congress said so because it was so and it wanted any numbskull in the Immigration Service and State Dept. to be advised of that fact and to not treat natural American children as if they were foreigners simply because they had the audacity of not being born on American dirt. The first Congress even sought to make it clear for posterity that they not only were American citizens but that they were natural born Americans just like their brethren born at home in America. That Congress, composed of many of the founding fathers, recognized that they had failed to include in the Constitution any clause that protected the rights of Americans born abroad and so they tried to state their clear realization that a foreign birth does not make an American couple’s child a foreigner. And they also wanted all to know that such children, born to Ambassadors, Diplomats, Consuls, and international trade entrepreneurs were just as eligible and capable of being President as any child born on American soil. Later, Congress stripped the “natural born” language from the revised Naturalization Act because it was not the proper place for characterizing the citizenship nature of Americans born abroad in relation to presidential eligibility.
Unfortunately, if this ever came to court, they would have to slice open your skull to examine the evidence.
Adrien Nash shows the biggest birther problem. The oh-so-close. Many good points in the post. EXCEPT: the 2 parent baloney.
Sorry, but 95% right is still 100% wrong. If you keep going to a bar with a sign that says ” free beer tomorrow”, you will die of thirst if you think you get to tomorrow today.
So how do good British subject parents raise good British subjects who suddenly declare their independence and become Americans (or Kenyans or Indians)?
It used to be that if you wanted to hear Adrien’s kinds of crap, you had to listen to A.M. radio at three in the morning, or pick up a hitchhiker, or be button-holed by some sputtering geezer in a bad sport coat at after-church coffee. Now you just turn on the internet and he’s there. And people say society is advancing . . .
Amazing the things a person can say when they are not bound by actually having to back up anything with facts.
You’re a nutter. Plain and simple. Nothing you have said since first appearing here has any basis in reality.
And despite all that, Scary Black Man is soon going to be reelected, and he’ll take all your guns away and force you to gay marry an illegal immigrant at the contraception emporium. I can’t wait until you suffer under the triumphant yoke of Black Muslim Communist Power!
Adrian went on about allegiance and loyalty being about who raised you and where. Has someone forgotten that Obama was raised in Hawaii (save a couple of years) by a citizen mother and 2 citizen grandparents.
Adrien goes on and on about natural law and man-made law without stopping to consider that the very concept of citizenship is an artificial, man-made construct.
As, of course, are borders.
I would go even further and state since guns are man-made and not found in nature, possessing them must be against natural law.
But cats are OK.
Adrien Nash:
You said: “Our forefathers understood that there exists no justification for men to proclaim or bestow a right that is already universally, naturally, incontestably, and equally possessed by all. ”
Not true. Our foremothers understood the need to WRITE laws down. It is an old and ancient practice among humans. Hammurabi did it Babylon. Moses did it on Mt. Sinai. Even Americans did. What is the reason we have the first 10 Amendments??? Wiki says:
In a paper later collected into the Anti-Federalist Papers, the pseudonymous “Brutus” (probably Robert Yates) wrote,
We find they have, in the ninth section of the first article declared, that the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless in cases of rebellion — that no bill of attainder, or ex post facto law, shall be passed — that no title of nobility shall be granted by the United States, etc. If every thing which is not given is reserved, what propriety is there in these exceptions? Does this Constitution any where grant the power of suspending the habeas corpus, to make ex post facto laws, pass bills of attainder, or grant titles of nobility? It certainly does not in express terms. The only answer that can be given is, that these are implied in the general powers granted. With equal truth it may be said, that all the powers which the bills of rights guard against the abuse of, are contained or implied in the general ones granted by this Constitution.[23]
Do you understand that? The Bill of Rights were added, in WRITING, to protect us from powers that were implied, or powers that were NOT written down.
Strangely, even the right of “Birthright Citizen” was added, in writing, to protect the right of people born here to be natural born citizens. You can find it in Wong Kim Ark, in Section V:
The same Congress, shortly afterwards, evidently thinking it unwise, and perhaps unsafe, to leave so important a declaration of rights to depend upon an ordinary act of legislation, which might be repealed by any subsequent Congress, framed the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. . .
and,
The foregoing considerations and authorities irresistibly lead us to these conclusions: the Fourteenth Amendment affirms the ancient and fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the territory, in the allegiance and under the protection of the country, including all children here born of resident aliens. . .
These are the kinds of rights you Birthers toy with and would have us lose in your Imaginary Law Fantasies.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
He hasn’t answered whether a moose needs a passport when he/she wanders through the forest from New Brunswick into Maine. But not even the great Apuzzo could answer that one.
Wrong!
All guns are gifted to us by God. Divine property on loan from the Most High. Our stewardship of the Weapons of The Lord is a test of our righteousness.
Firearms engineering is a seminary art. The Colt archives are divinely inspired.
The finest pieces bear the engraved mark of the First Shooter, “Jesus H. Christ”.
In the hand of a righteaous man, tt matters not what the Holy Projectiles strike, so long the weapon is not disrespected by forced to suffer the emission of an errant shot.
Firing straight and true brings glory to the Highest and honor unto His Creations.
In this the true meaning of “Guns don’t kill people, people do” can be found.
Meditate upon these truths with me now.
In a gravitational field it is impossible to fire straight, unless the projectile doesn’t have mass. But then it also wouldn’t have any momentum or energy when it struck the target. Therefore, firing a gun in a gravitational field dishonors the Creator.
Shhhh! You’ll disturb the truthiness!
Reminds me of http://www.amazon.com/Once-Moose-Daniel-Manus-Pinkwater/dp/0440420830
Alternately, gravity is Satan’s stumbling block.
Or a test of Faith.
Putting a bullet on target, putting a camel through the eye of the needle, it’s all the same.
Not to mention atmospheric effects. All the burdens of emplying the divine on this corrupt mortal plane.
The High Priests of the Shooting Arts, Scout-Snipers, laugh at the frailties of the flesh, and the atmospheric tricks of the Devil. Global warming included.
Faith will bring you home on target.
Haven’t you ever seen that stupid movie with Angelina Jolie … what was that piece of poo called … ?
Alright, alright, back to charting citizenship. Those charts are starting to look like targets … 😉
But it’s so attractive.
So where do you stand on cats with guns?
http://farm1.staticflickr.com/27/62334475_75255d0f2d.jpg
I would note that Congress repeatedly has changed the rules for who is recognized as a U.S. citizen at birth when born in a foreign country. As such, the argument that they are merely echoing “what is so” is a bit problematic, to speak mildly. But the bottom line is, so what?
The important part is that “Congress says so.” Clearly, Congress makes such laws because they want such citizens to be recognized as such, and just as clearly, the reasons why some are and some aren’t change over the years, but even if you were to argue that Congress is just getting closer to “what is so,” the important part is their power to make it so.
My point was that for such citizens the distinction between natural born and naturalized doesn’t matter except for presidential eligibility. Well, naturalized citizens also can be de-naturalized for more reasons than those by which natural born citizens can have their citizenship yanked.
My opinion is that such citizens are natural born citizens, not naturalized. My opinion is that is someone is born a citizen they should be recognized as NBC, but I think it makes sense for Congress to be in charge of who is made a citizen at birth in the cases of foreign birth. I think that reality in and of itself belies the notion of “natural law” in such matters, but I also think it is irrelevant. Congress has the power to use as it sees fit.
I just think that once you are recognized as a citizen at birth, no matter where you are born, that that also makes you a natural born citizen.
I have an interesting question. I know of at least one instance of a person who was in Cornwallis’ army (Hessian, in fact) who stayed behind in America at the end of the Revolution and fathered children. In light of the “jurisdiction” wording in the 14th Amendment what would have been the citizenship status of these children? I don’t know whether this person actually was naturalized.
As far away as possible…
You might find Jefferson’s musing on the subject interesting:
http://www.obamaconspiracy.org/2009/07/thomas-jefferson-on-natural-born/
As long as they can swing, the owner should pay them without having to resort to gun play.
And these cats could swing!
In France, they don’t need guns. We have… LES CHATS NINJAS!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBfy_kjkt4I
Dear Squeeky, You wrote before you thought. “Our foremothers understood the need to WRITE laws down”
I wrote of fundamental rights (Life, Liberty, Property, Self-Defense, Justice, Natural Membership, etc. Laws are written mostly to tell people what they can’t do, while the Bill of Rights and other amendments were written to tell the government(s) what they can’t do. That was to protect fundamental rights which the authors of the Constitution left alone as being self-evident natural rights which the Constitution gave Congress no authority to abrogate. They left passing laws to Congress, the States, and the People.
“Do you understand that? The Bill of Rights were added, in WRITING, to protect us from powers that were implied, or powers that were NOT written down.” Understand this, if something is not written in the Constitution then it does not exist. There are no implied powers that anyone can identify because they would be based solely on one’s own imagination and nothing else. And everyone has their own imagination so nothing would be agreed to.
“Strangely, even the right of “Birthright Citizen” was added, in writing, to protect the right of people born here to be natural born citizens. You can find it in Wong Kim Ark, in Section V”
You’ve failed to distinguish your reference with the proper degree of specificity. “the right of people born here”?? Which people? Some have rights, others have none because they are foreigners, -outsiders with no natural rights whatsoever except in their own country. . No one possess any birthright except the natives of the United States and their birthright is to be what their parents are, -to inherit their membership in American society and the American nation.
It doesn’t matter where they are born, but it matters where children of immigrants are born because their gift of citizenship is dependent on being born in America to parents subject to her jurisdiction. And only legal immigrants are subject.
Foreign visitors, tourists, diplomats, contract workers, and students (i.e. “non-immigrant aliens” as the INS calls them) are not because they remain subject to the jurisdiction of their own government. No one can get around that fact even while obfuscating the issue with the distraction about whether or not 14th Amendment constitutional citizens should be deemed to be natural born Americans. It DOES NOT MATTER! Obama’s father was NOT AN IMMIGRANT! He was a non-immigrant alien so Obama’s citizenship is not derived via the 14th Amendment through him. It’s derived from his mother’s citizenship. But historically speaking, a wife assumed automatically the citizenship of her husband, including foreign citizenship.
No one born with foreign roots is a natural born American. Natural Americans have no foreign roots whatsoever, though their parents might. And their grandparents, like mine, were very likely to have foreign roots, but neither the parents nor the grandparents would be eligible to be President. In practical terms that means that Obama’s children are natural born citizens, even though he isn’t, because they were born to American citizens. They have no direct foreign/Kenyan roots. Their only roots are American. American father, -American mother. They are eligible to be President. He isn’t.
PS. I finally felt compelled (after seeing the diagrams in this post) to create the versions I’ve been thinking about for a long time. I’ve added it to my home page. It contains four diagrams and explanations about the real facts of citizenship.
Here’s the link: http://h2ooflife.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/citizenship-graphic-lg.gif It explains everything about the principles of citizenship.
Dear Adrien,
You owe Squeeky a thank-you. If you wish to remain ignorant, that is your choice. Too bad many people here have tried to help you.
“No one born with foreign roots is a natural born American. Natural Americans have no foreign roots whatsoever, though their parents might”
The above is one of your quotes. It is the essence of stupidity. Maybe you should look up the term anchor baby, or discover why some countries have U.S tours for women who in the late stages of pregnancy.
I realize that having a position first; then trying to defend it against a bitter enemy ( logic and/or reality), is difficult, but come up with better stuff.
“Their only roots are American. American father, -American mother. They are eligible to be President. He isn’t”
Another of your quotes. So, the President is an American, because he was born in America. According to you he is not a natural born citizen. If that is the case, when was he naturalized? Or are you claiming another type of citizen?
I know you want the document to mean what you believe, but it just ain’t in the words.
Nice try. You lose. Move on.
Excellent thread responses,Squeeky.
You have amply demonstrated that you have no understanding of what the word “jurisdiction” means.
When Amanda Knox, a natural-born American citizen, was arrested in Italy, which country had jurisdiction over her, the United States or Italy?
When an alien commits a crime while in the United States, which country has jurisdiction, the United States or the alien’s home country?
Adrien, you are just wrong. Moreover, Congress disagrees with you, the Supreme Court disagrees with you, the Executive Branch clearly disagrees with you, and most Americans disagree with you. Thus, Squeeky is correct, all your talk of natural law is meaningless. Your particular notions of natural law are nonsense, but also they simply are not recognized by any body of our government, much less we the people, and thus your ideas of natural law have no power, no chance at having power, which may even be worse than being wrong.
You may be tempted, Adrien, to give the incorrect answers to Rickey, so just to be clear the answers to his questions are, in order: 1) Italy, and 2) the United States.
Bonus points for recognizing this is why diplomats cannot be arrested but tourists can.
When Adrien is done looking up “jurisdiction” he also should read up on diplomatic immunity. And then he can see if he can find anything on “non-immigrant alien” immunity.
Clearly you haven’t read the Bill of Rights lately.
Tell us how many of the Amendments are included in the Bill of Rights. That’s right, ten.
I would like to direct your attention to the Ninth Amendment, which is clearly in that Bill of Rights and says exactly the opposite to what you wrote in that paragraph quoted above.
I’ll quote the full text of the Ninth Amendment here, for anyone who might be mouse click impaired:
Please click on the link I provided to read the annotated history of that amendment and what it means.
You are wrong, Adrien.
Of the foreigners you list, diplomats are the only category that are “subject to the jurisdiction of their own government” while in the United States. That is what “Diplomatic Immunity” means: they are immune to the laws of the country in which they are physically present while representing their own.
Foreign visitors, tourists, contract workers, and students do not have diplomatic immunity, they are absolutely 100% subject to the jurisdiction of the United States and the individual State, County or Parrish, and local community in which they are physically present.
Exactly where does the 14th amendment say anything at all about anyones parents?
It doesn’t.
It is apparent that you don’t read the Constitution that you are apparently so confident in misrepresenting. Here is the text of the 14th amendment section 1:
Lets break that down bit by bit:
All persons
Not ‘some persons’. Not white persons only, color is not mentioned anywhere. Not men only, gender is not mentioned anywhere. Not Christians only, religion is not mentioned anywhere. Not rich people only, property is not mentioned anywhere. And not only persons with parents who are both citizens, family is not mentioned anywhere. ALL PERSONS. Get it? The amendment starts out by naming the entire human race. But wait, maybe there are some restrictions and we just haven’t gotten to them yet. Read on.
born or naturalized in the United States
Now it starts specifying restrictions: it is only talking about persons that are born in the United States or are naturalized in the United States. It is not allowing for any other subgroup; all persons born in the United States and all persons naturalized in the United States are the only two groups it is talking about. It is not talking about people who are neither born nor naturalized in the United States.
and subject to the jurisdiction thereof
A final restriction on the persons about whom it is discussing. It is acknowledging those with diplomatic immunity and telling us that those people are excluded too. I discussed your incorrect idea about jurisdiction in an earlier comment. Please refer to that for more information.
That seems to be the end of the restrictions, and interestingly for your argument, it still hasn’t said anything about needing two citizen parents.
are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.
So any person who meets the restrictions set out above (born or naturalized in the US, not holding diplomatic immunity) are citizens.
I just can’t seem to find anywhere where it says anything about the status of the parents of an individual who is a member of the class “all persons born in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof”.
The point of this clause is to correct the dreadful Dred Scott decision. It says that there are two classes of citizens, and two classes only: born and naturalized.
-> You are a citizen if you are born here (and sttjt).
-> You are a citizen if you are naturalized here.
For those not paying attention, saying that someone is a “born citizen” is exactly the same as saying that someone is a “natural born citizen”. This must be so, because there are only two classes of citizen, and only one of them is a born citizen. The two classes can be described as “natural-born citizen” and “natural-ized citizen”.
No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States
Here it says that the States cannot discriminate against any American citizen. Since the previous sentence says that people are both citizens of the United States and of the individual State where they reside, the States cannot discriminate against the citizens of other States, and the States cannot say they are only affecting their own citizens, because those citizens are, at the same time, also American citizens.
Essentially, the Bill of Rights is being extended to apply to the States. This was in response to the southern states discrimination against former slaves, and is a ‘correction’ to the Barron v Baltimore decision that said that the Bill of Rights applied only to the Federal Government and not the individual State Governments.
Notice that the above phrase specifically applies to ‘citizens of the United States’. It doesn’t say anything about non-citizens.
nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
Ahh, these phrases do say something about non-citizens because non-citizens are included in the catch-all ‘any person’.
So all humans, whether citizen or foreigner, must be treated with the respect by the law and not deprived of life or liberty, or property without due process of law.
Again, this is acknowledging the principle of jurisdiction. Foreigners in the United States, with the exception of those with diplomatic immunity, are subject to the legal system of the United States, and the legal system of the United States must apply equally to all persons, foreign or citizen.
Bravo! Your entire post was very well done!!
Please, Your logic is lame. Civil jurisdiction is not political jurisdiction. Can the United States require foreign tourists to register with the Selective Service or draft them and force them into military service? Well it can do that to all natural citizens, naturalized citizens, derivative citizens, and constitutional citizens because they are all subject to the full political jurisdiction of the federal government.
You don’t seem to grasp the concept of what “wrong” is. It isn’t related to anyone’s opinion, nor anyone’s opinion about what other’s opinions are. What I’ve written is 90 % fact and 10 % opinion at the most. So where is the counter-argument to any of it? You can’t argue with facts so you simply call all the facts opinions so that you then can freely call all the opinions wrong, which you can’t do with facts. How lame of a response is that? There is never any counter to what I write because there is no disputing facts. If you think I’m not totally comfortable standing on the ground of the truth then you exaggerate the importance of what others are said to believe. What they believe is irrelevant to what is the truth of the matter, and in this matter all that matters is the truth, not opinions.
Prove that anything I wrote is wrong, or simply present a perspective that logically adheres to an opposing view. No one does that because there are no facts except the ones I’ve pointed out. Everything else has been nothing but argued and asserted opinions. No one else presents the facts at the heart of the matter, but instead everyone attempts to sell the argument that facts don’t matter, nor do fundamental principles, -only opinions matter. That is pure BS. Nothing is more important than fundamental principles because everything is built on them.
Wow… this truly comes across as simply delusions of grandeur on your part.
From reading the back & forth, the synopsis seems to come down to this:
You posit your personal theory of “Natural Law” and how it works.
Others point out that your personal theory is not supported at all in how our nation’s laws actually work and in fact, the courts have repeatedly issued rulings that prove your notions wrong.
In summary – reality demonstrably doesn’t operate on the basis of your personal theory.
Therefore, all you have offered is mere OPINION, wholely unsupported by real world law. You again simply throw around the word “fact” without presenting any facts whatsoever at all…
Adrien, a key error in your argument is about jurisdiction. Others here have already pointed it out to you, as I did above. You have doubled-down on this error and try to make some new distinction in this context between civil and political jurisdiction. Keith and others have explained how jurisdiction already works. So as to your request to prove the errors in your argument, there you go. Refernces have been given pin this blog in previous posts, and you can use the search bar above, or dfo some research online. Or perhaps others here will link you to clear references to what jurisdiction means. I am not here to educate you, and if you want to live in clear error, that’s your business. Call it lame if you want. That’s your business. That also keeps you from how this country actually works.
Again, you are simply intentionally ignoring the entire reason that the proper meaning of jurisdiction had to be explained to you in the first place. Please re-read Keith’s excellent post above, which patiently breaks down and explains the 14th Amendment to you and how it works.
In terms of the legal definition of “jurisdiction” in terms of nations, it most certainly has important civil ramifications, which apply to both citizens and visiting non-citizens alike. The whole Birther argument about fears of “jursidiction” are even more senseless than they already are, if they didn’t imply concerns that would impact civil jurisdiction.
As Keith explained:
Therefore, I fail to see your point of raising concern about “jurisdiction” in terms of your ranting about rights, benefits, etc the first place, if “civil jurisdiction” is considered irrelevant to you. I think you are just trying to weasel away and shift goalposts again here.
Mr Nash: Folks whose posts are 90% facts typically cite to some source, even Wikipedia. I’m guessing that in your zeal for your position you forgot to set forth any sources. Surely there is one senator or representative who agrees and you can point to his or her web site. Maybe you can point even to Sheriff Joe’s little chat where you said he supported your view. I mean, there must be a fact somewhere. Some court decision. Even a dissenting judge. What about an election commissioner?
” ‘and subject to the jurisdiction thereof’ A final restriction on the persons about whom it is discussing. It is acknowledging those with diplomatic immunity and telling us that those people are excluded too.”
That is where you left the reservation and went renegade. If you recall, every example that mentions the diplomatic exception (not immunity) also adds something immensely important, and that something is “etc.” There is a whole long list of exceptions to the rule of foreigners who are subject to U.S. jurisdiction and you can find in on the INS website, I believe it might be under Title 8 Sec. 1401 but it so well known to those in the know that I for one am too bored to find it for you. It calls them “non-immigrant aliens” and I’ve more than once listed a bunch of them here. I’ll name just one, foreign students. I’ve written 10s of thousands of words on the subject from every angle conceivable to me. Your belief that only diplomats are exceptions shows a very elementary understanding.
“and interestingly for your argument, it still hasn’t said anything about needing two citizen parents” This crack shows that you know little about what you’re attempting to illuminate. If you’ve read and remembered anything that I’ve written then you wouldn’t have made such an erroneous comment.
“It says that there are two classes of citizens, and two classes only: born and naturalized.”
You don’t get it. It doesn’t matter what it says, all that matters is what is actually true and that statement is not true because the truth is that there are four types of citizenship and the two classes are: Natural, & Natural-ized. If you are not a natural citizen then you need to be naturalized via a law, an amendment, a judicial decision, or official administrative policy. If you are not a natural citizen then you were probably made a citizen via the 14th Amendment which covered your birth because you were born to legal immigrants officially sanctioned by the United States government to reside in the U.S. permanently as junior members of American society. You, and they can be drafted, but tourists and foreign students can’t because they remain subject to their own governments.
There are two types of born citizens [read the essay I wrote today on the subject: NATURAL vs ARTIFICIAL CITIZENSHIP/ the Gorilla Analogy http://h2ooflife.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/the-gorilla-analogy1.pdf%5D or WHY LEGAL CITIZENS ARE INELIGIBLE TO BE PRESIDENT http://h2ooflife.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/the-unwritten-law-of-citizenship.pdf%5D
One type of born citizen is born to natives of the nation, the other type of born citizen is one born to foreigners. Foreigners possess no natural right to membership in the nation because they are not of it but are of another nation. Hence they are not the same as those born to citizens of the nation. Those born to foreigners are citizens via naturalization by the 14th Amendment. Those born to citizens are citizens via no law whatsoever. No such law was ever written and never will be written because Congress doesn’t possess the authority to make any law regarding citizenship except that which relates to foreigners.
Regarding subjection to U.S. jurisdiction, understand this; children belong to their parents and not the state. It’s a fundamental unalienable right. As long as a child is a minor it is subject to its parents and not the federal government. Its relationship to the state is through the parents, not direct. If the parents are subject to the state then their children are subject also through them. Only legally sanctioned Green Card immigrants [and citizens] are subject to the full political jurisdiction of Washington and only they and no others are described by the 14th Amendment and granted naturalized-at-birth citizenship by the choice of the American people who ratified the Amendment. Any court decision or administrative policy to the contrary is in violation of the meaning of the 14th Amendment.
Adrien, you can say you think jurisdiction *should* mean what you think it does. But that is not how it works. Anchor babies are a concern to many because it doesn’t actually work your way. If it did, anchor babies would not be any issue.
By way of example, when Congress set laws for who becomes a citizen when born abroad, they treated unwed mothers differently from wed mothers, in part apparently worried over a flood of babies from Korea and Vietnam carelessly fathered by soldiers in those wars.
But when it comes to birth on American soil, they don’t and can’t do any such thing.
That’s the world we live in, the actual world. Saying you would like it to be different is one thing. But it is incorrect to say it actually works the way you think it should.
I don’t believe there is any Constitutional bar against that, other than that the 14th insists that all persons within the jurisdiction of the United States be treated equally under the law.
The laws of the United States generally specify what set of persons the law affects, citizens, non-citizens, or both. The Selective Service law undoubtedly says that it affects only citizens and permanent residents. So it isn’t that we can’t draft foreigners, it is that we won’t.
Also the any foreigner, drafted into the U.S. military against their will, will probably ask their own country for protection. The U.S. fought a war over just this issue when the British were impressing American merchant sailors into the British Navy. We call it the War of 1812. That war was called off due to lack of interest on both sides and with no resolution, but not before the British had burned Washington and other places on the U.S. seaboard.
Britain stopped using impressment after 1814, but there has never been any permanent ‘legal’ barrier to stop them using it again.
America doesn’t do it because it doesn’t like the practice, not because it can’t.
Re: your (Adrein’s) reply to Keith above…
You say all that matters is what is true. But the truth that matters is how it works. The way it actually truly works is that babies born on American soil by tourists and illegal aliens and foreign students, to name a few, are born American.
Again, you can say you wish otherwise, that you think there is a greater, deeper, more natural law even. But that isn’t how it actually works. So calling your wishes truth is stretching it a bit.
Wow! You reeeally don’t get it. If I assert that the sun will rise in the East tomorrow I don’t need to cite some official “expert” or authority in order for that statement to be true. It is either true or it is not. No one’s opinion matters except your own opinion as to whether that statement is true or not. The truths I’ve stated aren’t made truer or falser by anyone’s opinion of agreement or disagreement. Don’t be like a boot-licking sycophant who always looks to the Alpha male as the source of his adopted opinion because he is too insecure in himself to do his own thinking.
“Sheriff Joe’s little chat where you said he supported your view.” You’re confusing me with someone else.
They are still subject to our jurisdiction. The subject to jurisdiction was to exclude common law exceptions which include children born to invading military and foreign dignitaries.
You may want to check 8 USC 1401
Nothing much to support your position.
Who is surprised?
ROTFL… You’re funny… Much projecting lately?
But children born to foreigners have a natural right to citizenship. It’s sooooo simple.
What part of US v Wong Kim Ark is still confusing you?
Just as appoint of reference, the Selective Service does require illegal immigrants, refugees, green card holders and a a couple other types to register for the draft. Any such who do not will lose their chance at future citizenship. Tourists and students, for instance, are not so required.
As for impressment, good point about the War of 1812.
Except the equivalent of what you actually are saying is that the sun should rise in the West.
In terms of jurisdiction, the way it actually works is that an illegal immigrant or a student or a tourist who has abby on American soil has just given birth to an American citizen. That is what happens, just as what happens is that the sun rises in the East.
Mr. Nash: Whether the sun will come up tomorrow is a fact to which you can cite a source. I don’t care if your source on that point is Little Orphan Annie.
However, the issue here is your assertion that your post is 90% facts, which you now assert are so self-evident, on the order of the sun rising in the East that you are exempt frrom citing facts, even citing to Wikipedia. If your position was so self-evident, then surely there is some citation which can explain why not a single member of Congress, not a single judge, not a single election commissioner, who has been asked this question, has agreed with you. Your response to me seems to back 100% off your 90% fact claim. Indeed, you resort to an ad hominen attack suggesting I might be a “boot-licking sycophant” [sic] apparently because I do not see the “facts” so self-evident in your opinions.
If I was truly a boot-licking whatever on this site, I might support Mr. Obama. I don’t. In my former career, we actually used facts to decide whether to fire rockets or drop bombs, and rarely, if ever, made such decisions based upon our view of “natural law.” Sometimes the search for facts became a thing unto itself.
So surely you must have a fact somewhere. How about a fact that non-immigrant aliens present in our country, such as foreign students, are not subject to our jurisdiction. Surely there is a case where some foreign student successfully defended himself from the jurisdiction of the United States.
NBC: thank you for coming to my defense.
There, that must make me a boot-licking sycophant.
That brings me back to Galileo and his Dialogue, where Simplicio, the guy he ridiculed, was the person making the “natural law” argument about objects falling through the air.
Are you telling us you didn’t follow Simplicio? That you gave credence to Galileo’s experimental proof over natural law?
Are you still reading that stuff? I quit reading past the first couple of sentences days ago.
There was always someone, sometimes a C.O., who was in favor of killing all of “them” and letting God sort it out.
WIsdom I need to follow.
Nor do they actually become “truths” just because your magical thinking wishes it so.
Again, you seem to have no real grasp of what constitututes the defintion of “truth” or “fact”. You simply sling those words around to disguise what is nothing more than your fantasy opinions.
Real facts and truths have solid grounding in empirical evidence to support them. Not mere magical thinking.
Again, all the real empirical evidence to be found only debunks your kooky notions.
The formal name for the diplomatic exception is “diplomatic immunity”. Diplomats are ‘immune’ from the metropolitan law of the country and remain under the jurisdiction of the country they are representing.
The “etc.” of which you speak is two extremely minor additions: members of an invading army, who are likewise not subject to the jurisdiction of the country they are invading, and Indians that are “not taxed”. There aren’t any Indians that are not taxed anymore, and Indians are citizens of the United States and subject to the laws of the United States just like any other citizen.
That is not a list of foreigners who are exempt from U.S. jurisdiction. It is a list of birth circumstances that Congress has decided results in ‘citizenship by birth’. The list doesn’t distinguish different classes or types of citizens, it distinguishes between different circumstances of birth that all result in the same class or type of citizenship.
The first item in that list is
(a) a person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof;.
There is no reference to the persons parents in that sentence, anymore than there is in the Constitution. This phrase is not new law. It is merely restatement, an acknowledgment, of the clause in the 14th Amendment, which is itself merely a restatement of the rule inherited from the English Common Law that the framers of the Constitution understood implicitly.
The other points (b) through (h) are descriptions of complicated birth circumstances not understood through Common Law. This is ‘new law’, passed by Congress. There is genuine academic debate about whether this individuals, ‘citizens from birth’ are technically ‘natural born’ or ‘natural made’. There is no debate that they are one or the other, there is no other choice, but there are proponents on both sides. I am on the technically ‘natural made’ side. But I am also on the side that kids born overseas to parents honorably serving their country should be considered ‘natural born’; it is unfair to punish the kid for the parent’s honorable service and deny them the right to grow up to be President.
The existence of this academic debate is the sole motivation behind the Senate resolution that declared that McCain was a Natural Born Citizen. According to one side of the debate he is not a Natural Born Citizen because his citizenship resides in an act of Congress. But it is unfair and unreasonable to deny him the right to be President because of his parent’s service overseas. The resolution served notice that no Senator (it passed unanimously) would sign a protest against McCain on those grounds should he win the Electoral College vote. Note that it takes a written, signed protest from one Congressman and one Senator to challenge the vote count during the election certification session.
A similar resolution for Obama was not required, there is no academic debate about whether Hawai’i is in the United States nor that he was subject to the jurisdiction of the United States at birth and thus there is no question that is is natural born.
I see. The Constitution doesn’t matter?
None of these processes ‘make you a citizen’. Amendments don’t make you a citizen. Judicial decisions don’t make you a citizen. administrative policy doesn’t make you a citizen.
You are either born a citizen, that is ‘natural-born’ or you are made a citizen, that is ‘natural-made’. You can only be ‘natural-made’ by law, passed by Congress. The Constitution gives Congress the sole power to make naturalization law. period.
The 14th Amendment does not ‘naturalize’ anyone. It describes the two classes of citizen, ‘natural-born’ and ‘natural-made’. Congress has had complete authority to make laws about naturalization. The 14th amendment did not alter or add to that authority in any way.
A person natural born does not require a law to make him a citizen. A person foreign born does, and Congress is responsible for that law, not Judges, and not administrators. Judges interpret the Constitution and the laws, administrators formulate policy based on the Constitution and the laws and execute the intention of those laws. They do not ‘make someone natural’, Congress does. And every naturalized citizen is exactly the same as every other naturalized citizen under the law.
There is no distinction between one natural made citizen and another natural made citizen. None.
There is no distinction between one natural born citizen and any other natural born citizen. None.
There is exactly one distinction between a natural born and a natural made citizen: the natural made citizen cannot be President.
Kudos again Keith. Another entirely excellent and well written post!
You are correct sir! It is true that the truth is not recognized and therefore is not followed, but it doesn’t follow that we can therefore contentedly go about our business in The Matrix of American life without perhaps seeking to know what the truth actually is. It boils down to this; either there is a principle to how things are meant to be or there is no principle. If there actually is a principle and it is fundamental to our origins, then believing that there is no principle would not be the correct approach to discerning what national policy should really be. The problem of the misconceptions embedded in the American psyche goes back several centuries to the time of the domination of the colonies by the Crown of England. I wrote a treatise on the history of national membership but it’s 8 pages long. I’ve not yet decided whether or not to post it online, but I also wrote one called The Evolution of Terms but can’t seem to find it. I’ll have to hunt for it.
Those who write of my wishes, -my desire that things were the way I want them to be, are doing me an injustice by ascribing subjective motives where none exist and none have been stated. I’m strictly analytical and have more important things to worry about, such as the federal debt and deficit. That could be a reeeeal game-changer. All that concerns me is what the truth actually is, not whether the government recognizes it. The government has a history of being stupid, or else Wong Kim Ark would not have had to sue the federal government all the way to the Supreme Court just to be recognized as an American citizen via the 14th Amendment.
I view the matters of citizenship from a perspective most or all of you do not have, and I’m speaking of not just a philosophical perspective but a literal perspective being as I live in a hamlet in a wilderness area far from the nearest town. I can go a whole week without speaking to another human being.
I just happened to come across the INS delineation of non-immigrant aliens while looking for something else
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/uscode08/usc_sec_08_00001101—-000-.html
TITLE 8 > CHAPTER 12 > SUBCHAPTER I > 1101
1101. Definitions
(15) The term “immigrant” means every alien except an alien who is within one of the following classes of nonimmigrant aliens—
(A)
(i) an ambassador, public minister, or career diplomatic or consular officer who has been accredited by a foreign government, recognized de jure by the United States and who is accepted by the President or by the Secretary of State, and the members of the alien’s immediate family;…
(B) an alien (other than one coming for the purpose of study or of performing skilled or unskilled labor or as a representative of foreign press, radio, film, or other foreign information media coming to engage in such vocation) having a residence in a foreign country which he has no intention of abandoning and who is visiting the United States temporarily for business or temporarily for pleasure;…
(a)…
(i) an alien having a residence in a foreign country which he has no intention of abandoning, who is a bona fide student qualified to pursue a full course of study and who seeks to enter the United States temporarily and solely for the purpose of pursuing such a course of study.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The exceptions to the exceptions in “B”, which includes workers, media people and scholars, show that the government views many who are here on a semi-permanent basis as not being foreign residents but as American residents. I suppose those exceptions are granted Green Cards since they are living and working here. They therefore would be viewed as subject to the full federal jurisdiction and children born to them would be viewed as being Americans.
Translation: You need to get out more. It appears that your isolation has only led to letting your imagination overtake you. No wonder your writings display such an utter detatchement and disregard from reality – you barely have to interact with the real world at all…
You may view yourself as “analytical”, but you are mistaken. A real analytical mind doesn’t ignore empirical data and doesn’t start with pre-conceived biased conclusions and then waste time coming up with lengthy screeds to describe what amounts to nothing more than their personal wishful thinking of how they want the world to work.
No, you are simply confusing being merely detailed in your personal obsessions with being “analytical”. Just as the real meanings of “truth” and “facts” escape your grasp, so does the actual meaning of being “analytical”.
See, the fact that you have “written 10s of thousands of words on the subject” does not mean that you have understood the subject or made correct conclusions.
Here is the first clue: all foreign students have to obtain a visa in order to enter the country. Their stay in the country is governed by the rules set out by that visa, if they violate the rules of the visa they can be deported. That visa is the result of a U.S. law.
If “foreign students” are not subject to the jurisdiction of U.S. law, how can the U.S. require them to obtain a visa and follow the rules governing it? Your entire hypothesis is overthrown at the first hurdle. Then there are traffic tickets, bank robbing, rape, dope smoking. If a foreign student is not subject to the jurisdiction of U.S. law, how on Earth is there anything resembling order on American college campuses?
All foreigners are subject to the jurisdiction of U.S. while they are in the U.S., except Diplomats of course.
While Diplomats are classified as ‘non-immigrant aliens’ for the purposes of visa classification, and diplomats enjoy diplomatic immunity from U.S. jurisdiction, that does not mean that ALL ‘non-immigrant alien’ visa holders are diplomats or immune from U.S. jurisdiction.
All oranges are citrus fruits, but not all citrus fruits are oranges.
A discussion of aliens rights and obligations under U.S. jurisdiction is here: Cornel University Law School Legal Information Institute: Alien.
A discussion of non-immigrant visa types is here: Immigrant and Non-Immigrant Visa Types
A discussion of diplomatic immunity in the U.S. is here: Diplomatic immunity in the United States
There is nothing in that stuff that says that non-immigrant aliens are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. Nothing.
All it says is that the Congress has recognized that different people have different reasons for coming to the U.S. and the Congress finds it useful to grant those folks the privilege of coming here under conditions appropriate to their stated reasons.
Students want to come to study. A reasonable study experience might include some part time work to supplement their income and/or to gain experience in their field of study. It does not include dropping out of school and working as a taxi driver in New York City or robbing a bank. Foreign students are under the jurisdiction of the United States.
Diplomats want to come to represent their country. Diplomats, officially representing their country are traditionally granted immunity from the jurisdiction of the metropolitan law of the country where they are accredited in order to ensure their duty to their home country is not compromised by harassment, law suits, etc. It has now been enshrined International Law via the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.
Diplomats and invading armies are the only set of aliens (whether immigrant or non-immigrant) that are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States while they are in the country.
I have done both, and quite a bit in between and all around. Big city, and by myself in the woods. I find it useful to move between society and nature, between theory and practice, etc. It can be useful to get out into seclusion, but it is not more true than city life. Until one can meditate in the noisy city, or the equivalent, one is just making nature/seclusion into a fetish. Similarly, theories need to be subject to the jurisdiction of practice; otherwise, they are merely weaving winter scarves out of lint collected while navel-gazing.
Utter nonsense.
Keith, diplomatic immunity is not related to the citizenship of a foreign diplomat’s American-born children. The diplomat exception refers to them being exceptions to the rule as to who is an immigrant alien. Diplomats aren’t immigrants and thus are exceptions to the rule.
The “etc” that refers to other exceptions is not what you’ve declared it to be because that view is not an element of U.S. law found in the Constitution, any amendment, or any legislation ever passed by Congress. You seem to think you’re living in England with its English common law. Common law is not actual law until it is relied upon to write actual law or interpret something by the judiciary. So the view you referred to is not only not written in stone, it’s not written in anything legally binding. Our relations with the diplomats of foreign nations is strictly via treaty and the Law of Nations. It should be noted though that the view you expressed is based on principle and that principle still holds sway, but is not limited in the manner that you erroneously assume.
You expounded on the wrong INS page. Here’s the correct one:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/uscode08/usc_sec_08_00001101—-000-.html
TITLE 8 > CHAPTER 12 > SUBCHAPTER I > 1101
1101. Definitions
(15) The term “immigrant” means every alien except an alien who is within one of the following classes of nonimmigrant aliens—
(A)
(i) an ambassador, public minister, or career diplomatic or consular officer who has been accredited by a foreign government, recognized de jure by the United States and who is accepted by the President or by the Secretary of State, and the members of the alien’s immediate family;…
(B) an alien…who is visiting the United States temporarily for business or temporarily for pleasure;…
(i) an alien having a residence in a foreign country which he has no intention of abandoning, who is a bona fide student qualified to pursue a full course of study and who seeks to enter the United States temporarily and solely for the purpose of pursuing such a course of study..
~~~~~~~~
“A person natural born does not require a law to make him a citizen. A person foreign born does, and Congress is responsible for that law”
This statement reveals a hidden assumption that is based on nothing. Nowhere in the Constitution is Congress given authority over those born overseas. It’s sole authority was “to establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization”. Natural citizens do not need to be naturalized. They can be born on the Moon and it makes no difference. They can be born just within, on top of, or just over the U.S. border and in principle it doesn’t matter to their citizenship because Congress has no authority to legislate regarding natural citizenship. Naturalization only pertains to foreigners and those born to them. They need to be artificially made into citizens via natural-ization.
“They (judges) do not make someone natural’, Congress does.”
Just to clarify, -that quote is not quoting any actual person, especially me since I’ll assert all day that no one can be made natural. They either are born that way or are not. You might want to backpedal on the idea that Congress can make someone a natural citizen. Congress used its authority to make foreigners into derivative citizens, and automatic naturalized citizens via the Civil Rights Act of 1866 but it is the executive branch as well as judicial offices that exercise jurisdiction over the naturalization process. All Congress could do was delineate who was and was not eligible for naturalization and citizenship, -excluding certain groups for decades.
Neither the Civil Rights Act of 1866 nor the 14th Amendment dealt with any persons other than freed slaves and children of immigrants born in the U.S. Natural Americans have always been citizens without it and its existence confers nothing to them. If immigrants did not exist, Americans would still be Americans via the natural law principle of natural membership. See: THE PRINCIPLE OF NATURAL MEMBERSHIP http://h2ooflife.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/the-principle-of-natural-membership-amicus-curiae2.pdf
“None of these processes make you a citizen’. Amendments don’t make you a citizen. Judicial decisions don’t make you a citizen. administrative policy doesn’t make you a citizen.”
You have much to learn. See the above. The INS is the only service that makes citizens from foreigners and their children and it has authority to administer law and policy, including traditions, but historically judges have been the front-line officers in the naturalization process. People don’t need it if they are born here to parents who are here legally thanks to the 14th Amendment and Wong Kim Ark. As for those here illegally, their status can only rightfully be dealt with via a constitutional amendment because it rightfully needs the direct consent of the American people.
“there is no academic debate about whether Hawai’i is in the United States nor that he was subject to the jurisdiction of the United States at birth and thus there is no question that he is natural born.”
Uh-oh, it appears that you are willing to be intellectually dishonest by the unsupported and unsupportable claim that natural citizenship is connected to place of birth. If you had said that there’s no question that a U.S. birth location makes one “native-born” then you would be truthful and accurate. But being native-born does not make one a natural native of any country. Only one’s native parents convey that status. See: NATIVE-BORN FOREIGNERS & FOREIGN-BORN NATIVES http://h2ooflife.wordpress.com/native-born-foreigners/
Of course not. Your sentence doesn’t even make sense.
Diplomatic Immunity is related to their job and their status as official representatives of their government.
If they have a child in the U.S. while on a Diplomatic mission, that child is not a citizen of the United States (either natural born or naturalized) because it is not born subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. Pure and simple.
On the other hand, a child born to a foreign student while in the United States is a natural born citizen because the child is under the jurisdiction of the United States..
Both Diplomat and Foreign Student are non-immigrant aliens. One is not subject to the jurisdiction of American law, the other is. It is not the non-immigrant status that is the difference. It is the REASON for being in the U.S. that is the difference.
Wrong.
The diplomat exception refers to the reason for their presence in the United States.
Diplomats are not exceptions because they are not immigrants. Diplomats are exceptions because they are Diplomats. Invading armies are exceptions because they are invading armies.
No other alien, immigrant or non-immigrant, student or tourist or businessperson, legal or illegal is excepted from the jurisdiction of United States law. No one.
The different classifications of ‘non-immigrant alien’ are bookkeeping aides distinguishing between the different reasons someone might like to visit the United States temporarily and has zero effect outside of immigration control.
I did comment on that here:
I repeat for emphasis: that section has nothing to do with jurisdiction, and nothing to do with citizenship. It has to do with different visa’s that can be issued for different purposes to specify what each class of non-immigrant alien is allowed to do while in the United States.
It is an example of the United State explicitly enforcing its jurisdiction on those aliens, not waiving it.
You are not barking up the wrong tree, you are in the wrong forest.
Fifteen minutes to Judge Wapner.
Mr. Nash: The sun has again risen in the East, but you have yet to cite any court decision or other source which confirms your intepretation of federal law, that non-immigrant aliens are free spirits floating among us, not subject to the jrisdiction of the United States.
We have a fellow in our business from India who is here on a work visa, but is a non-immigrant. He lives, I believe, in Orange County, California, and travels everyday day to our our California office, or whereever the job takeshim. I’ll be sure to tell him that since he is a non-immigrant he is not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. Does that theory exempt him from the Highway Patrol as well? May he speed, if one can ever really go fast on Southern California freeways? Does he owe California or Federal taxes, or have we been wrong in withholding them from his pay? Just how far does your theory extend?
Orly Taitz has managed it multiple times, so it can’t be that hard.
Dr. Taitz is clearly not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, or of civil society, given her ability to wreak such havoc upon the courts without consequence.
Mr Nash — I read the first half of your treatise on Natural Membership. I see that you begin as:
You are a philosopher, not a legal scholar. Your attempt to discern the fundamental nature of laws are by definition clouded by the fact that you are human and not divine. You are looking at a world where humans and human civilization have developed over time.
Your “facts” of natural law are not “facts” of nature, i.e. observable, reproducible, objective truths — they are your subjective truths, philosophical laws that you have discerned for yourself. Because they are yours, they are not universal. They seem to exist to you. The rest of us have not agreed that your subjective facts represent reality. You seem to be trying to reason from reason alone. This works for you in your cabin in the woods, but the modern world runs on man-made law, judicial opinions, and precedence.
Write you own philosophical treatise if you wish, but to operate in the real world you must establish that your “facts” are more than just yours.
BTW — Keith, Paper, and G — this has been a fascinating discussion to eavesdrop upon even though I am neither lawyer, philosopher, or Thoreau-wannabe.
Adrien is also wrong on many points if Natural Law, as discussed by various authors such as Locke.
This birther might want to look into seceding and starting his own republic. Nashville is taken but he might find more sympathy for eugenics there than some isle in the Adriatic.
And not a very good one. Ted Kaczynski was more coherent.
Was thinking about posting something very similar.
Adrien Nash obviously desires to engage the world, no matter where he lives currently. He has a website devoted to the topic. He comes here to engage and publicize himself.
The problem for Adrien is his approach does not work. That is, he is not going to be effective in engaging the world and convincing many people. His style and attitude and language will push many people away. He will perhaps feel secure in his ideas and think the world is wrong. That will work for him in his own logical cul-de-sac , but it will not work in the world at large, much less in our legal system.
For all of Thoreau’s relative removal to nature, he was quite engaged (perhaps not as Emerson would have liked him to be, but nonetheless engaged). His work went on to influence Gandhi and Martin Luther King. He invented an improved pencil.
*If only* Thoreau were a model for birthers and such otherwise insular philosophers.
This amateur academician seems to suffer a common birther malady which is being able to distinguish fantasy from reality or what is from what should be.
” the fact that you have “written 10s of thousands of words on the subject” does not mean that you have understood the subject or made correct conclusions.”
Allow me to educate you a little as to incorrect conclusions. Counties, and States are not the federal government. Their laws are irrelevant to the 14th Amendment requirement of subjection to the the laws of The United States. That subjection is not what you erroneously presume it to be from your simplictic view point. The jurisdiction that one must be in subjection to is the FULL political as well as legal will of the federal government. I’ve said it a thousand times so I’ll say it one last time; non-immigrant aliens are not subject to the requirements of citizens and immigrants to defend the country.. If a foreigner is not a lega permanent resident then they are not required to register with the Selective Service, nor are they subject to the draft and forced military service. They are not subject to federal orders to not visit certain countries nor trade with them unlike citizens who are under such orders no matter where in the world they live, as well as income tax laws. Foreigners are subject only to the political orders of their own government and as such they are no different from diplomats.
The section of the INS code I posted does not explicitly relate to jurisdiction, but that does not mean that there is therefore no direct connection. There is a connection, but just as I don’t know where it is, so you don’t know where there is proof that all non-immigrant aliens are not viewed as one single class when it comes to jurisdiction. If you want to prove your point then prove it with actual U.S. Code, not just claims.
I’ve related examples that disprove any claim that foreigners are no different from citizens unless they are diplomats and such. The ball is in your court to prove otherwise.
Replies that use the word jurisdiction in a vacuum without acknowledging the fact that it is not something that one can characterize casually and be accurate are simply exercises in juvenile thinking.
Whatever4 wrote:
“Your “facts” of natural law are not “facts” of nature, i.e. observable, reproducible, objective truths — they are your subjective truths, philosophical laws that you have discerned for yourself. The rest of us have not agreed that your subjective facts represent reality. The rest of us have not agreed that your subjective facts represent reality. …the modern world runs on man-made law, judicial opinions, and precedence.
There is so much wrong with these statements, beginning with the fact that facts are facts and not opinions. Subjective truths? Philosophical laws? which no one else agrees to? The truth is that truth is not subjective, nor are natural laws subject to subjective perspective. The facts that I’ve pointed out are facts that are indisputable, and that’s why no one has disputed them. No one. Not one single fact regarding natural law has been contested by anyone because you all know them to be true from your own experience and observation. Don’t object that truth in principle is not reality in the real world because I don’t write about “the real world”, I write about the principles on which it was once based but no longer is because of the bastardization of legislative, and administrative law. I have never argued with anyone about what the law is as practiced, -only about what it means as written. I only point out the principles on which nations and groups are established but which have been forgotten and abandoned by those who were ignorant of the root principles of all natural civilizations. (see THE FOUNDATION of NATIONS/ Natural Rights & Unnatural Citizenship http://h2ooflife.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/the-foundation-of-nations.pdf)
More asinine gibberish. Yawn.
Natural laws
Eat
Crap
Copulate
Die
Thems the lot all else is manufactured
No bugger off
Yick Wo V. Hopkins:
Is this the Supreme Court exercising in juvenile thinking? BTW, I believe SCOTUS quoted this passage in Wong Kim Ark.
No sir or madam, you are absolutely 100% wrong. You are the one with the erroneously simplistic view.
What follows from your view is that no foreign student or tourist is subject to the laws of the Counties and States where they are physically present. They are absolutely free to any darn thing they want. They can violate traffic laws, run prostitution rings, traffic illegal drugs, anything. What is wrong with you?
Furthermore, the 14th Amendment specifically says that all persons (without regard to Citizenship, that is foreigner or U.S. Citizen) are to be treated equally under the law by the States (and by extension the political subdivisions of the States).
True. But only because the Government has chosen not to do so. There is no Constitutional bar against it. It would be an extremely desperate situation for this to happen, such as during the declining years of the Roman Empire and during Britain’s war with Napoleon. But it is a political bar, not a Constitutional bar.
In addition, there are provisions, in most States, that allow, during time of emergency, for ‘all able bodied persons’ to be ‘deputised’ or ‘commandeered’ to help deal with the emergency. If you are a ‘non-immigrant alien’ and you are ‘able-bodied’ you can be ordered to help fill sand bags at the levy just like every other ‘permanent resident’. Foreign doctors attending conventions in the U.S. are frequently called on to ‘pitch-in’ during emergencies, such as the fires in California or Tornados in the mid-west. That is not quite the same as being impressed into the military, but it demonstrates that they are fully subject to the jurisdiction of the Country and the State and the County and the Local Governments.
That is because a ‘non-immigrant alien in America’ is not ‘non-immigrant alien in America’ if they are in Cuba. The U.S. Government can make laws that govern the behavior of its own Citizens when abroad, but it cannot make laws that govern the behavior of non-Citizens unless they are physically in the United States. When foreign tourists enter the United States, they are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States as long as they remain in the United States, when they leave the United States they are under the jurisdiction of whatever country the enter, whether their own or another.
‘non-immigrant aliens’ are absolutely subject to American income tax laws. If they come here to work, they are most definitely required to pay income tax under the exact same circumstances as a citizen.
That is absolutely incorrect. It is beyond comprehension that you could even consider that a rational position.
If you would think about it for even a nano-second, you would realize that that situation would prevent any international tourism or business every where on the planet. If a foreigner could enter any country and do anything they darn well pleased, no country would ever let any foreigner into their country for any purpose at any time.
In fact, a non-citizen can owe US income taxes without ever setting foot in the US, through investments in US companies, properties, assets, etc.
I dispute them, right here, right now. Therefore, they are NOT indisputable.
That is why Whatever4 put the word in quotes: “facts”. Your “facts” are not facts, they are opinions.
As the saying goes, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, they are not entitled to their own facts.
The concept of Natural Law is not a fact, it is a philosophical framework. And it is a philosophical framework that you misunderstand. Your so-called “facts” are not facts at all, but opinions based on beliefs you hold about that philosophical framework.
That you have misunderstood the ideas in that framework is quite possibly because you are listening (reading) people who have recently appropriated the name and twisted the ideas and ideals to match their own. In this way they are trying to steal the ‘authority’ of people like Aquinas and Locke and Hobbes.
My sense is that your error appears to lie in understanding the relationship of Natural Law to Common Law and Common Law to Statutory Law. This is not a class on Philosophy 101, so I’ll just leave it at that, a suggestion where you could start some honest exploration of the subject you seem so flippant about.
The sovereign citizen and tax protester movements are full of people like Adrien who sadly think they can devine their own law and are delusional enough to think anyone cares. They have to admit that everyone is history disagrees with them but thinks insisting over and over that they are right are everyone else is wrong means anything. It is hard to understand this kind of mind. Why would anyone say the framers agreed with their view when they don’t have a shred of evidence that such is so? Seems something is wrong with their thinking process.
I’m having trouble parsing all the double negatives in that sentence, but I’ll take the ball anyway.
No one has made any claim that foreigners are no different from citizens. There are lots of differences, and the INS categories listed in the Titles that you named demonstrate that they do indeed have restrictions placed on them that citizens are not subject to.
The fact that there are laws restricting the behavior of foreigners while in the U.S. does not mean that those foreigners are not also subject to laws that apply to citizens as well. That some some laws specify that they apply only to citizens does not mean that all laws apply to citizens only.
The fact that there are laws that apply to citizens only does not mean that foreigners are not completely subject to the jurisdiction of U.S. law.
If I invite you to my house, and tell you that you can go anywhere in the house, except that my bedroom is off limits to everyone except my immediate family (and you are not my immediate family), does that mean that your behavior while in my house is governed solely by your Mother’s house rules and directives? Are you free to violate my house rule against peeing in the kitchen sink because you are a ‘non-immigrant alien’ in my house?
Riddle me this. Remember the guys that flew the airplanes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon? One of them missed the plane and survived. Can he be prosecuted?
He is a ‘non-immigrant alien’, yet he is sitting in a U.S. prison. How can this be?
Mr Nash seems not to have read the 14th Amendment at all. It reads: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
Note that as for jurisdiction it does not refer to the parents at all. It only refers to the jurisdiction of the child born in the United States. Suppose a hockey player pops over from Canada for a game in Detroit, has sex with a woman under the stands at the arena between the first and second periods of the game and impregnates her. He then returns to Canada and never darkens the door of the US again. It is true that when that child is born, the father is not subject to US jurisdiction in any way. But the child is, 100%. If the father decides he wants to claim paternity and bring the child to Canada to raise, he has to file his case in a US court. That child is a US natural born citizen and can grow up to be President. If paternity were established, he or she could also be a Canadian citizen and grow up to be Prime Minister. In theory, he could do both jobs at the same time, though the commute would be a bear.
Again there is clearly established law and then there is Adrien’s nonsense. The Supreme Court almost 200 years ago ruled that aliens were subject to our jurisdiction unless falling within the narrow exceptions of public law that included ambassadors and foreign armies. Wong Kim Ark agreed with this and rejected the silly “complete jurisdiction” argument that came from a cherry-picked quote when Congress was discussing indians who lived on land not competely under our control. The 14th Amendment Congress made clear the question was whether we had to ability to subject persons to our laws, not whether we did. Hence, with indians, the question was whether we had the ability to subject them to our legislative authority. The conslusion was we didn’t as we didn’t completely control the territory they lived on. Sadly, no matter how many times the Court rules on something, there will be ignorant idiots claiming their own version of law which, of course, means nothing. There is always be pro se nonsense from people with no understanding of law or history.
Translation: “I’m covering my ears. I’m not listening to you. La la la la!!!”
Nothing illustrates the fallacy of this assertion better than the very topic we’re discussing.
There are those to whom it is self-evident that citizenship and allegiance flow naturally from parentage (jus sanguinis) and others that believe that citizenship and allegiance flow naturally from place of birth (jus soli). Various societies have adopted different rules based on what they naturally feel is right.
The very existence of political factions flies in the face of your claim that there are universally-agreed-upon natural laws. Some believe that natural law is the “law of the jungle” — kill or be killed while others believe that forgiveness and self-sacrifice are the laws of the Creator. Some believe that the right to control ones own body is a natural right, while others believe that abortion is against the law of nature.
The fact of the matter is that “natural law” is nothing more than culture and personal opinion.
This does not mean that within a culture consensus can’t be reached on some basic things, but it means that natural law, if such a thing exists, is found by measuring consensus.
Your own posting here argues strongly against natural law because what you understand as “natural” is contrary to the consensus. If natural law is true and real, most folks would agree with it. You must be some aberrant fluke of nature, with a warped view of natural law because your view of natural goes against that of most people. I really think that for you “natural law” is just an excuse for your inability to marshal facts and logical argument in support of your views.
I would like to expand on my earlier comment about the full impact of the 2-citizen parent requirement for NBC.
As SCOTUS has definitively pointed out there are only 2 types of citizen: NBC and Naturalized. If the 2CP requirement is valid, then in order for a person to prove his citizenship today he must either be naturalized or be able to prove that all his U.S. ancestors were either naturalized, or were in this country by 19 Apr 1775 (I choose 1775 instead of 1776 or 1789 because of the 14 year requirement in Art 2), or were born to parents who also can provide this proof. As we all know, there is absolutely no requirement to do any of this to get a passport, regisister for elections, or any of the other myriad things for which citienship is a requirement. Most people can only take their ancestry by a couple generations. Therefore, the 2CP requirement is bunk. It only takes a little bit of reasoning to see how poorly thought through this whole 2CP thing is.
You must be some aberrant fluke of nature, with a warped view of natural law because your view of natural goes against that of most people. I really think that for you “natural law” is just an excuse for your inability to marshal facts and logical argument in support of your views.” -Doc
What Adrian, Al, Winston etc. fail to grasp (among a million other things) is this:
Hundreds of judgements, from all over the country, have upheld BHO’s eligibility and the jus soli version of NBCship. Now this is the important part:
These Judges, Administrators, Electoral Officials and so on have been young, old, white, black, hispanic, persian, asian, Chistian, Jewish, agnostic, liberal, moderate, conservative, libertarian, strict-constructionists, loose-constructionists, children of privileged elites and of poor single mothers… in short, a broad cross-section, politically, philosophically, socially, culturally… and every single one understood the law THE SAME WAY.
And yet you few still believe YOU are right, and ALL OF THEM, that wide variety of diverse, wise, and accomplished Americans, are wrong.
Call it what you will– shared delusions, toxic narssicism, conspiracy obsession– what it means is that Doc is correct. In lay terms, all your dogs are not barking; you have a screw loose somewhere; you are a couple ants shy of a picnic.
There is no other way of looking at it.
What? You are the only one who can use natural law without reference to the way things are? After all, it is natural law that states jurisdiction includes non-immigrant aliens. How do I know? Well, as you say, truth is truth, not subjective, and I see the truth very clearly, this is the way it should be, non-immigrant aliens are subject to US jurisdiction. You are contested and disputed by natural law itself. I would point you to a statute but like you I don’t write about the “real world.” I write about how it should be, the basis of how it was set in motion long ago before some people were treated as only 3/4’s of a person in our very own constitution. You are just apostate in your natural law, a heretic. Serious responsibility is put upon those few of us who see the real truth as it has always been, and you are just failing to do justice to truth. I wish there were an amendment to the constitution that would handle this situation where people have different opinions on what is true. But any such amendment by definition is merely an amendment and truth cannot be amended. It is eternal and always, beyond amendment. So we are left with you being apostate, a false prophet. It will be hard for you to accept, but I know you mean well, and so as you explore your heart I am sure you will come to see your errors, and return to the truth.
I can go to 1066 at least, five generations more if a doubtful source is correct.
Can you prove that all of them were naturalized U.S. citizens, or were present in the U.S. in 1775, or were born to such?
I hope you are not relying on anything from Halbert’s to prove your ancestry.
There is also a break at my 5 times great grandfather though. He was born in 1806, but the British burned the town and all the records in 1814 or there-a-bouts. I have to make a reasonable assumption to decide on who his father is. Its a pretty good guess, but uncertain none-the-less.
Yes.
Every one of them born 1776 were natural born subjects of the Crown, though if that doubtful reference is correct, a few of them may have BEEN the Crown (local Saxon Kings anyway). Those that stayed in the US after 1776 morphed from NB subjects to NB citizens and all the following generations remain NBC. The records are quite clear on all that – its written in Bibles and Church records so it must be true.
Good! Glad you’re not relying on fake genealogy.
Speaking of which, it is interesting that we may have one of this family’s members commenting on this site.
On my direct male line, we hit a wall in 1700 Virginia. Some people have posted conjecture but not enough evidence, in my thinking, to be valid. The added issue of a family of the same name but not directly related at the time has made it difficult.
Now, if I were to follow the Birther method, I would claim what I thought it should be and make the evidence (or lack thereof). My method is less satisfying in the short run but will prevent false claims and allow me to possibly find the answers. I accept the fact that I do not know yet and keep looking.
The first of my family name to arrive in the New World was likely a cabin boy on the Mayflower who apparently returned to England, then settled in Virginia for a short while, and finally died of drunkenness in Bermuda. It is the cabin boy’s older brother, who secured a franchise to run a ferry in Connecticut that is the ‘founder’ of our great lineage. There is another ‘line’ in Virginia, started we believe a few years later by a cousin.
The family was very prolific, each generation having between 8 and 14 children right down to my grandfathers day (my father had 12 siblings, 3 of which died at birth, and there were 4 sets of twins).
The break in my family’s line is fairly reliably solved due the observed ‘hole’ in the sequence of siblings in his nominated father’s offspring. In other words the guy we think was the father had something like 12 kids, spaced from 12 to 18 months apart (I really feel sorry for mothers back then), except that there is a ‘missing’ child in the pattern from 1805 or so to 1808. The nominated father had only two brothers, one of which died early and unmarried, the other married a widow late in life and had only 2 children from her.
It is not an unusual name, but it is not very common either. We are pretty certain that when we see the name in the area at the time, it is pretty certain that they are from our tree.
I’m sure this is all yawningly interesting to everyone out there.
Every response to my last comments was rife with elementary logic errors that are as transparent as glass to me but not to those who wrote them. I can’t help intelligent educated people with an innate problem with their logic ability. One of the clearest examples is talk about County and State jurisdiction that is completely unrelated to the federal government and its political will, or talk of civil jurisdiction when the matter at hand is political jurisdiction. The list goes on and on.
But let me make one thing clear, the principles of natural law are not subject to interpretation or opinion. They are the principles that govern the natural world, and one of them is the principle of natural membership. It is that principle that no one in a hundred thousand words has ever responded to because there is no way to dispute it. I’ve written about it in more than a dozen essays and no one has ever offered a single counter to any of it because there is none since it is a fact of life. Membership is either natural or it is not. Today I penned a 5-page essay on the subject of citizenship, natural membership, and presidential eligibility which illuminates things that you’ve never even thought of. Here’s a small section:
Those made citizens via the 14th Amendment are not described by it as “natural born citizens”, nor natural citizens, nor natural Americans, but are simply called “citizens” and that was enough and that was all that any foreigner and children born to him could have hoped for. It was what they were praying for and it became law via a gift of the American people, even if it was ignored by the INS & State Dept. for three decades when it came to its universal application (see Wong Kim Ark 1898).
But the citizenship of the other 98% was not affected by either of those acts, nor dependent upon them because it preceded them by decades, if not centuries, if not millennia. The law by which they were citizens was never written. One can argue incorrectly that it was the unwritten law of jus soli, as opposed to jus sanguinis, but what one can’t argue is that it was actually written and therefore is identifiable.
It was never written because it was derived from a universal principle that was as self-evident as its parent law, i.e. the law of natural membership, -the same law that’s seen in the relationships of all natural groups throughout the world, throughout the history of life that exists in social groups. “As are the parents, -so are the children.”. As it is in nature, so it is in society and in nations.
But if one chooses to assert that the unwritten law by which they are a natural American is based on jus soli, then that belief does not cancel the fact that any citizenship that is based on and derived from U.S. law or court ruling, or administrative policy is not natural citizenship but is man-made citizenship.
Man-made citizenship, including constitutional citizenship via the 14th Amendment (which can be called “legal citizenship”) is not natural citizenship in any sane person’s vocabulary. That which is natural is not dependent on the machinations of legislators and judges to make it so because it is so via blood connection. Thus it can be stated that natural citizenship is not legal citizenship because it is not derived from law nor the Constitution, even if it were to be jus soli natural citizenship (an oxymoron).
Therefore, anyone who is merely a legal citizen and not a natural citizen is not eligible to be President because their citizenship is not based on the principle that pre-dates the laws and the charter of government that formed the nation. Their citizenship is by the beneficence of the American people and they have no natural right to it, but obtained it as a gift, even if that gift began at birth.
But the citizenship of natural citizens is not a gift because it’s an unalienable right that they are born with. The government doesn’t grant it and the government can’t revoke it. Read the full text here:: NATURAL CITIZENSHIP: BEYOND ALL LAWS (unwritten, unconditional natural membership)
Hmm.. Are you aware you are using an argument that was popular with the Posse Comitatus and can currently be seen often on Stormfront. I would hope that is not your intent.
I am getting a big whiff of SovCit here.
The Presidency is a gift bestowed on someone by the American people (aka, the voters). No one has a right to the office. The current occupant has earned it fair and square appears llikely to do so again. Sucks to be you….
Your arrogant nonsense is laughable, bizarre and inconsequential.
“Unlike in Alice in Wonderland, simply saying something is so does not make it so.”
– U.S. District Court Judge Clay Land
Exactly. That’s why you’re wrong. You are expressing opinion. When you are ready to deal with the real principles, let me know. I am the only one who has the truth, and you don’t. Well, there a couple of other people, but they would spit you out for breakfast. The important thing is, truth, principles of natural law, you ain’t got it. There are few things that are as obvious as that. Thank you for the experience. Truth normally takes a lot of hard insight. It’s refreshing to see the truth of your errors so easily.
That is the whole flaw in your thinking. Your “principles of natural law” do not exist outside of your own mind.
If you actually considered yourself a “logical thinker”, you would not always begin your “analysis” with pre-conceived assumptions and then work backwards from there.
That is NOT the way that a proper methodology proceeeds. Quite the opposite.
But that is because you are simply espousing a faith-based personal philosophy of belief. One which quickly runs aground in failing to match-up to how the real world actually operates…