Posted on 11/19/2012 2:11:58 PM PST by KheSanh
A petition asking the Supreme Court to give a clear concise definition of the term "Natural Born Citizen".
Whitehouse.gov url to obtain the first 150 signatures:
http://wh.gov/9dpd
“This is where Obama may have issue. After he WAS, without a doubt an Indonesian citizen. He had a break in his US citizenship.”
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LOL, total BS!
There is no proof that he was an Indonesian citizen, and no legal basis for claiming that he would have “had a break in his US citizenship” even if he had been.
Either you are hopelessly confused and conflate and confound a “natural born Citizen” with a “citizen of the United States” or you do so intentionally.
All this shows is the WKA court didn't have a strong legal foundation on which to make Ark a citizen. If it were as simple as what you want to believe, then the court shouldn't have rambled on for 50 pages trying to parse and dissect English common law. They certainly did NOT have a case where any child of a foreign subject outside of England had their citizenship examined. They admit that the rules they wanted to use only applied to the children of WHITE resident aliens, but they still had to create a way to satisfy the subject clause which means English common law was never sufficient on its own to make anyone a citizen.
Except the ruling DOES say that principle continued after the Declaration, and on after the Constitution.
Yes, I acknowledged that it said that this applied to making the children British subjects who were born to British loyalists. Go back and read what I just wrote.
WKA makes a two-prong argument: that WKA was a citizen by both the NBC clause and by the 14th Amendment.
Sorry, but this is an outright lie. The court defined the NBC clause as per the Minor decision: all children born in the country to parents who were its citizens. WKA was NOT a citizen by the NBC clause.br
This is another one of your falsehoods. Read the quote. It doesn't say Minor used English common law to determine the Founder's intent in writing NBC. It says they used "common law" to as an "AID" in the "construction of THIS provision." THIS PROVISION is a reference to the "very provision of the Fourteenth Amendment now in question." It is NOT a reference tot he NBC clause nor was it to determine intent in writing NBC. Besides, the common law that Minor used to define NBC is from the Law of Nations NOT from English common law. It's not noted in the decision, but the quote is close enough to LoN to be plagiarism.
Second, the context in Minor REJECTED a 14th amendment citizenship argument. This means that this idea that the very English common law that YOU THINK defines NBC was instead soundly and comprehensively rejected by the Minor court as applying to the 14th amendment birth provision. If the common law were accepted, then there was no reason to reject Virginia Minor's 14th amendment citizenship claim. But that's exactly what happened. Waite said the 14th amendment did NOT confer citizenship on Virginia Minor because her citizenship was never in doubt since it conformed to being born in the country to citizen parents ... a definition that he EXCLUSIVELY characterized as Natural-born citizen.
Learn to read ALL the words. You're failing badly.
That's not what that passage says. Gray cited Slaughterhouse because of the exclusions it listed to the subject clause of the 14th amendment. These exclusions were NOT comprehensive because NBCs are ALSO excluded from the 14th amendment, but NOT by the subject clause. They are excluded by definition within a UNANIMOUS decision written by the same people who decided Slaughterhouse. The circumstances in Slaughterhouse didn't need to consider a definition of NBCs, but only who was excluded from the subject clause of the 14th amendment. Gray also cites Elk v. Wilkins for the exclusion of Indians from the 14th amendment. By citing the Minor definition of NBC, Gray has to go elsewhere to make WKA a citizen. That's why the WKA decision proceeds another 25 pages beyond the paragraphs you just cited. Ark was not born to citizen parents, thus he was NOT a natural-born citizen.
What purpose does it serve for the WKA decision to cite anything about citizen parents at this point in the decision?? Why does it emphasize that the holding in Minor was dependent on Minor being born to citizen parents if not for how that criteria defines NBC??? Think, Rogers, think.
Rogers is engaging in intentional disinformation. He knows better but is only here to confuse people who may read this and realize the truth that Obama is not and cannot be Constitutionally eligible for office.
This is simply not true. "Born a citizen" is a criterion. It is not "the crtieria" (sic). Hamilton wanted it to be the only crtiterion, but that idea was wisely rejected by the Constitutional Convention in favor of the natural born citizen requirement.
Hope this helps.
His stepfather was clearly an Indonesian citizen. BY LAW his mother became an Indonesian citizen one year after the marriage in March 1965. She would have become an Indonesian Citizen in March of 1966. At that time Obama was only 4 years old.
http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/3ae6b4ec8.html
“(2)With the exception as mentioned in para 1 the foreign woman who marries a citizen of the Republic of Indonesia also acquires the citizenship of the Republic of Indonesia one year after the marriage has been contracted,...”
So how does a child, age 4, have two parents/guardians that are legally citizens of a country that disallows dual/multi-citizenship and the child NOT be a citizen of the same country?
It fails any and all simple logic tests. A child of this age would automatically follow his parents citizenship.
As far a proof. Proof of anything during the period of 1966 to 1972 is lacking. What passport did Obama use during the period? He was removed from his mothers US passport. That is a fact. Did he go onto his own US passport? Show it and this is a mute subject. Fail to show it and the mystery continues.
1971. The ‘grand reunion’ in Hawaii. This is where this was all cleaned up. No one, absolutely no one has chosen to look under that rock. Its a rock that probably has a bouncing betty under it.
Of the scant documentation that has been produced there is evidence of Indonesian citizenship. There is nothing to counter that. As of now the objective evidence points to Indonesian citizenship. It can be countered with full and complete transparency.
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Show Obama’s US passport he held between 1968 and 1971. And this failure of being a ‘born Citizen’ all goes away.
Until then, he has potential and likely problems with the natural part and the born part of the requirement.
“So how does a child, age 4, have two parents/guardians that are legally citizens of a country that disallows dual/multi-citizenship and the child NOT be a citizen of the same country?”
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That’s the best you can do? That’s nothing but conjecture, completely unsupported by anything even remotely approaching proof that Obama ever became an Indonesian citizen.
But you’ve neglected to address the most important part. As you say, he was four years old. Now please cite some U.S. law that would justify your claim that acquiring Indonesian citizenship — which there is not the slightest jot of proof that he did — would have compromised his U.S. citizenship in any way. Note that it doesn’t matter in the least what Indonesian law says. U.S. citizenship is governed by U.S. laws; no other nation gets to tell us who is or is not a U.S. citizen.
If you can’t make that part of the case, and I don’t believe that you can, your point is worthless.
Perhaps you should define your terms.
How do you believe “citizens of the Unites States” differ from the other two categories?
A “citizen of the United States” is any U.S. “citizen” who is not a “natural born Citizen.”
The “natural born Citizens,” “[a]t common law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar” were “all children, born in a country, of parents who were its citizens.” Minor v. Happersett, 88 U.S. 162, 167-68 (1875); U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649, 679-80 (1898) (citing and quoting Minor). Wong Kim Ark recognized that simply being a “citizen at birth” did not make one a “natural born Citizen.” It therefore held that Wong was a Fourteenth Amendment “citizen of the United States” from the moment of birth, but it did not hold that he was an Article II “natural born Citizen.” Hence, to argue with reliance on Wong Kim Ark that a “natural born Citizen” is any person who becomes a “citizen at birth” is to not only misstate the holding of Wong Kim Ark, but also to state the obvious condition of a person who is a “natural born Citizen” (a “citizen at birth”), rather than to provide the means by which one becomes a “natural born Citizen” (born in a country to “citizen” parents).
There are two types of citizens: those born citizens and those made citizens by naturalization. Thus, per the US Supreme Court:
“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.” The evident meaning of these last words is not merely subject in some respect or degree to the jurisdiction of the United States, but completely subject to their political jurisdiction and owing them direct and immediate allegiance. And the words relate to the time of birth in the one case, as they do to the time of naturalization in the other. Persons not thus subject to the jurisdiction of the United States at the time of birth cannot become so afterwards except by being naturalized, either individually, as by proceedings under the naturalization acts, or collectively, as by the force of a treaty by which foreign territory is acquired.”
There are only two categories of citizens, not three - born, or naturalized. As Minor pointed out:
“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.”
If I recall properly, there are seven pieces of proof that he was an Indonesian citizen. 1. Registered at a school restricted to Indonesian citizens.
2. Statement on Mother's Passport naming him "Soebarka".
3. Under Indonesian Law, Adoptions are Automatic.
4. His Sister Maya said her father (Lolo Soetoro) Adopted him.
5. In Ann's Divorce decree, he is named as a child of Soetoro.
And I forget the other two. Anybody else remember what they were? I'll have to check through my old messages, but I remember there were seven bits of proof that he became an Indonesian citizen.
WKA used a two prong argument, not one. It did NOT discuss just the 14th Amendment, but also discussed at great length the meaning of natural born citizen. It spent half the decision discussing the meaning of NBC, and the only reason for doing so would be to show that WKA met that standard - and that standard was born in the USA under amity with the government. The exceptions that applied - children of ambassadors and an invading army - also applied to the 14th:
“The real object of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, in qualifying the words, “All persons born in the United States” by the addition “and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” would appear to have been to exclude, by the fewest and fittest words (besides children of members of the Indian tribes, standing in a peculiar relation to the National Government, unknown to the common law), the two classes of cases — children born of alien enemies in hostile occupation and children of diplomatic representatives of a foreign State — both of which, as has already been shown, by the law of England and by our own law from the time of the first settlement of the English colonies in America, had been recognized exceptions to the fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the country.”
And you too are leaving out the important part.
Even if, hypothetically, he had become an Indonesian citizen, so what? Show me the U.S. law that says it would have had any effect whatsoever on his U.S. citizenship. He was born in Hawaii, and is therefore a natural born citizen regardless of anything that Indonesian law might have to say, or any action his parents could have taken.
Thank you for your opinion.
My opinion would be that “natural born citizens” would be a subset of “citizens of the United States,” but let’s ignore that particular discussion.
I would suggest that the Constitution recognizes three classes of citizens. “Natural born citizens,” naturalized citizens, and “a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution.”
In constitutional terms classes 1 and 3 are identical, since there are no differences between their rights and privileges. And of course, class 3 is extinct, so there is not a whole lot of point talking about them.
I think you are correct on this, but I am not certain. Sven maintains that it *IS* possible for parents to give up a child's citizenship, but the child may reacquire it during his majority.
The only way I can see Indonesian citizenship as being a problem for Obama is if he committed an act of affirmation after his age of majority. Some people argue that Obtaining and Using an Indonesian passport after he turned 18 qualifies as an act of affirmation for Indonesian citizenship.
I do not know if he did this, and even if he did, I do not know that this constitutes an affirmative act sufficient to obviate his existing American Citizenship. It is just something to keep in mind as a possibility, but currently I know of no conclusive evidence that he affirmed Indonesian citizenship after he turned 18.
His college records might shed some light on this. (If we could see them.) I wonder if University officials could be charged with Misprision of a Felony if they know the truth and intentionally withhold that information from the authorities?
Show the US passport and the entry records between 1968 and 1971.
Simple.
Obama simply has no US passport after being taken off his mother passport. He only had an Indonesian passport during the time.
It is the only reasonable explanation.
The kicker is what happened in December of 1971.
All the records were updated and sealed. They had to be. They had to make Obama Senior the legal, docucmented father in order to get Obama Jr. out of Indonesian cleanly.
So Obama goes from being Indonesian to Kenyan (since the official birth father was used to terminate Indonesian citizenship) then to ????? back to US citizen via naturalization? Or was his original citizenship restored with no legal breakage though in actuality it was.
Yes, that makes sense - all done in December of 1971. Hence no naturalization records in all likelihood.
Is that all I got? Its a lot more that anything that support Obama being a US citizen at the time. For that - there is nothing. Like a passport or an port of entry record from immigration. But we already covered how easy it would be to put this to rest.
School record.
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