Is Ted Cruz a Natural Born Citizen... of Canada?

[RegulatorCountry]

I suggest spending a little more time with this topic before getting too torn up about it. I cited dicta from a well-known USSC opinion that is pertinent to the debate.

As far as terms-of-art utilized by the Founders in the Constitution, there were no definitions offered for citizen, law, press, religion, nation, state... no terms were defined.

I suppose we’re now completely adrift and at the complete mercy of whatever scheme a bunch of politicians dream up, as far as the meanings of Constitutional terms?

I want a pony. Which term should I choose to mean pony so I can get one?

[Ray76]

“The statute defines who is a US citizen at birth. To claim that he would not be a citizen without that statute — and that there is some class of “naturals” who would be — is to assume a definition that is not in the law or the Constitution. You can invoke natural law, and so can anyone, on anything; Nature hasn’t handed down any statutes.”

The statute defines who is a CITIZEN at birth. Without the naturalization statute he would not be a citizen.

The US born child of citizens has ALWAYS been a citizen and it has NEVER been doubted. NO LAW makes this so.

[Ray76]

sovereignty - ie subject to the jurisdiction

[Forty-Niner]

Agreed! In an effort to justify Obama’s installation as President in spite of his ineligibility, all sorts of redefinitions of NBC are floated.

The sad thing is that there are Conservatives that have been sucked into this and are using it to promote their own favorite ineligible horse.

[Forty-Niner]

They were also not US citizens and therefore he is not eligible.

[Forty-Niner]

I never wrote the words you quoted......

Article II requires that a President be 35 years old, resided in the US for 14 years, and be Natural Born Citizen.

The Founders did not coin the term “Natural Born Citizen.” The term itself had been in use in Western culture for hundreds of years. They chose to use that specific term in writing Article II to exclude those not so born.

As the 18th Century accepted definition of NBC was born in a country to citizen parents, those lacking that quality were excluded from the Office of the President with the exception of those citizens that had been born before the Constitution was written, because it is impossible for someone to have had citizen parents before the establishment of the US as a Nation. (They chose not to wait 35+ years before installing someone as President.)

The USSC, which is the final arbitrator of US law, has always held the those who were born in the US to citizen parents were the Natural born Citizens of the US. It has never used that term (NBC) in conjunction with those born under circumstances not meeting that definition. They have accepted as born citizens people that did not meet the NBC standard but were born under specific other circumstances...In doing so the courts have been careful not to establish “classes” of citizenship where the rights of those citizens were different than those of other citizens. We must be aware that NBC has no application in the US except in qualifying to be President.

My statements that

“All NBCs are born citizens, but not all born citizens are Natural Born Citizens” stands.

Obama, Jindal, Rubio, and Cruz do not meet the definition of Natural Born Citizen and therefore none of them are eligible to hold the office of President of the US. Are these men citizens? Probably, because of various applications of law, but they are most certainly not Natural Born Citizens as envisioned by the 18th century Founders and US law.

[Godebert]

“The citizens are the members of the civil society; bound to this society by certain duties, and subject to its authority, they equally participate in its advantages. The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens. As the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights. The society is supposed to desire this, in consequence of what it owes to its own preservation; and it is presumed, as matter of course, that each citizen, on entering into society, reserves to his children the right of becoming members of it. The country of the fathers is therefore that of the children; and these become true citizens merely by their tacit consent. We shall soon see whether, on their coming to the years of discretion, they may renounce their right, and what they owe to the society in which they were born. I say, that, in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is a citizen; for, if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country.”

[Forty-Niner]

John McCain’s Father, accompanied by his mother, was in the US Navy and was on duty in the Panama Canal Zone. The soil of the US is always under the shoes of military personnel wherever they are assigned. No matter what line was crossed to insure his safe birth, John McCain was born to parents who stood on US soil.

(and I thoroughly dislike John McCain and his politics)

Be advised that John McCain, in any event, did not assume the Office of President so questions of his eligibility are moot.

[Jeff Winston]

I don’t know whether you’ve been in on the discussion, but 3 of our first 4 Presidents were declared citizens of France by the French Parliament.

Yes, it was out of honor. But it seems to have carried with it all privileges of French citizenship.

So George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison were all French citizens - WHILE serving as President.

[Jeff Winston]

The words "natural born" do not occur on any of the explanatory information that I was also given about his situation. My understanding has been that he could not run for POTUS, just as my husband could not play rugby for Wales. But that is not explicitly written anywhere on the official info given to me that day.

There's never been an official Supreme Court decision.

That said, after studying the matter for WAY longer than I should've ever put into it, I conclude that "natural born citizen" is, to all purposes, simply an equivalent term to "born a citizen." Although I confess it would've been a heck of a lot easier if they had just used the latter term instead of writing what was an old common-law term of art.

This is also the general consensus of legal scholars.

You son can run for President if he wants to. On meeting the other criteria (age and residency), he's eligible.

[DiogenesLamp]

Any person regardless of nationality can be compelled by the nation state in which they are physically located to serve in that nations armed forces. This is because that person is within their dominion. While uncommon, unwise and rarely done, it has been done by nation states. This is because the nation state can force the individual to serve or suffer punishment.

You left out "unlawful". You are simply trying to dodge the point. If Mr Cruz had remained in Canada, and had been drafted into their army engaged in a war against us, after all was settled, no one in this country would make any objection to Canada for their having used Mr. Cruz in this manner.

Should they do such a thing to you or I, the State Department would consider it a violation of international law, and would likely bring it up as a charge against that Nation.

In Cruz's case, we would recognize the right of Canada to do so. In your or my case, the United States would regard it as a breach of civilized norms, and a crime against the United States.

Stop pretending that there is no difference. There *IS* a difference.

[maica]

I conclude that “natural born citizen” is, to all purposes, simply an equivalent term to “born a citizen.”

#####

I think you are correct.

[DiogenesLamp]

SCOTUS is the final arbiter of all cases under the Constitution.

SCOTUS is the body who decides what gets shoved down our throat whether it be right or not. They do not transform something which is factually WRONG into something that is FACTUALLY correct.

Again, do you recognize Roe v Wade as legitimate Law? Or do you correctly recognize it as a Judicial grab for power and an imposition of false legal doctrine on the states because the court was partisan and had the power to do so?

I do not respect the rulings of the court which are wrong. When they are wrong, I will say so, and I will say WHY those rulings are wrong. We conservatives should STOP taking the word of "Authorities" for anything. They've lied to us so many times, and we should simply stop respecting their authority to rule over us by Fiat.

Do you support Roe v Wade?

[DiogenesLamp]

You make two assumptions: First, that non-citizens cannot be drafted as a general rule, which is false. Second, that Canadian law should determine US citizenship status, which is absurd.

Yes, it IS absurd, and that is exactly why you phrased it that way. It wouldn't serve your argument to phrase it correctly.

I believe I said that they couldn't be compelled to fight against their own country. Not legally anyway, and it isn't "Canadian" law which is determining the claim, it is recognized and accepted "International law." Citizenship is always a case of International Law. Were there no other nations, there would not be different "citizens." All would be the same.

[Ray76]

I conclude that "natural born citizen" is, to all purposes, simply an equivalent term to "born a citizen."

Article II specifies “citizen” at the time of adoption of the constitution, and “natural born citizen” thereafter.

“Citizen” necessarily encompasses “naturalized citizen” as well as “natural born citizen”. If a naturalization statute creates “natural born citizens” then there is no need for the Grandfather Clause, “citizen” would have sufficed.

Equating "born a citizen" with “natural born citizen” is an impermissible construction.

[bluecat6]

Go read dozens and dozens and dozens of government document that say anyone SINCE Congress passed the law IS collectively naturalized.

Tool.

[Jeff Winston]

I think you are correct.

Thanks.

There's now LOTS of evidence out there as to what the Founding Fathers and their generation meant by the term.

The thing that really simplified it for me was reading James Bayard's comments on the matter in his Brief Exposition of the Constitution of the United States (1834), in which he described the term as being a "citizen by birth." He was talking about people in the exact situation as your son, and his specific point was that such people were eligible; one only had to be born a citizen.

His book was reviewed by Chief Justice John Marshall, who dominated the US Supreme Court for 34 years, starting just 13 years after the Constitution was ratified. Marshall basically said he found only one point in the whole book to correct - that Congress didn't seem to need permission from the States to build military and post roads, they already had it.

So it seems that Chief Justice John Marshall, "the Great Chief Justice," was of the opinion that whoever was a "citizen by birth" was a "natural born citizen," and eligible.

I figure if anybody ought to know, it would be him.

[Nero Germanicus]

c. Birth on U.S. Military Base Outside of the United States or Birth on U.S. Embassy or Consulate Premises Abroad:
(1) Despite widespread popular belief, U.S. military installations abroad and U.S. diplomatic or consular facilities abroad are not part of the United States within the meaning of the 14th Amendment. A child born on the premises of such a facility is not born in the United States and does not acquire U.S. citizenship by reason of birth.
(2) The status of diplomatic and consular premises arises from the rules of law relating to immunity from the prescriptive and enforcement jurisdiction of the receiving State; the premises are not part of the territory of the United States of America. (See Restatement (Third) of Foreign Relations Law, Vol. 1, Sec. 466, Comment a and c (1987). See also, Persinger v. Iran, 729 F.2d 835 (D.C. Cir. 1984).

http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/86755.pdf.
(See page 5)

[Jeff Winston]

“Citizen” necessarily encompasses “naturalized citizen” as well as “natural born citizen”. If a naturalization statute creates “natural born citizens” then there is no need for the Grandfather Clause, “citizen” would have sufficed.

No, there's a huge difference between someone who is a citizen at and by birth, and someone who was NOT born a citizen of the United States but was naturalized at some point later in life.

Those who are citizens AT AND BY BIRTH (whether that status can be affected by laws set by Congress or not) is a natural born citizen. Those who aren't citizens AT AND BY BIRTH are not.

See my previous post. James Bayard wrote in 1834 that people in Cruz's situation were ELIGIBLE. And Chief Justice John Marshall, who of all persons ought to have been in a position to know, agreed.

[Ray76]

At and by birth, or at and by statute? Cruz is a US citizen by naturalization statute.