Justice Kennedy rejects 2 more challenges to Obama

AP via SFGate ^ | 12/17/8

[SmithL]

WASHINGTON, (AP) -- Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy has rejected two more efforts to get the court to consider whether President-elect Barack Obama is eligible to take office.

Kennedy on Wednesday denied without comment an appeal by Philip J. Berg, a Pennsylvania attorney, that claims Obama is either a citizen of Kenya or Indonesia and is ineligible to be president . . .

[El Gato]

The actual *wrong* here — is — the vetting process is deficient and failed us. Obama is not the “wrong” in this matter — but in the spirit of the “founding fathers” — they never depended upon “man” to provide the “right” in the situation — but rather — they depended upon the *process* to provide the right — because they knew that all men are sinful and therefore cannot be depended upon.

There is nothing that says there cannot be two wrongs. One is that their essentially is no vetting process under the law. Two: It is absolutely and positively wrong for an ineligible candidate to run for an office. It's fraud, it taints the entire process. "I didn't get caught" is no excuse for violating the highest law, the Constitution. That wrong, assuming it exists, must be addressed as well as the flaw in the system that the mere possibility of it has exposed.

[El Gato]

Guess you missed it, but he’s already been officially designated by the Electoral College now as the next president.

Guess you missed that votes are not counted yet, and won't be until January 8th, when Vice President Cheney opens the reports of the votes from the states. The Fat Lady has not yet sung.

[El Gato]

I don’t see how it’s not about politics.

Two different versions of politics. This is not about partison politics, since even if Obama were DQ'd the House is overwhelmingly Democrat, and would pick a Democrat, or would fail to pick anyone until 2013, in which case we'd Acting President Biden for 4 years.

But is about the other sort, the kind you describe.

I think battletank was referring to *partisan* politics.

[El Gato]

I should have thought you would know enough to understand that you can’t say it with any authority — without — proof that he is unqualified... But..., that’s the point that escapes you.

But of course the catch 22 is that the one thing that would prove the case, either way, is being kept from the public.

Now there are all sorts of circumstantial evidence that something is amiss, but again the one thing that would provide proof is what is sought.

[dennisw]

Or, there could genuinely be nothing to this stuff, as many of us have said for some time. Nahh, that couldn’t be it. USSC has to be corrupt.

You are a historian
You should know there is very little case law on "natural born citizen" and the Presidency
The Supreme Court was asked to rule on this with 0
And they punked out
Because they are gutless wonders not because the case has no merit

http://www.theobamafile.com/NaturalBornCitizenChart2.htm

 

[LS]

"they are gutless wonders"

This is exactly what I predicted people would say when the USSC rejected these cases.

Now, people will kick the can down the road again and say, "It isn't official until January." Once it becomes official in January, the goal posts will move again until gradually it becomes 2012 and people around here are still harping on birth certificates.

[dennisw]

http://www.theobamafile.com/NaturalBornCitizenChart2.htm

You should Research the above and then give me your opinion

[LS]

My opinion is that whatever the courts say is law. Therefore this case is a nothing. Move on.

[RC2]

You’re kidding. I found your information very informative, but there are a lot of people that only listen to information that they want to hear. Again, thanks for your time.

[Red Steel]

Info. Berg refiled the Application again with Scalia.

“Dec 18 2008 Application (08A505) refiled and submitted to Justice Scalia.”

http://origin.www.supremecourtus.gov/docket/08-570.htm

[MN Doc]

It is interesting to note the case Perkins v. Elg, 307 U.S. 325 (1939), which refers to a young woman born in the US of parents holding Swedish citizenship. Her father had been naturalized, but later renounced his US citizenship after the parents returned to Sweden with her when she was a child. She sued to claim her US citizenship on reaching age 21:

The court below, properly recognizing the existence of an actual controversy with the defendants..., declared Miss Elg 'to be a natural born citizen of the United States'

By this definition, therefore, anyone born in the US, even of non-citizen parents, is a natural born citizen of the United States.

The website's "Natural Born Citizen Chart" claims the the Constitutional definition of "Natural Born Citizen" requires that the person be "Born in the U.S. mainland" of parents who "Both are U. S. Citizens". This is not true. The term is not defined in the Constitution: "No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President..." The site claims that this term is also defined in law, but offers only a Swiss source document predating the Revolution:

Emmerich de Vattel's explanation of "Natural Born Citizen" given in his 1759 benchmark work, used, and so often quoted, by the framers of the U. S. Constitution, makes the understanding simple, explicit, clear, definite, exact, precise, and strict. In the CITIZENS AND NATIONS, paragraph #212, de Vattel says: "The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens. As the society can not 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 a 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."

This statement is obviously in conflict with the concept of the US as a nation of immigrants, and with US law, specifically the 14th Amendment:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.

The issue of his father's citizenship is therefore irrelevant, and the only issue in question is whether Obama was, in fact, born in the US.

[dennisw]

The website's "Natural Born Citizen Chart" claims the the Constitutional definition of "Natural Born Citizen" requires that the person be "Born in the U.S. mainland" of parents who "Both are U. S. Citizens". This is not true. The term is not defined in the Constitution: "No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President..." The site claims that this term is also defined in law, but offers only a Swiss source document predating the Revolution:

Natural born citizen is not well defined at all anywhere. How much case law is there on it?
This is exactly why I wanted the Supreme Court to rule whether 0 is a natural born citizen for purposes of being President. The Supreme Court chickened out

 Take a look at "Perkins v. Elg" Natural born citizen is not mentioned   http://supreme.justia.com/us/307/325/

 

[El Gato]

The *history* is that the issue has been on the table for a long while. People have already had the opportunity and time to consider it all they want to (*if* they really want to).

IF

they even knew about it before the election.

Most of the Obama voters did not even know that the Democrats controlled Congress, and you expect them to know that there were questions about the eligibility of The One to the office of President.

[dennisw]

From Wikipedia>>>Constitutional provisions

The special term "Natural Born Citizen" is used in particular as a requirement for eligibility to serve as President or Vice President of the United States. Section 1 of Article Two of the United States Constitution contains the clause:

“

No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.

_______________________________________________

 

George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were born as British citizens in their colony here
Obama was born a British/Kenyan citizen

Washington and Jefferson were eligible to be President despite being born British citizens  .... Only because they were US citizens at the time the US Constitution was Adopted. Obama is not eligible for that exemption

I'll bet if Obama was born here of two British citizens and was thus a British citizen, that you would still call him a natural born citizen. I sure wouldn't

[dennisw]

In nutshell——

In the USAs early days there was a special exemption for those born as British citizens to be eligible to be President. That exemption is gone. Obama was born a British citizen therefor cannot be President

[MN Doc]

You said:

Take a look at "Perkins v. Elg" Natural born citizen is not mentioned

This quote is from the deciding paragraph of Perkins vs Elg, which I quoted (my emphasis) in the earlier post:

The court below, properly recognizing the existence of an actual controversy with the defendants..., declared Miss Elg 'to be a natural born citizen of the United States'

Miss Elg was born in the US of parents with Swedish (and in the case of her father, naturalized US) citizenship. The Supreme Court, in this case, used that precise phrase to describe her in its conclusion. Apparently, the Supreme Court, in a case you cited, believes a "natural born citizen" to be any person born on US soil, regardless of that person's parentage, (except for the children of diplomats, who are not subject to US jurisdiction.)

[El Gato]

All very nice. But he must still meet the actual Constitutional qualifications. The process is important, but it's those qualifications that are more important. It's what makes us a Representative Republic and not a Representative Democracy. Running, and taking office too, if one knows that they are not qualified is fraud. When and if exposed there will be Hell to Pay, one way or another.

You make a big deal of the fact that the voters picked him. If he wasn't eligible, then those voters where hoodwinked and defrauded.

The fact that no one (officially) asked for proof that he met the qualifications is beside the point. He knew what they were, so he can't claim ignorance, if he does not meet them.