Posted on 03/12/2011 9:33:22 PM PST by Seizethecarp
You may add The Boston Globe to the growing list of influential media sources who have expressed the opinion that simply being born in the United States does not qualify one to be President. Recently, this blog pointed to a similar opinion in the New York Tribune. These pre-dated Breckenridge Long’s similar opinion as stated in the Chicago Legal News.
Recently, one of my readers uncovered this crucially relevant article published in the Boston Globe on November 9, 1896 by Percy A. Bridgham, aka “The People’s Lawyer“. (Mr. Bridgham’s book, One Thousand Legal Questions Answered by the “People’s Lawyer” of the Boston Daily Globe, can be found in the Harvard Law School library.)
The People’s Lawyer, upon answering a reader’s question regarding the Constitution’s natural born citizen clause, stated:
“The fact that the Constitution says “natural” instead of native shows to my mind that the distinction was thought of and probably discussed. A natural born citizen would be one who by nature, that is by inheritance, so to speak, was a citizen, as distinguished from one who was by nativity or locality of birth a citizen. A child born to Irish parents in Ireland cannot become a citizen except by naturalization, while his brother born in the United States is a native born citizen; the former is neither naturally nor by nativity a citizen, the latter is not naturally, but natively a citizen.”
It’s important to note that, while this article was written two years before the controversial decision in Wong Kim Ark, Bridgham adopts a similar conclusion as Justice Gray did in that case by stating that children born of aliens on US soil are citizens. But Bridgham also states that while these children are “native born” citizens, they are not “natural born” citizens and therefore cannot be President.
(Excerpt) Read more at naturalborncitizen.wordpress.com ...
We’ve rarely had such a nasty jerk in the White House as John Adams. He turned on Hamilton (and everyone else) many a time, to the point that Hamilton finally crossed the party line and endorsed Jefferson over Adams.
Adams (at the encouragement of his wife Abigail) had tried to round up his political opponents at newspapers and jail them under the Alien and Sedition Act, because at heart he was a fascist.
Jefferson, brilliant as he was, was also a sneaky bastard, possibly due to the influence of James Madison, with whom he was close. He had the good sense to burn his personal papers before his death.
Adams lost his reelection bid, appointed a bunch of judges he thought would be hostile to Jefferson’s policies, and blew town before Jefferson was sworn in.
The whiny little bitch did one service for the country that was his greatest — he was the poor bastard who followed George Washington.
The remarks about “foreign influence” probably were Adams’ barbs directed at Jefferson, whom he (through proxies) accused of being too much under French influence.
Similar to your example of the Georgia fiasco, New Hampshire has in the past few days rejected a move that would require presidential candidates to establish NBC status at its primary level.
One Republican leader said the requirement would jeopardize its treasure as the “first primary” state because Obama didn’t need NH and would just not appear.
Another “Republican” leader argues the “birther issue…keeps discussion away from many of the things that President Obama is doing wrong and puts the discussion on where he was born, in spite of the fact that we’ve seen copies of the birth announcement in the Hawaiian papers.”
Astonishingly, other Republicans were fearful the proposed bill would seem a direct attack on Obama and moved to have it apply only after the 2012 election.
Is anyone aware of a single state with meaningful electoral votes that has considered effective NBC legislation that has not also defeated it?
How many more years will the anti-Americans need to complete their agenda?
That wouldn't bode well for a state in deep financial trouble...they NEED the revenue from the 9% meals and lodging tax that would be generated by the media and all that political support staff coming to Red Hampshire.
Yes, and the point made by one observer is that they seem willing to trade off a piece of the Constitution, if not the future of the country, for those tax revenues.
There are certainly a lot of names for such behavior, none flattering.
Wow .. such vitriol to read on a Sunday morning.
All these demeaning adjectives used to describe
John and Abigail Adams is certainly new to me.
David McCullough wrote of his flaws, as all humans have, but the overriding influence and impact that Adams had on the early days of this nation is mighty.
There’s always rivalry among power players and men of power, vision and egos. I accept McCullough’s well-researched analysis of the life of Adams and the conclusion that he was a patriot and pivotal to the founding and early survival of this country.
They all played their parts, that .. at the time in all the various areas of government.. were so key in the tenuous first days and years of creating a country from square one. And Hamilton sure doesn’t appear to have been such a prince of a man and to be that saintly and worthy of descimating and trampling Adams’ reputation and documented record of contributions and achievements.
“During his tenure as Treasury secretary, Hamilton clashed repeatedly with another cabinet member, Thomas Jefferson.
Hamilton favored a powerful central government while Jefferson feared it; Hamilton favored closer relations with Britain, and Jefferson, with France. The men would both resign their Cabinet posts before the end of Washington’s first term. They would remain lifelong political enemies.
Hamilton might have risen to the presidency if not for a scandal in 1797. A pamphlet published that year revealed Hamilton’s affair with a woman named Maria Reynolds and linked him to a scheme by Reynolds’ husband to illegally manipulate federal securities.
To prove his innocence, Hamilton resorted to publishing love letters he had written to Maria Reynolds. This cleared Hamilton of financial impropriety, but badly damaged his reputation. The scandal did not stop George Washington from appointing Hamilton acting commander of the U.S. Army in 1798 when the country was on the brink of war with France.”
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/duel/peopleevents/pande06.html
We’re all failed, flawed human beings, no?
We were born in the mid-west USA and our parents were unnaturalized Russian immigrants. These facts and consequences of the matter dawned on me after WWII service although I thought differently as a child with the idea any one can become POTUSA.
We were born in the mid-west USA and our parents were unnaturalized Russian immigrants. These facts and consequences of the matter dawned on me after WWII service although I thought differently as a child with the idea any one can become POTUSA.
Once dependence on others is gone, then only can one's potential be realized.
(Longtan)
A clean kill or no kill, Lord
Such is my heart's desire
Give me the skill to make it so
Or let me hold my fire
And when my time upon this earth
The days they are fulfilled
Grant that I may die at least
As clean as those I killed
Our parents were unnaturalized Russian immigrants and we were born in mid-west USA. As a child I believed anyone born a citizen could become POTUSA. Learning differently wouldn’t have made any difference as to serving.
Adams was as I described him, and did the things I recounted — it wasn’t vitriol, it was fact.
“Hamilton favored a powerful central government while Jefferson feared it”
Adams did also — which is why both were Federalists.
Hamilton’s “love affair” was actually a blackmail plot that succeeded because of his chivalrous alley cat nature.
Burr was a scumbag. And when Hamilton was murdered by Burr, Adams’ response was, “a caitiff had come to a bad end.”.
Thanks to McCullough’s book, we’ll probably have to put up with how great and misunderstood the mean-spirited Adams was. He was an important figure, but he was bitter about what he saw as a lack of recognition for his (mostly imaginary) greatness. Washington put together a very gifted cabinet — an institution that we actually owe to him, and not to the Constitution (quick, get the torches! the cabinet is unconstitutional! ;’), but Adams was denied any role (other than breaking ties) in the Senate, and he was bitter about that too.
Hamilton had far more impact and influence on the early republic than Adams, and our country is the better for it. Washington was nominated as the commanding general of The Revolution by John Adams, which is another of his great contributions, because without Washington’s leadership and choice of aides (including Hamilton), the British would have won, period, and he wouldn’t have become our first, and one of our two greatest, Presidents.
And speaking of vitriol, Adams wrote of Washington:
[snip] He once sarcastically listed Washington’s talents, all of them involving his appearance, form and pedigree. “Here,” he sneered, “you see I have made out 10 talents without saying a word about reading, thinking, or writing.” [unsnip]
Well, it seems you are quite emotionally married to
your point of view. So be it ..
I shall be grateful for all the Founders, each
playing his part in creating the greatest beacon
for freedom and individual rights in the world.
we’ll probably have to put up
Wouldn't that be a nice change?
I'm getting tired of putting out.
Stating facts is not the same thing as being emotionally married to a point of view. Adams said and did those things, that’s just a fact. But go ahead and call it whatever you want.
The mysterious, ongoing FR smear campaign against Alexander Hamilton continues to both amuse and bemuse — and those smears are not only vitriolic, they are incoherent, much like the FR attacks on Lincoln.
I shall be grateful for all the Founders, each
playing his part in creating the greatest beacon
for freedom and individual rights in the world.
“Learning differently wouldn’t have made any difference as to serving.”
And for that, you receive a standing ovation and the gratitude of your fellow Americans. You paid higher dues than many, and your brother paid the most that could be asked. Thank you.
(Please understand I was merely completing the other posters comment.)
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