Natural born citizen just means an American citizen at birth.
“Natural born citizen just means an American citizen at birth.”
Huh? Please explain.
That's not how I understand it. Please cite your source. Thanks.
Oh, and welcome to FR.
wrong.
do a bit of homework before spouting off when you know nothing about the subject matter. your feelings on the subject are insufficient
I’m afraid it doesn’t.
No it doesn't. Aldo Mario Bellei was a citizen at birth. The Supreme court took away his citizenship because he did not meet the residency requirements. Natural born citizens do not have any residency requirements. Rogers was a citizen at birth by congressional statute. A natural citizen does not require any statute or any amendment to be a citizen, they are a citizen by nature.
>> “Natural born citizen just means an American citizen at birth.” <<
The documents of the time show that to be utterly false.
Not according to the controlling Supreme Court decision, Minor vs. Happersett
This issue stirs old Obots like Mr. Rogers and Allmendream, and inspires a few new ones, as it should, since truth will eventually be understood, even if the Constitution is no longer deemed relevent.
The Constitution doesn't include definitions - by design. James Madison, among several framers and many founders explained that to preserve ideas, hopefully eternally, required fixing definitions of words to the time of the authors. Over time the meanings of words change. It was the intent to create a document clear and readable to every literate citizen (and literacy was amazingly high in 1787), not depending upon interpretation of terms by a titled aristocracy or the protectors of their privilege.
The common law was cited by Chief Justice John Marshall, referring to the interpretation of “natural law” which was designated as our new nation's first law book by Thomas Jefferson in 1779, for our first law school, carved out of William and Mary by the Swiss legal philosopher whose volume “Law of Nations” was read by Ben Franklin when released in the French, its publisher providing Franklin three copies of the first English translation in the 1770s. Those copies, according to Franklin, were in constant use by our founders during the Continental Congress. Washington had three copies, but had to borrow one on his first day as President from the New York Public library. Hamilton and Jefferson's copies were cataloged in their private libraries, and legal historians show that no legal source was more cited by in US jurisprudence between 1790 and 1821 than Law of Nations.
Thomas Paine explained in “Rights of Man”: &ldquo:
"The presidency in America (or, as it is sometimes called, the executive) is the only office from which a foreigner is excluded, and in England it is the only one to which he is admitted. A foreigner cannot be a member of Parliament, but he may be what is called a king. If there is any reason for excluding foreigners, it ought to be from those offices where mischief can most be acted, and where, by uniting every bias of interest and attachment, the trust is best secured.”
Chief Justice Morrison Waite, establishing the principle referenced at least thirty times in Supreme Court Cases, as precedent in Minor v. Happersett clarified both the nonsense that the US has no common-law, as well as the clear common-law definition of who are natural born citizens, the same definition explained to the full house by 14th Amendment author John Bingham. From Waite's decisions, and cited by Justice Gray in the Wong Kim Ark, the case resulting in anchor babies, which decided that San Francisco-born Wong Kim was not a natural born, but was a naturalized citizen, as Barack has described himself:
“The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common-law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives, or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners.”
Every US Senator agreed, in April of 2008, during Senate Judiciary testimony over Resolution 511, sponsored by Barack’s campaign co-chair Clair McCaskil, Barack, Hillary;, and others:
“My assumption and my understanding is that if you are born of American parents, you are naturally a natural-born American citizen,=d>” Chertoff replied. “That is mine, too,” said Leahy.”
Why did Clair initiate a resolution to imply (resolutions are not legally binding) that John McCain should be considered a natural born citizen? Her earlier action, S. 2678, a law, the ‘‘Children of Military Families Natural Born Citizen Act’’, to make McCain eligible, failed to pass. McCain's problem was a technicality which the Senate claimed was an oversight, and should be ignored. McCain is why Republicans were silent, though they will likely claim the political turmoil with the economy failing was not in the nation's interest. There are probably lots of other explanations, like their plans to make Rubio, ineligible for the same reason Obama is ineligible, vice president to court the Hispanic vote. It is about money and power.
These issues have be thoroughly examined here at Free Republic, but many hadn't the time or interest in digging into the details. There is much much more, but here is the clarification to the House in 1866 by Congressman, judge-advocate in the Lincoln conspiracy trials, abolitionist, John Bingham, arguing for his Naturalization Amendment, the 14th, explaining who are natural born citizens, and why his amendment doesn't change that definition:
"I find no fault with the introductory clause [S 61 Bill], which is simply declaratory of what is written in the Constitution, thatevery human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen…."
Barack Obama never once claimed to be a natural born citizen. He told us, using the legalize with which he was familiar, and careful, that “I am a native-born citizen of the US”. That is the definition of a naturalized citizen, naturalized at birth to make slaves, born on our soil, citizens at birth, but not natural born citizen. Their children, born on our soil, were then natural born. American Indians, born on our soil, were not made citizens, because they were born with allegiance to another form of government. Obama was born with the eligibility to be a Member of Parliament, and he told us the truth. Our political classes found this truth inconvenient, and the media concurred, clouding the legal truth of his ineligibility, just as internet operatives like Mr. Rogers attempt to confuse those here at FR.
Why did our founders and framers make the distinction between natural-born and naturalized? In 1776 estimates range from three to thirty percent for those willing to fight Britain for independence. Those first decades were fraught with danger from secret Royalists, the majority. The most critical role in our survival was held by our Chief Executive and Commander in Chief. How can his allegiance by ferreted? Our framers, with committees from each state, required that the president have been a citizen, a term defined differently in the Constitutions and legislatures of each sovereign state at the time of the signing of the Constitution, 1787. They required that our President be thirty five or older, and have been resident for three years before 1776, meaning he was eighteen three years before the Declaration. He thus fought in or lived through the suffering of the fight for independence.
After the “grandfather” period, presidents were born to those who fought for freedom, born to those with sole allegiance, and on our soil. The first president not born before 1787 was James Buchanan. The Constitution only specifies who are natural born citizens, since each state had its own citizenship rules. To address this non-uniformity, since citizens could move freely from state to state, Article 1 Section 8 chartered Congress with creating “A Uniform rule for Naturalization”, which it is still doing. Only the President must be natural born. Over twenty six attempt to amend Article II have been attempted, seven alone between 2002 and 2007, two by John Conyers to make Obama eligible and one by Orrin Hatch to make Scharzenegger eligible. None have passed.
Read for yourselves. Remember that even FR, perhaps especially FR, has active propagandists. Read original sources. Read Paine's Rights of Man, Part 2, On The Constitution; read Chief Justice Marshall's short explanation in The Venus, 12 US 253 (1814), which is about inherited allegiance, made relevent by the War of 1812; read Continental Congress President Dr. David Ramsay's pamphlet, “A Dissertation on Citizenship...”. Ramsay was our first Congressional Historian; read Minor v. Happersett; read the 14th Amendment, which never mentions, and thus never modifies the definition of who were natural born citizens.
These are truths that probably involve too much careful reading to have effect. We now know that our current Chief Justice is not interested, and doesn't have the character to preserve, honor, and defend the Constitution. The Constitution can only protect those who honor it. Let's hope more citizens learn its value before we reach the point of no return. We are close to no return when Soro’s cadre at Center for American Progress, having penetrated our most prestigious law schools, edits some twenty five Supreme Court Cases to scrub citations to Minor v. Happersett from the most widely used reference, Justia.com, for Constitutional law, and is not reprimanded. The law schools, at Berkeley, Cornell, Yale, Georgetown,... say nothing, probably because they depend upon the government for grants, and to employ their graduates. These are not unverifiable rumors. While Google scrubbed their archives, many of us captured the editied cases, editied during the Summer of 2008, before they were replaced with corrected versions. Tim Stanley, CEO of Justia admitted the corruption, but said it was a programming error!
Authors make a good living exposing the political associates of Obama, as if it is news. Pundits ar paid to chatter about political ideology which was never in question, given the Acorn activist's background, and his funding from Alwaleed bin-Talal, Giuliani's and Harvard's benefactor (Rudy refused but Harvard eagerly accepted twenty million dollars and the Alwaleed bin-Talal Center for Islamic Studies. The chattering class produces nothing, but stands testing the wind while a socialist, honest about his naturalized citizenship and British birth crushes productivity with non-productive bureaucrats - czars - whose talent is running the lives of others and redistributing the wealth that remains.
I don’t understand the simplicity definition for ‘natural born’. If I take one view then the children of the Muslim President of Egypt could be POTUSA because they were born in the USA when the father was college prof in the USA. Also under that simple correlation any anchor baby could come back in later years to the USA and be POTUSA. In another take the reason/basis for the Founders at their time for being explicit as to ‘natural’ shows a judgement of concern that applies even today.