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To: allmendream
So you are reduced now to making the argument that the founders were more familiar with Vattel than they were with English law? Another fools errand - no doubt you are up to the challenge!

Well, given that this is the Book of English Law which John Adams studied, and given that he actually spent several months living with, and several years working with Charles Dumas (Editor/Publisher of Vattel's Droit des Gens), I would say that this particular founder most certainly does not follow YOUR definition of Natural Born Citizen.

143 posted on 11/21/2012 8:44:06 AM PST by DiogenesLamp (Partus Sequitur Patrem)
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To: DiogenesLamp

So then, you agree with me that the founders did not almost exclusively study in French?

And that the law they studied was English law, and the language they studied it in was English?

Now it is obvious that under English law for one to be “natural born” EITHER place or parentage was enough - the law the founders were most familiar with, that being English law - did not have the requirement for BOTH parentage and place of birth in order for one to be “natural born”.

James Madison had this to say...

“It is an established maxim that birth is a criterion of allegiance. Birth however derives its force sometimes from place and sometimes from parentage, but in general place is the most certain criterion; it is what applies in the United States; it will therefore be unnecessary to investigate any other.”

It seems that the law Madison was most familiar with derived its force SOMETIMES from place and SOMETIMES from parentage - there was no requirement that it be both.


145 posted on 11/21/2012 9:21:13 AM PST by allmendream (Tea Party did not send GOP to D.C. to negotiate the terms of our surrender to socialism)
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