Posted on 04/29/2010 9:14:44 AM PDT by BuckeyeTexan
Ping
It says "citizen" for Congress because a naturalized citizen is eligible. That's the only distinction to draw from those words.
ping
Well, crud. Sorry, rxsid. Cut and pasted the whole title into the FR search and it didn’t show the one you posted. Maybe the ellipsis at the end screwed up the search?
I agree.
No worries. And yeah, probably the “...” made the difference (in not finding the other thread).
I guess my objection is with the idea that Obama OWED the UK allegiance at birth.
He was eligible to claim citizenship in the UK, but foreign law does not obligate him to do so, or divide his natural loyalty.
Given that:
1) His father never seems to have lived with his mother, and he was raised by his mother or her parents, and
2) his father completely abandoned him at a very early age, and
3) his father wasn’t legally married to his mother, since he was already married at the time and bigamy was illegal,
4) he has never in any way acted as though he had allegiance to the UK, and
5) he has deliberately snubbed the British government on multiple occasions,
I find the idea that Obama owed natural allegiance to the UK ridiculous.
Also, the USA does NOT support the ‘once British, always British’ doctrine - we had a war over that in 1812...
The search function will miss threads at times especially if you use the entire title. Example is to use the following words from the title and it will call both threads up.
educating
really
confused
Just my experience with the search function.
The following quotes came before the possibility of Obama being elected was raised, so I think they show where legal opinion had settled prior to Obama running:
“NATURAL BORN CITIZENS. A natural-born citizen of the United States is one who is a citizen by reason of his place of birth or the citizenship of his father. The two classes of naturalized and natural born citizens are thus mutually exclusive, and together constitute the entire citizen body of the United States. ”
Andrew C. McLaughlin & Albert Bushnell Hart ( Ed.), CYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN GOVERNMENT Vol. 2 (1914).
“NATURAL-BORN CITIZEN. A person whose citizenship derives from the nation where he or she was born.”
Kenneth Robert Redden, Enid Veron, Modern Legal Glossary, pg. 263 (1980)
“Natural-born citizens can acquire that status by being born in the United States, on the basis of jus soli…”
William Carroll, Norman Smith, American Constitutional Rights: cases, documents, and commentary, pg. 130 (1991)
“The requirement that the president be a “natural born” citizen implies that the framers recognized the principle of jus soli. According to this doctrine – literally meaning the “right to land or ground” – citizenship results from birth within a national territory.”
Kermit Hall, The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States, pg. 24 (1992)
“Americans are accustomed to the concept of automatic citizenship granted to persons born in the United States, who are called “natural-born citizens…”
Joseph M. Bessette, American Justice, Volume 1 – Page 129 (1996)
“Natural-born citizens are people born in the United States.”
David Heath, the Presidency of the United States, pg. 8 (1999)
“Natural Born Citizenship Clause. The clause of the U.S. Constitution barring persons not born in the United States from the presidency.”
Black’s Law Dictionary, eigth edition (1999)
He doesn't believe there are multiple classes of citizenship. He believes there is only one class, citizen and that all citizens enjoy the same rights and protections under the Constitution. Where he distinguishes a difference between citizens is in the multiple paths to obtaining citizenship.
For example:
1. Citizens by birth
a. natural born citizens
b. citizens by the 14th Amendment
c. citizens by statute
2. Citizens by naturalization
3. Other citizens by statute
An example of this might be derivative citizens - i.e. foreign woman who married a U.S. male between 1855-1922. Or a woman whose husband became naturalized in those same years and the wife became a citizen by statute automatically - this one could also be seen as a sub-category of naturalization, but there are probably more examples.
The Fine Print: I believe I have acturately summarized his opinion. However, don't hold him accountable for any errors in my interpretation.
I guess I missed the part in your quote that show Obama felt loyalty to the UK, and how he demonstrated that loyalty...silly me.
Lesson learned. Thanks for the advice. It’s appreciated. I hate to be a culprit of posting duplicate threads. In this case, I’m not going to ask the mods to delete it. If they do so on their own, so be it.
Beckwith,
For clarification, are you essentially saying that a law governing the status of one’s citizenship (by blood) equates to that person owing a natural allegiance?
Mr Rogers,
Are you essentially saying that the such a law does not equate to a natural allegiance?
Thanks,
Tex
He was granted British citizenship at birth and did not have to take affirmative action to claim it or retain it at the age of majority, just like his U.S. citizenship.
(Stipulation: Some dispute Obama’s being granted British citizenship at birth based on his being an illegitimate child of an unrecognized marriage under the BNA of 1948.)
When Obama was granted his Kenyan citizenship upon Kenya’s independence from GB, he was required to take affirmative action to retain that citizenship when he reached the age of majority. (I believe that’s correct. Someone please correct me if I’m wrong.)
Obama took NO steps to claim UK citizenship, so there is no sign he felt any allegiance. My sister was born in Germany, but she has ZERO natural allegiance to Germany, although she COULD have claimed German citizenship.
Under the Kenyan Constitution, if Obama wanted to be a citizen, he needed to renounce his US citizenship:
“A person who, upon the attainment of the age of twenty-one years, is a citizen of Kenya and also a citizen of some country other than Kenya shall, subject to subsection (7), cease to be a citizen of Kenya upon the specified date unless he has renounced his citizenship of that other country, taken the oath of allegiance and, in the case of a person who was born outside Kenya. made and registered such declaration of his intentions concerning residence as may be prescribed by or under an Act of Parliament.”
http://kenya.rcbowen.com/constitution/chap6.html#97
I’m saying the British law does not impose any natural allegiance on Obama’s part, nor has he ever shown any allegiance in any way to the UK.
Legally, I believe the consensus prior to Obama’s running was that ‘natural born’ meant born in America, versus a naturalized citizen. That may or may not have been the original intent, but the original intent doesn’t seem clear enough for a court to rule Obama ineligible.
Obama didn’t have to take any steps to claim his British citizenship. It was his by birthright.
Same as Elg, right? U.S. citizenship was hers by birthright. Her parents couldn’t take it away from her by moving her out of the country and renouncing their U.S. citizenship.
Wouldn’t the same apply to Obama? His mother and grandparents couldn’t take away his British citizenship just by raising him in Indonesia and the U.S.
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