>> I thought this was common knowledge, are it was when I went to school. <<
You need to get a tuition refund. Panama WAS part of the United States, just like Barry Goldwater’s birthplace, the territory which would later become Arizona. And you didn’t actually need to be born in the United States to be born a natural citizen of the United States. Ask George Romney, 1968 presidential candidate, who was born in Mexico.
>> The people who wrote the constitution did not believe in having military spread across the world. <<
Tell that to Thomas Jefferson, who spent much of the era of the Articles of Confederation in France! They sure as hell did believe that the United States should have a diplomatic presence throughout the world, and take the fight to whoever would attack us.
The actual text of the U.S. Constitution, as amended: “the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond sea, or outside the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born citizens.”
The Canal Zone being purely a Federal Zone, I can think of no better term for John McCain then US Citizen as at birth he had no connection to any of the Several States.
See #83