I think we need a poll of Freepers, anonymous of course, asking our opinions on “Natural Born Citizen.
One question should be, “Does Natural Born Citizen mean Citizen at the moment of Birth and nothing else?”
I am confident that the radical, crackpot birther theory would not represent a majority of Freeper opinion.
How in Sam H can we convince the country of anything, when after arguing this nonsense for over 6 years on FR, you birthers have NOT convinced a majority of Freepers?
(And I note that Diogenes Lamp attacked me by name before I even entered this thread discussion!)
This does not that he IS smarter than everyone else.
It means only that he, himself is CONVINCED that he is smarter than everyone else.
He can not present a single, major Conservative or Liberal legal or lawsuit oriented political action committee like the Heritage Foundation or the Landmark Legal Foundation which agrees with him.
He can not name a single elected official anywhere in the country who supports his idiotic legal theories.
He can not point to a single Judge, anywhere, who agrees with him.
He can not point to a single immigration attorney, ANYWHERE who agrees with him.
He has not one, single legal scholar on his side.
And, he will now tell you that I am making the “argument from authority” error in logic, huh?
What is law, if not OPINION?
And he has no respected opinion on his side, at all.
NONE!
That's pretty well put.
DL would of course point to Herb Titus, and possibly to one of the Justices in the Dred Scott case, to Samuel Roberts, to John Marshall, to Bushrod Washington, to John Bingham, and maybe to one or two others.
But as I've noted before, Herb Titus really enjoys no national stature. Even worse, he gives no detail at all for reaching his conclusion. NONE. No authority. NOTHING. He just states it as fact.
What it amounts to, then, is just his opinion.
The Justice in the Dred Scott case wasn't arguing the definition of natural born citizen, and was directly contradicted by another Justice of equal authority.
Samuel Roberts, like Herb Titus, was a guy of no national authority who was expressing his own opinion unbacked by any authority at all, and he was completely contradicted by all the heavyweights of his day.
Neither Marshall nor Washington said what DL claims, and Marshall actually very much seems to have affirmed the understanding in Bayard's book, which totally contradicts DL.
And as we've talked about many times, the words of John Bingham and our other legislators have been misunderstood and misrepresented by DL and other birthers. That becomes clear when you read the entire debates. By "subject to no foreign sovereignty," he did NOT mean what the birthers claim.
This is evident, for example, by another representative quoting Rawle's crystal clear statement while Bingham was in the room, and nobody, including Bingham, objecting in the slightest.
So on the whole, I'd say what you said was correct.
And, he will now tell you that I am making the “argument from authority” error in logic, huh?I've been auditing a number (most) of these Ted Cruz and related eligibility threads for several months. Interests in history and law make the topic a good one. Schedule doesn't allow for much posting (it's a very time-consuming habit), but I'll come off lurking mode for a bit.