Posted on 10/20/2011 1:47:23 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Unable to prevent Barack Obama from becoming president, rigid followers of the Constitution have turned their attention to another young, charismatic politician many think could one day occupy the White House.
The birthers are calling for U.S.Sen. Marco Rubio, the budding Republican star from Florida.
"It's nothing to do with him personally. But you can't change the rules because you like a certain person. Then you have no rules," said New Jersey lawyer Mario Apuzzo.
Forget about allegedly Photoshopped birth certificates; the activists are not challenging whether Rubio was born in Miami. Rather, they say Rubio is ineligible under Article 2 of the Constitution, which says "no person except a natural born citizen … shall be eligible to the Office of President."
The rub is that "natural born citizen" was never defined.
[snip]
"It's a little confusing, but most scholars think it's a pretty unusual position for anyone to think the natural born citizen clause would exclude someone born in the U.S.," said Polly Price, a law professor at Emory University in Atlanta who specializes in immigration and citizenship.
Price said natural born was likely drawn from the concept that anyone born in what was once a colony was considered a subject and parental status was not a factor.
But there is sufficient muddiness to fuel the birthers, many still angry with the Republican establishment for not taking their case against Obama more seriously. Rubio was among them, saying he did not think it was an issue.
"The other shoe has dropped," conservative figure Alan Keyes said on a radio program last month. "Now you've got Republicans talking about Marco Rubio for president when it's obviously clear that he does not qualify. Regardless of party label, they don't care about Constitution. It's all just empty, lying lip service."
[snip]
(Excerpt) Read more at tampabay.com ...
We have debated this issue ad nauseum here. It gets tiresome after a while. HOWEVER, NBC DOES require TWO citizen parents as well as an in-country birth. That’s the way the founders understood it (To them, Vatel’s definition was so well-known and obvious that they saw no need to define the term in the Constitution.)
If having US citizen parents were unimportant, please explain why Chester Arthur went to extreme lengths to conceal the fact that his Irish-born father failed to become naturalized until Chester was a young man. Arthur went so far as to burn his personal papers to stop investigators.
Be careful whom you call “full of it.” All but Arthur fit the “Laws of Nations” definition. The other parents had become naturalized in a timely fashion or the candidate was grandfathered in by the Constitution itself as were the Framers.
If you think I am wrong, produce some factual evidence to prove it and lay off the cheap ad hominem crap.
The gutless SCOTUS refuses to rule on eligibility-—they avoid “political” cases-—so we have to look at the times, the authoritative books the Founders used, as well as texts of congressional debates argued during the adoption of the 14th Amendment.
They took the question VERY seriously and would doubtless be appalled at the way our Constitution is regularly and cynically trampled under foot for nothing more than crass political reasons.
I can’t believe how many FReepers would bury constitutional principles just to enable success for this or that politician. People here can do what they want but I’ll stick to the Framers’ interpretation. Strict constructionism is for me because once we start to take liberties with the Constitution and use the liberal “living document” rationale, we head down the road to national doom.
Want some good, solid info on this? Go to Leo D’Onofrio’s Natural Born Citizen blog. Leo is a brilliant and very convincing teacher. http://naturalborncitizen.wordpress.com/
Yes. Naturalization as a process takes a while.
Then, to serve in Congress, one must have been a citizen for seven years.
See the U.S.Constitution: Article I; Section 2; clause 2.
Unlike other nations, we do not bar naturalized citizens from participating in elective office.
“Native is a higher standard. If you qualify as native you also qualify as natural born.”
Yes, that’s what you keep saying, but you are wrong.
What you are expecting us to believe is that our Founding Fathers had a LESSER standard for President and Vice President than the general population of citizenry.
Are you really thinking what you are saying here?? Honestly. You could not be more wrong on this subject.
I at first read that to mean that applying was enough to consider the child a natural-born citizen.
What I believe is that the parents must complete the naturalization process before their child is born for the child to be a natural-born citizen.
I do agree that any citizen is eligible for state and local offices, as well as for Congress, given the residency and age requirements. Citizenship of parents is not a factor for Congress.
-PJ
“... parents must complete the naturalization process before their child is born for the child to be a natural-born citizen.”
Correct.
How do you get that??
If your mother naturalized as an American citizen Prior to your birth, that makes you a "natural born citizen", assuming your father was an American.
The primary requirement is born to two citizen parents.
Where do you types come from? Why is it you will do research to find out who the parents of various Presidents were, but never bother to learn WHY it didn't matter?
The early Presidents were exempted specifically by article II,
"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."
and the later Presidents (except for Chester Arthur) had parents that naturalized PRIOR to their birth.
Now you have just been demonstrated to be incredibly ignorant on this subject, so You should just stop offering YOUR opinion until you LEARN WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT! You ought to be horribly embarrassed about beclowning yourself, but my experience with you types is that you have no shame.
You are certainly good at the non-sequitur. Your argument is that because A = B, then B must = C.
The notion that Chief Justice Roberts might have based his actions on false assumptions never occurs to such as you. Apart from that, he flubbed the oath of office, so perhaps he did have some misgivings.
And here we find you again, popping off with the most ignorant blather. To be accurate, "native born" means to be born in a certain place. (your argument) "Natural born" means to be born a citizen inherently. You have the meanings EXACTLY backwards, and THAT notwithstanding the fact that in the early founding era of our country, the terms were used interchangeably. Perhaps the Supreme Court of the United States could explain it to you, though I doubt it.
MINOR v. HAPPERSETT, 88 U.S. 162 (1874)
“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. Some authorities go further and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction without reference to the citizenship of their parents. As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first.
And that "strictest definition" would be THIS ONE provided by the Supreme Court in Minor v Happersett:
MINOR v. HAPPERSETT, 88 U.S. 162 (1874)
“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. Some authorities go further and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction without reference to the citizenship of their parents. As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first.
Do you not agree?
You are the most laughable thing I have seen yet coming from the ranks of the opposition. A history lesson (or a good intellectual drubbing) would be wasted on you. You would have to start a cram course of research just to get up to squeeky's level of incompetence.
Should you decide to throw off your ignorance, a good place to start would be here.
You are wrong, and Jill Pryor is also wrong. Here is a rebuttal from 1916. Here is a rebuttal from 1884. Either is a more accurate essay than what Pryor wrote.
It occurs to me that lawyers who support a dishonest status quo are more of a problem. I'm sure that during the Jim Crow era, lawyers prosecuting the black codes won in court all the time.
A further review of your comments demonstrates to me that you were just playing stupid. Well plaid sir!
So where did the principle of Jus Soli originate?
I would argue that it is a "term of art" specifically know to the founders by their reading and familiarity with the writings of Grotius, Pufendorf and Vattel, who's collective works and Vattel's specifically, are referred to as the Laws of Nations.
Wong Kim Ark does not use the term of art "natural born citizen". Even though Wong Kim Ark was wrongly decided, it decided only that Wong Kim Ark was just a "citizen."
They did not declare him eligible for the Presidency, merely to the equal status of a naturalized citizen.
Or the Supreme court could just admit the 1898 Supreme court made a mistake. Yeah, that’s gonna happen. :)
It was simply a term used to describe someone that wa sa citizen by birth, nothing complex or complicated about it.
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