Ramsay wrote that citizenship “belongs to none but those who have been born of citizens since the 4th of July, 1776.” That is plainly untrue. It may have been true at the time, but the 14th amendment fundamentally changed the definition of citizenship in this country.
Oh, and Justice Douglas was a Justice of the United States Supreme Court, who was writing on behalf of the court. His word carries more LEGAL weight than some obscure historian, regardless of when the historian lived.
The 14th amendment did not alter the definition of natural born. That amendment only addresses those who are native born.
Since you have apparently declared yourself a constitutional scholar perhaps you’d like to educate the rest of us by explaining:
1) Why there have been over 300 congressional resolutions in the past 220 years attempting to RE-DEFINE natural born as something other than TWO Citizen parents???
2) Why the Senate resolution regarding John McCain’s elibility in 2008 (and signed by Obama) confirms he was natural born by virtue of TWO citizen parents???
If you'd read the footnote:
One must be aware, however, that this language does not appear in any case having to do with citizenship or naturalization or the rights of naturalized citizens and its force may be therefore questioned
It's dicta, having no legal force at all. It was an attempt at an analogy. It could still have persuasvie force, but in determining the meaning of a Constutional term, the writing of a historian contemporary with the adoption of the Constitution, especially one as well known and thought of as Ramsay, would likely be much more persuasive.
Ramsay wrote that citizenship “belongs to none but those who have been born of citizens since the 4th of July, 1776.” That is plainly untrue. It may have been true at the time, but the 14th amendment fundamentally changed the definition of citizenship in this country.
It did not. Even it's authors said as much. What it did change was to apply the "rules" to "all persons", regardless of race. Otherwise it didn't change anything. Plus it says nothing about "natural born citizenship". Oh it has the word "born" and the word "citizens" but that does not equate to "natural born", at least until a court says it does, in a case where it matters. Meaning a case involving eligibility to the offices of President or Vice President.
You are plainly misinformed and highly uneducated on the subject. Elk v. Wilkins (1884) upheld the ruling in Slaughterhouse (1873) which held that the 14th Amendment was infact constitutional. What was the ruling on “born subject to the jurisdiction” phrase in the 14th?
The jurisdiction clause of the Fourteenth Amendment is somewhat different from the jurisdiction clause of the 1866 Act, of course. The positively phrased “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States might easily have been intended to describe a broader grant of citizenship than the negatively phrased language from the 1866 Act, one more in line with the modern understanding. But the relatively sparse debate we have regarding this provision of the Fourteenth Amendment does not support such a reading.
When pressed about whether Indians living on reservations would be covered by the clause since they were “most clearly subject to our jurisdiction, both civil and military,” for example, Senator Lyman Trumbull, a key figure in the drafting and adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, responded that “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States meant subject to its “complete” jurisdiction, “[n]ot owing allegiance to anybody else.”[4] And Senator Jacob Howard, who introduced the language of the jurisdiction clause on the floor of the Senate, contended that it should be construed to mean “a full and complete jurisdiction,” “the same jurisdiction in extent and quality as applies to every citizen of the United States now”[5] (i.e., under the 1866 Act). That meant that the children of Indians who still “belong[ed] to a tribal relation” and hence owed allegiance to another sovereign (however dependent the sovereign was) would not qualify for citizenship under the clause. Because of this interpretative gloss, provided by the authors of the provision, an amendment offered by Senator James Doolittle of Wisconsin explicitly to exclude “Indians not taxed,” as the 1866 Act had done, was rejected as redundant.[6]
The interpretative gloss offered by Senators Trumbull and Howard was also accepted by the Supreme Court-by both the majority and the dissenting justices-in The Slaughter-House Cases.[7] The majority in that case correctly noted that the “main purpose” of the clause “was to establish the citizenship of the negro” and that “[t]he phrase, ‘subject to its jurisdiction’ was intended to exclude from its operation children of ministers, consuls, and citizens or subjects of foreign States born within the United States.”[8] Justice Steven Field, joined by Chief Justice Chase and Justices Swayne and Bradley in dissent from the principal holding of the case, likewise acknowledged that the clause was designed to remove any doubts about the constitutionality of the 1866 Civil Rights Act, which provided that all persons born in the United States were as a result citizens both of the United States and of the state in which they resided, provided they were not at the time subjects of any foreign power.[9]
Although the statement by the majority in Slaughter-House was dicta, the position regarding the “subject to the jurisdiction” language advanced there was subsequently adopted as holding by the Supreme Court in Elk v. Wilkins.[10] John Elk was born on an Indian reservation and subsequently moved to non-reservation U.S. territory, renounced his former tribal allegiance, and claimed U.S. citizenship by virtue of the Citizenship Clause. This Court held that the claimant was not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States at birth, which required that he be “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.”[11] Elk did not meet the jurisdictional test because, as a member of an Indian tribe at his birth, he “owed immediate allegiance to” his tribe and not to the United States.
“It may have been true at the time, but the 14th amendment fundamentally changed the definition of citizenship in this country.”
That is twisting the original intent of the 14th, which was to protect slaves newly freed. NO slave ancestors of Barrack H. Obama were in America then. His U.S. citizenship comes SOLELY through his mother. THE 14th doesn’t apply.