“natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens”
“Please note that the correct title of Vattel’s Book I, Chapter 19, section 212, is “Of the citizens and naturals”. It is not “Of citizens and natives” as it was originally translated into English. While other translation errors were corrected in reprints, that 1759 translation error was never corrected in reprints. The error was made by translators in London operating under English law, and was mis-translated in error, or was possibly translated to suit their needs to convey a different meaning to Vattel to the English only reader. In French, as a noun, native is rendered as “originaire” or “indigene”, not as “naturel”. For “naturel” to mean native would need to be used as an adjective. In fact when Vattel defines “natural born citizens” in the second sentence of section 212 after defining general or ordinary citizens in the first sentence, you see that he uses the word “indigenes” for natives along with “Les naturels” in that sentence. He used the word “naturels” to emphasize clearly who he was defining as those who were born in the country of two citizens of the country. Also, when we read Vattel, we must understand that Vattel’s use of the word “natives” in 1758 is not to be read with modern day various alternative usages of that word. You must read it in the full context of sentence 2 of section 212 to fully understand what Vattel was defining from natural law, i.e., natural born citizenship of a country. Please see the photograph of the original French for Chapter 19, Section 212, here in the original French if you have any doubts. Please do not simply look at the title as some have suggested that is all you need to do. Vattel makes it quite clear he is not speaking of natives in this context as someone simply born in a country, but of natural born citizens, those born in the country of two citizens of the country. Our founding Fathers were men of high intellectual abilities, many were conversant in French, the diplomatic language of that time period. Benjamin Franklin had ordered 3 copies of the French Edition of “Le droit des gens,” which the deferred to as the authoritative version as to what Vattel wrote and what Vattel meant and intended to elucidate.”
http://www.birthers.org/USC/Vattel.html
Thank you - I have found that reference as well and tend to agree with their assessment. I expect that the Framers used the English translation as well as copies in French. To me Vattel was the source and they did not use Blackstone. They were moving away from being subjects of a King.
I believe that the Framers meant natural born citizens to be those born in the country with citizen parents. The 14th amendment and WKA did not change that. And most telling to me is that Chester Arthur acted like he knew that he did not meet the eligibility requirements to be VP and POTUS.
It also seems clear that there has been an effort to muddy this up and equate born in country with being natural born. Since natural born Citizen is only a requirement for President/VP there has been no cases directly dealing with this issue. Everything has been citizenship issues with the natural born Citizen clause as a side issue. It also looks like in latter years Justices relied more on Blackstone.
But I still need to read and absorb more. It might need to wait until the snow is flying and other demands on my time are less.