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  #101  
Old 02-23-2010, 05:04 PM
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Originally Posted by DerailAmnesty.com View Post
Why? I didn't say he was. In fact, I haven't represented anything about Obama, other than I can't keep track of all the theories/positions you birther types have been espousing here in support of your proposition.

Before CF climbed into the SOS campus clocktower and started spraying this thread with pump-action posts by the dozens (at which point I changed channels), from what I could gather, there were three essential points being made:


1. Obama was born outside the United States and is therefore ineligible to be President.

2. Obama never attended Columbia.

3. Whether or not Obama was born in Hawaii is irrelevant, because his father wasn't a U.S. citizen and, therefore, he shouldn't hold the presidency.

To a man, you Birther-ites agree that the former Senator from Illinois has no legal business occupying the White House. However, the assertions you folks roll out in support of your position are so varied, often times conflicting, and mostly requiring extensive conspiracies involving parties with wildly disparate interests to be accurate, that they strain the limits of credibility. Guys, you can't even agree on what the story is. So let me ask you, who really killed JFK? Was it the Cubans, the mob associates of Onassis or the CIA?
You have been asked many questions, at which you turn the whole subject around, and go on the same name calling (birthers) as PachoPatriot, RIMO, but not one of you have posted a legitimate response to any of thee questions.

So now we lead down the inferior road of "Conspiracy Theory".
  #102  
Old 02-23-2010, 06:26 PM
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You have been asked many questions, at which you turn the whole subject around, and go on the same name calling (birthers) as PachoPatriot, RIMO, but not one of you have posted a legitimate response to any of thee questions.
I have no plan to join in your rants. Barack Obama does not need me to argue for him and nothing anyone can say will change your mind. Good Bye.
  #103  
Old 02-23-2010, 06:56 PM
DerailAmnesty.com DerailAmnesty.com is offline
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Originally Posted by Twoller View Post
It doesn't matter what people agree to. What only matters is what is beyond debate. The only thing that is truly beyond debate is that his father was not a US citizen. Not only is this beyond debate, but it also puts into dramatic highlight the crisis of US citizenship that has come to bear at this point. Anchor babies are the issue here and the fact that we have a fraud in the white house that should not be there at a time when the issue of birthright citizenshiip needs to be confronted the most is no accident.

You're right, insofar as your statement that Obama's father is not a U.S. citizen is concerned, that is. No one (to my knowledge) has ever claimed he was. That part is not your problem. What is your problem is federal law. You don't seem to understand it. I'll give you a reprint of much of what I posted last time you made this assertion (a post, I might add, to which you didn't respond):

That assertion is flat out wrong. You have misstated federal law pertaining to birthright citizenship ...

Not only is what you have stated inaccurate, it would be inaccurate if the law was modified in the fashion many border security activists would like to see undertaken. Currently, a child is legally a U.S. citizen if he is born on U.S. soil, regardless of his parents' unlawful residency status. Many individuals feel this is the result of a perversion/misinterpretation of the Civil War Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. They opine that a person should not receive legal residency if born in our country, if one or more parents is an illegal alien. Even under this formula, Barack Obama would be a citizen.



So I'll ask you again, Twoller. How does Obama's father's citizenship status prevent our current president from holding office?
  #104  
Old 02-23-2010, 08:11 PM
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Originally Posted by DerailAmnesty.com View Post
....

Not only is what you have stated inaccurate, it would be inaccurate if the law was modified in the fashion many border security activists would like to see undertaken. Currently, a child is legally a U.S. citizen if he is born on U.S. soil, regardless of his parents' unlawful residency status. Many individuals feel this is the result of a perversion/misinterpretation of the Civil War Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. They opine that a person should not receive legal residency if born in our country, if one or more parents is an illegal alien. Even under this formula, Barack Obama would be a citizen.[/i]


So I'll ask you again, Twoller. How does Obama's father's citizenship status prevent our current president from holding office?
The only reason that a child is "legally" declared a citizen if born on US soil is because of a perversion of the US constitution and a perversion of our whole institution of US citizenship. Just because you can collect enough people to say that Obama or anyone like him is a US citizen doesn't make him or them US citizens.

For anyone who actually cares about their own US citizenship and the citizens of any country where such a thing is respected, there simply is no other conclusion.
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  #105  
Old 02-24-2010, 10:45 AM
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Originally Posted by DerailAmnesty.com View Post
You're right, insofar as your statement that Obama's father is not a U.S. citizen is concerned, that is. No one (to my knowledge) has ever claimed he was. That part is not your problem. What is your problem is federal law. You don't seem to understand it. I'll give you a reprint of much of what I posted last time you made this assertion (a post, I might add, to which you didn't respond):

That assertion is flat out wrong. You have misstated federal law pertaining to birthright citizenship ...

Not only is what you have stated inaccurate, it would be inaccurate if the law was modified in the fashion many border security activists would like to see undertaken. Currently, a child is legally a U.S. citizen if he is born on U.S. soil, regardless of his parents' unlawful residency status. Many individuals feel this is the result of a perversion/misinterpretation of the Civil War Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. They opine that a person should not receive legal residency if born in our country, if one or more parents is an illegal alien. Even under this formula, Barack Obama would be a citizen.



So I'll ask you again, Twoller. How does Obama's father's citizenship status prevent our current president from holding office?
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Tuesday, September 8, 2009
The Natural Born Citizen Clause of Our U.S. Constitution Requires that Both of the Child’s Parents Be U.S. Citizens At the Time of Birth
When interpreting the Constitution, we must decide whether we will look to the document as an original and static one whose meaning has already been established at a given time by the People and its Framers or one that is living and which can be changed over any given time by a court of law. See the address of Justice Antonin Scalia to the 2008 Annual National Lawyers Convention on November 22, 2008, at the Mayflower Hotel, in Washington, D.C. http://www.fed-soc.org/publications/...pub_detail.asp. (advocates originalism rather than living constitutionalism). I submit that Article II’s “natural born Citizen” clause has a fixed and knowable meaning which was established at the time of its drafting and should therefore be interpreted through the eyes of the original Framers that drafted and ratified the clause so as to determine what they intended the clause to mean (original intent theory). I also submit that we should interpret the “natural born Citizen” clause in a way that reasonable persons living at the time of its adoption would have declared the ordinary meaning of the text to be (original meaning theory). This is not living constitutionalism but rather originalism or textualism as applied to interpreting the Constitution. It is this latter approach that I will utilize in this article.

E. Vattel stated in 1758, as translated into English in 1797: "The citizens are the members of the civil society: bound to this society by certain duties, and subject to its authority, they equally participate in its advantages. The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens. As the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights. The society is supposed to desire this, in consequence of what it owes to its own preservation; and it is presumed, as matter of course, that each citizen, on entering into society, reserves to his children the right of becoming members of it. The country of the fathers is therefore that of the children; and these become true citizens merely by their tacit consent. We shall soon see, whether, on their coming to the years of discretion, they may renounce their right, and what they owe to the society in which they were born. I say, that, in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is a citizen; for if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country." E. Vattel, The Law of Nations or Principles of Natural Law, Sec. 212 Citizens and natives. In Footnote 1 at the end of Sec. 212, Vattel stated that “as a general rule” the child inherits his father’s citizenship, or his mother’s but only if she is not married.

The first thing that we have to understand about what Vattel wrote is that he made a distinction between a “citizen” and a “natural born Citizen.” A citizen is simply a member of the civil society who is bound to the society by certain duties and subject to its authority. “Citizens” also participate equally in all the advantages the society has to offer. On the other hand, a “natural born Citizen” means much more than just “citizen.” Vattel required that for a child to be a “natural born citizen,” or what he called in French in his 1758 first edition of The Law of Nations or Principles of Natural Law, les naturels, ou indigenes (the “natives or indigines”-The Venus, 12 U.S. (8 Cranch) 253 (1814)), the child must be born in the country to both parents who are also citizens of the same country.

In the original French, Vattel wrote: "Les naturels, ou indigenes, sont ceux qui sont nes dans le pays de parents citoyens,” meaning the "natives or indigines" are those born in the country of citizen parents. Both the Framers and later English translators of Vattel's treatise replaced the words"natural born Citizen" for the words "natives or indigenes." From Madison's notes, we see that there were some delegates who were concerned about foreigners. For example, from Max Farrand's transcripts of Madison's notes (August 9 and August 13, 1787), there is the following concerning the House of Representatives eligibility requirements: "Mr. Gerry wished that in future the eligibility might be confined to Natives." The word "native" occurs multiple times in the notes for these two days. (The phrase "natural born citizen" was not used here by the delegates.). The word "native" was a synonym for the phrase "natural born citizen." The delegates had already used the term “natural born citizen” when proposing the requirements for President, Vice President, and either House of Congress and later used the word “natives” when referring to eligibility requirements for the House of Representative. There is further evidence of this in at least three works: Blackstone's "Commentaries on the Laws of England" (see Book the First: The Rights of Persons; Chapter the Tenth: Of People, Whether Aliens, Denizens or Natives.), translations of Quintilian's "Institutio Oratoria", and the 1797 English edition of Vattel's "The Law of Nations or Principles of Natural Law."

In the beginning of his definition, Vattel required that the children be born of “parents” who are citizens. The use of the word “parents” refers to both mother and father. If he required only one parent such as the father, he would have said “of fathers who are citizens” and not “of parents who are citizens.” He did later refer to “fathers,” but only because wives automatically acquired the citizenship of their husbands the same way children did. This rule was carried into our own naturalization laws, wherein citizenship can be derived from a close relation. Historically, a number of U.S. laws have provided for the automatic naturalization of children or wives (not husbands) of naturalized U.S. citizens. In some periods of our history, these laws provided that married women derived citizenship from their husband and had no control over their status. Under the Act of 10 February 1855, a woman automatically became an American upon marrying a U.S. citizen or following the naturalization of her foreign husband. Kelly v. Owen, 74 U.S. 7 Wall. 496 (1868). The 1922 Married Women's Act (or the Cable Act) finally severed the link between naturalization and marital status for most women. Hence, if Vattel meant to focus only on “fathers,” he would have used “fathers” throughout his definition and never mentioned “parents” when he first defined “natural born Citizen,” for there would not have been any need to use the word “parents” when “fathers” would have sufficed. Hence, Vattel would have focused on the citizenship of the father since that citizenship would determine that of both the mother and child. It is also noteworthy that Vattel had no problem allowing the child to inherit the citizenship of the mother when the mother was not married to the child’s father. Given that Vattel in effect really focused on the citizenship of both the child’s father and mother in defining a “natural born Citizen,” Vattel’s definition of a “natural born Citizen” does not violate the equal protection guarantee embedded in the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause. Miller v. Albright, 523 U.S. 420 (1998); Nguyen v. INS, 533 U.S. 53, 121 S.Ct. 2053; 150 L.Ed.2d 115 (2001).

There is other evidence in his treatise that shows that Vattel meant to refer to both the child’s mother and father in his definition of a “natural born citizen.” When defining what a country is in Section 122, he stated the “term signifies the state, or even more particularly the town or place, where our parents had their fixed residence at the moment of our birth…. A man ought to preserve gratitude and affection for the state to which he is indebted for his education, and of which his parents were members when they gave him birth….” In commenting on the citizenship status of children born at sea at Section 216, he stated that a child born abroad a foreign vessel that is docked in a port belonging to their own nation is reputed born in the country, provided “she [the mother] and her husband have not quitted their native country to settle elsewhere.” In commenting upon vagrants in Section 219he stated: “Vagrants are people who have no settlement. Consequently those born of vagrant parents have no country, since a man’s country is the place where, at the time of his birth, his parents had their settlement (Section 122), or it is the state of which his father was then a member…” Given that Vattel in effect really focused on the citizenship of both the child’s father and mother in defining a “natural born Citizen,” Vattel’s definition of a “natural born Citizen” does not violate the equal protection guarantee embedded in the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause. Miller v. Albright, 523 U.S. 420 (1998); Nguyen v. INS, 533 U.S. 53, 121 S.Ct. 2053; 150 L.Ed.2d 115 (2001).

The Framers were very familiar with William Blackstone. We can also see in the writings of Blackstone that the allegiance of both parents to the King was needed to avoid dual allegiance in the child. Blackstone wrote:
  #106  
Old 02-24-2010, 10:45 AM
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"When I say, that an alien is one who is born out of the king's dominions, or allegiance, this also must be understood with some restrictions. The common law indeed stood absolutely so; with only a very few exceptions: so that a particular act of parliament became necessary after the restoration, for the naturalization of children of his majesty's English subjects, born in foreign countries during the late troubles. And this maxim of the law proceeded upon a general principle, that every man owes natural allegiance where he is born, and cannot owe two such allegiances, or serve two masters, at once. Yet the children of the king's embassadors born abroad were always held to be natural subjects: for as the father, though in a foreign country, owes not even a local allegiance to the prince to whom he is sent; so, with regard to the son also, he was held (by a kind of postliminium) to be born under the king of England's allegiance, represented by his father, the embassador. To encourage also foreign commerce, it was enacted by statute 25 Edw. III. st. 2. that all children born abroad, provided both their parents were at the time of the birth in allegiance to the king, and the mother had passed the seas by her husband's consent, might inherit as if born in England: and accordingly it hath been so adjudged in behalf of merchants. But by several more modern statutes these restrictions are still farther taken off: so that all children, born out of the king's ligeance, whose fathers were natural-born subjects, are now natural-born subjects themselves, to all intents and purposes, without any exception; unless their said fathers were attainted, or banished beyond sea, for high treason; or were then in the service of a prince at enmity with Great Britain (emphais in the original)."

William Blackstone, Commentaries 1:354, 357--58, 361-62 (1765). We can see that even the English Parliament gave importance to a child having both parents be “in the allegiance of the king,” which under English common law meant the parents would have been “natural born subjects.” By having both parents be “natural born subjects,” the child would not have been born with any other conflicting allegiance other than the one that attached from the foreign soil. Parliament was willing to live with any allegiance attaching to the child from the foreign soil but not with any that may attach by descent from one of the parents, the latter one being by nature a much more stronger one. It was only later in time that the rule was made less restrictive and allowed for just the father to be a “natural born subject.”

There is historical evidence that the Founders borrowed from the Dutch much more heavily than from the British when making the new nation. During the revolutionary period Dutch law provided for citizenship by jus sanguinis. There is considerable evidence that the Framers were also influenced by the citizenship law of Holland. “The American colonists had become familiar with the rights of citizenship possessed in other countries, both from the fact that some of them resided in Holland for a time, before they came to America, and from the further fact that the New York colony was essentially Dutch in its original settlement and government.” John S. Wise, A Treatise on American Citizenship (1906). In Holland, “[c]itizenship could be acquired in several ways. Probably the most common was birth. Some towns accepted everyone as citizen who was baptized in a local church. But more commonly it was required that one’s parents were citizens too. . . .” R. Po-chia Hsia & Henk F. K. van Nierop, Calvinism and Religious Toleration in the Dutch Golden Age 161(2002). “One’s parents” would necessarily included one’s mother and father. This Dutch law is consistent with Vattel’s definition of what is a “natural born citizen.”

Apart from the heavy Dutch influence upon the Founders, when the Framers drafted the Constitution, they relied heavily upon Vattel to guide them. Citizenship was a topic that affected U.S. relations with other nations. Given that citizenship affects "the behavior of nation states with each other" (Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain, 542 U.S. 692 (2004), the Founders would have looked to the law of nations to define it for the purposes of the new nation. The law of nations definition on citizenship also gave uniformity to the subject area, which the Framers wanted to achieve for citizenship laws as they did for naturalization laws. Gibbons v. Ogden, 22 U.S. 1, 36 (Wheat) (1824). They would therefore have referred to and accepted Vattel's law of nations definition to give meaning to what an Article II “natural born Citizen” was.

The meaning of a “natural born Citizen” as expressed by Vattel, including that both parents of the child must be citizens at the time of the child’s birth in order to make the child a “natural born Citizen,” was carried forward in American history following the Founding. The standard provided by Vattel has not changed in our jurisprudence and is still valid today as it was during the Founding. Also, the Fourteenth Amendment has not changed the meaning of a “natural born Citizen.” Legislative activity by the early Congresses provides insight into the question of whether Vattel required one or two parents to be citizens. There are Congressional acts that were passed after the Constitution was adopted that give us insight into what the Framers of the Constitution meant by “natural born Citizen.” The 1790 Congress, many of whose members had been members of the Constitutional Convention, passed the Naturalization Act of 1790 (1 Stat.103,104) which provided that “And the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond the sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born citizens.” This phrasing followed the literal terms of British statutes, beginning in 1350, under which persons born abroad, whose parents were both British subjects, would enjoy the same rights of inheritance as those born in England; beginning with laws in 1709 and 1731, these statutes expressly provided that such persons were natural-born subjects of the crown.” The Naturalization Act of 1790 declared these children to be "natural born Citizens," but only retrospectively. See Weedin v. Chin Bow, 274 U.S. 657 (1927). It is interesting to note that George Washington was president of the Constitutional Convention and President of the United States when this bill became law and if he had disagreed with the two U.S. citizen-parent requirement, he could have vetoed this bill. One would then at first think that this legislation strongly suggests that the Framers of the Constitution understood this phrase to refer to citizenship acquired from both of the child’s parents at birth, regardless of whether or not that birth had taken place in the United States. This statute shows what role the parents played in the minds of the early founders.

While only retrospectively, the First Congress was willing to declare a child born out of the United States to two United States parents a “natural born Citizen.” This was not consistent with what Vattel wrote in The Law of Nations of Principles of Natural Law, at Sec. 215. Children of citizens, born in a foreign country, where he declared these children just “citizens” and not “natural born citizens”: "It is asked, whether the children born of citizens in a foreign country are citizens? By the law of nature alone, children follow the condition of their fathers, and enter into all their rights (Sec. 212); the place of birth produces no change in this particular, and cannot of itself furnish any reason for taking from a child what nature has given him; I say 'of itself,' for civil or political laws may, for particular reasons, ordain otherwise. . . .” (emphasis supplied). Clearly, Vattel addressed the question of whether these children are “citizens,” not “natural born citizen.” He does not address the question of whether they are “natural born citizens” because according to his own definition, a child had to be born “in the country” in order to be a “natural born citizen.” Being born abroad and therefore not “in the country,” such a child could not be a “natural born citizen.”

In this connection and as an aside which applies to the question of whether Senator McCain is an Article II “natural born Citizen,” it should be noted that according to Vattel, being physically born out of the country did not necessarily mean that one was not born “in the country.” Vattel explained that if a child was born “in the armies of the state,” that child was “reputed born in the country; for a citizen, who is absent with his family on the service of the state, but still dependent on it, and subject to its jurisdiction, cannot be considered as having quitted its territory.” Vattel, Sec. 217. Since this child would have been born in the foreign “armies of the state,” he would normally not be granted citizenship in the country in which he was physically born. Additionally, the country on whose soil the child might be born might adhere to a jus sanguinis system of conferring citizenship (meaning that born on its soil alone would not confer citizenship and therefore allegiance and loyalty on the child). Being born under those conditions, this child would therefore be born with sole allegiance to the country of his parents and would qualify as a “natural born citizen” of that country.

While the 1790 act naturalized all "persons" and so included women, it also declared that "the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never been resident in the United States...." This prevented the automatic grant of citizenship to children born abroad whose mother, but not father, had resided in the United States. Citizenship was inherited exclusively through the father. As we have seen above, Congress did not remove the inequity until 1934. This focus on the father as the source of citizenship (but not meaning that the status of the mother was not considered) is consistent with what Vattel wrote in Section 212 of The Law of Nations. This is further evidence that the Framers relied upon Vattel in defining citizenship for the new Republic.

In 1795 the Congress passed the Naturalization Act of 1795 which removed the words “natural born” from the term “natural born citizen” and thereby just left “citizens” as the status to be given to children born out of the United States. The fact that the 1790 Act as written was short lived and was only retrospective shows that Congress just wanted to make certain persons born abroad during the early years of the Republic “natural born Citizen” so that they could be eligible to be President. This sort of special allowance was comparable to the grandfather clause of Article II which allowed a “citizen” to be President provided that he was such at the time of the adoption of the Constitution which the Framers in 1790 knew occurred in 1789. It seems that the Third Congress passed this amendment to the 1790 Act to clarify for those living at that time who was and who was not a “natural born Citizen” per the Framers intent at that time, since the 1790 Act had introduced confusion into that subject regarding the use of those special words as found in Article II. United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649, 714 (1898) (Fuller, C.J., dissenting) (statute “passed out of abundant caution to obviate misunderstandings” about the citizenship status of foreign-born children of Americans). It is again important to note that George Washington was also President in 1795, making him aware of this change by the Third Congress. If he disagreed with the clarification and change in the wording in the new 1795 Act, he would have vetoed it. The 1790 and 1795 Acts are contemporaneous evidence of who the Framers meant to include as “natural born Citizens.” Pryor, The Natural-Born Citizen Clause and Presidential Eligibility: An Approach for Resolving Two Hundred Years of Uncertainty, 97 Yale L.J. 881 (1988).
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Old 02-24-2010, 10:46 AM
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Subsequent Supreme Court cases have stated that in interpreting the Constitution, we must look to the common law that the Framers accepted at the time of the Founding. There is strong historical evidence that the Framers in constituting the new Constitutional Republic rejected the English common law and accepted the new federal common law which emanated from the law of nations. On this subject, see my article included at this blog entitled, The Law of Nations or Principles of Natural Law as U.S. Federal Common Law Not English Common Law Define What an Article II Natural Born Citizen Is. Indeed, as we will see below, our Supreme Court adopted that definition when defining a “natural born Citizen” and thereby incorporated it into U.S. federal common law.

The definition and two-parent requirement has been reiterated by the Supreme Court and other courts in the cases of The Venus, 12U.S. 253(1814), Shanks v. Dupont, 28 U.S. 242 (1830), Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1856), Minor v. Happersett, 88 U.S. 162 (1875) , Ex parte Reynolds, 20 F. Cas. 582 (C.C.W.D. Ark 1879), United States v. Ward, 42 F. 320 (1890); Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898), and Ludlam, Excutrix, & c., v. Ludlam, 26 N.Y. 356 (1863). It has also been confirmed by renowned legislators, including Senator Trumbull, the author of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and Representative John A. Bingham, the architect of the 14th Amendment to our Constitution.

In the case of The Venus 12 U.S. 253, 289 (1814), Justice John Marshall said: "Vattel, who, though not very full to this point, is more explicit and more satisfactory on it than any other whose work has fallen into my hands, says 'The citizens are the members of the civil society; bound to this society by certain duties, and subject to its authority, they equally participate in its advantages. The natives or indigenes are those born in the country of parents who are citizens. Society not being able to subsist and to perpetuate itself but by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights.'”

Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857), did not directly deal with Article II "natural born Citizen." But there are parts of the Dred Scott decision that are relevant to the question of what is a “natural born Citizen.” The case clearly defined “natural born citizen.” While as repugnant as slavery was and still is, no court or amendment has over turned the meaning of “natural born citizen” from Dred Scott. The main point is that in deciding what a "citizen" was in 1857, both the majority and dissent went back to 1787 to examine what the Framers and the people of that time considered a "citizen" to be. The Court said that the Constitution must be understood now as it was understood at the time it was written. The judges did not disagree that one had to look back to the Founding Fathers. What they disagreed on is what the public opinion was at that time as to whether a freed slave was a citizen. In this regard, we know that the case was overruled by the Thirteenth Amendment. As to the “natural born Citizen” clause, the Court said: "The citizens are the members of the civil society; bound to this society by certain duties, and subject to its authority, they equally participate in its advantages. The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens. As society cannot perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their parents, and succeed to all their rights. Again: I say, to be of the country, it is necessary to be born of a person who is a citizen; for if he be born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country. . . ." Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393, 476-77 (1857). As can be seen from the quoted language, the Court actually removed from the Vattel’s definition the reference to “fathers” and “father” and replaced it with “parents” and “person,” thus showing that it is not just one parent (the father) that needs to be a citizen, but the “parents,” i.e., both mother and father. Also, both Vattel and the Court stated that “if he be born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country.” The controlling language is “a foreigner.” In the English language, the letter “a” is an indefinite article meaning one. Hence, the use of the word “a” shows that only one is required. We know that a child has both a mother and father and the “a” would necessarily refer to either the mother or father. Surely, if the child were born of one parent who was not a citizen, he would be “born there of a foreigner,” who would be either his foreign mother or father. As can be seen, it is our United States Supreme Court that has made this reading and interpretation of Vattel. This understanding of Vattel is not only correct but also binding upon us.

Chief Justice Waite, in Minor v. Happersett, 88 U.S. 162 (1874), stated: "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." Here we can see that the U.S. Supreme Court in all three of these cases adopted Vattel’s definition of what a “natural born Citizen” is, and specifically repeated his two U.S.-parent test. Dred Scott even removed the word “father” and replaced it with the word “parents.”

The Civil Rights Act of 1866 (Act of April 9, 1866) first established a national law that provided: “All persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are declared to be citizens of the United States.” Civil Rights Act of April 9, 1866 (14 Stat. 27). Not being subject to a foreign power includes being free from any political and military obligations to any other nation and not owing any other nation direct and immediate allegiance and loyalty. The primary author of this Act was Senator Trumbull who said it was his intention “to make citizens of everybody born in the United States who owe allegiance to the United States.” Additionally, he added if a “negro or white man belonged to a foreign Government he would not be a citizen.” In order for this requirement to be satisfied, clearly both parents of the child must be U.S. citizens, for if one is not, the child would inherit the foreign allegiance and loyalty of foreign parent and would thereby “belong to a foreign Government.” Rep. John A. Bingham, who later became the chief architect of the 14th Amendment's first section, in commenting upon Section 1992 of the Civil Rights Act, said that the Act was “simply declaratory of what is written in the Constitution, that every 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” (emphasis supplied). Rep. Bingham said “parents.” He did not say “one parent” or “a mother or father.”

Now let us turn to the Fourteenth Amendment. Senator Trumbull, when commenting on that Amendment declared: “The provision is, that ‘all persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens.’ That means ‘subject to the complete jurisdiction thereof.’ What do we mean by ‘complete jurisdiction thereof?’ Not owing allegiance to anybody else. That is what it means.” Sen. Howard added: “the word jurisdiction, as here employed, ought to be construed so as to imply a full and complete jurisdiction on the part of the United States, coextensive in all respects with the constitutional power of the United States, whether exercised by Congress, by the executive, or by the judicial department; that is to say, the same jurisdiction in extent and quality as applies to every citizen of the United States now.” On May 30, 1866, Senator Howard continued: "This amendment which I have offered is simply declaratory of what I regard as the law of the land already, that every person born within the limits of the United States, and subject to their jurisdiction, is by virtue of natural law and national law a citizen of the United States. This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Govern- of the United States, but will include every other class of persons." Congressional Globe, 39th Congress, 1st Session, May 30, 1866, P. 2890, col. 2. Again, only if the both parents of the child were citizens at the time of birth could the child be subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States, not owe allegiance to any foreign power, and not be a person “born in the United States who are foreigners [or aliens].”

There then followed Supreme Court cases that discussed citizenship under the Fourteenth Amendment. In The Slaughter-House Cases, 83 U.S. 36, 73 (1873), in discussing the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment’s citizenship clause said: “[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.” Even the dissenting opinion affirmed that the citizenship clause was designed to assure that all persons born within the United States were both citizens of the United States and the state in which they resided, provided they were not at the time of birth subjects of any foreign power. Again, only if both parents of the child were citizens at the time of birth could the child not be considered a citizen or subject of a foreign State born within the United States, be subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States, and not be subject to any foreign power.
  #108  
Old 02-24-2010, 10:47 AM
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In Elk v. Wilkins, 112 U.S. 94 (1884), the Supreme Court specifically addressed what is meant by “subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” and held: "The persons declared to be citizens are 'all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.' The evident meaning of these last words is 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. And the words relate to the time of birth in the one case, as they do to the time of naturalization in the other. Persons not thus subject to the jurisdiction of the United States at the time of birth cannot become so afterwards except by being naturalized, either individually, as by proceedings under the naturalization acts, or collectively, as by the force of a treaty by which foreign territory is acquired." Only if the child’s both parents were citizens at the time of birth could the child be “completely subject to their [U.S.] political jurisdiction and owing them direct and immediate allegiance.

U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898), did not address what an Article II “natural born Citizen” is. Rather, the Supreme Court there gave a new, divergent, and incorrect interpretation of the “subject to the jurisdiction” clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and vetoed the will of the People and their Legislature to declare Wong a U.S. “citizen” under the unique circumstances of that case. While the case did approvingly cite Minor v. Happersett, since the case only dealt with what is a Fourteenth Amendment “citizen,” the case cannot in any event be used to explain what the Founders meant by Article II’s “natural born Citizen” clause. Justice Antonin Scalia, during his address to the 2008 Annual National Lawyers Convention on November 22, 2008, at the Mayflower Hotel, in Washington, D.C., gave three reasons in ascending order (the last being the most compelling) which would serve justification for overturning a prior case: how wrong was it, i.e., was it blatantly and malicious improperly decided ; how well has the public accepted the case; and did the decision cast the Court as a policy maker rather than an interpreter of the law. Given that the Wong Court did not give Congress and the Executive the wide deference that they deserve in exercising its immigration and naturalization powers (Nguyen v. INS, 533 U.S. 53, 121 S.Ct. 2053; 150 L.Ed.2d 115 (2001) and the Scalia factors, the Wong decision is a prime candidate for reversal.

We have seen that the citizenship status of the parents of a child determines whether that child is born a “natural born Citizen.” Why should we want the child’s parents to be citizens? Alexander Hamilton explained what happens to a person when he or she becomes a citizen of the country: "But there is a wide difference between closing the door altogether and throwing it entirely open; between a postponement of fourteen years, and an immediate admission to all the rights of citizenship. Some reasonable term ought to be allowed to enable aliens to get rid of foreign and acquire American attachments; to learn the principles and imbibe the spirit of our government; and to admit of a probability at least, of their feeling a real interest in our affairs. A residence of not less than five years ought to be required. " Alexander Hamilton, The Works of Alexander Hamilton, (Federal Edition), vol. 8 > EXAMINATION OF JEFFERSON’S MESSAGE TO CONGRESS OF DECEMBER 7, 1801 1 > paragraph 827. Additionally, the development in the formative years of a child’s minority of a relationship between citizen parents and their child is essential to the child’s ties and allegiance to the United States. Nguyen v. INS, 533 U.S. 53, 121 S.Ct. 2053; 150 L.Ed.2d 115 (2001) (addressing the importance of the tie between a child and his U.S. citizen father before the child’s 18th birthday as a crucial ingredient in the child attaching and owing allegiance to the United States and that the U.S. government has a “profound” important interest and objective in promoting that link; showing that a child must meet all statutory preconditions [would also mean constitutional requirements] no matter how much one may deem them to be unfair or onerous in order to be bestowed U.S. citizenship). But we have seen that United States Supreme Court case law, the early 1790 and 1795 Naturalization Acts, legislative history of the Civil Rights Act of the 1866, and the Fourteenth Amendment all conclusively show that Vattel was understood to say that both parents had to be citizens in order for a child to be a “natural born Citizen.” The Founders, our Supreme Court, Congress, and framers of the Fourteenth Amendment all adopted Vattel’s law of nations definition and two-parent requirement and made it part of Article II, United States citizenship federal common law, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and the Fourteenth Amendment, respectively. It also would not make sense to allow just one U.S. citizen parent to be sufficient, for each parent has just as much influence as the other on his or her child.

The purpose of Article II’s “natural born Citizen” clause is to exclude foreign influence from the Office of President and Commander in Chief. It “cuts off all chances for ambitious foreigners, who might otherwise be intriguing for the office; and interposes a barrier against those corrupt interferences of foreign governments . . .” Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution 3:Sec 1472-73 (1833). Remember that Vattel said that if a child is born on a nation's soil to a non-citizen father (meaning parents), that place "will be only the place of his birth, and not his country." Article II’s “natural born Citizen” clause looks only to the moment of birth and not thereafter. This interpretation is consistent with Jay’s underlining the word “born” in his 1787 letter to General (later President) Washington. In other words, to meet that special Presidential eligibility requirement, one must be born a “natural born Citizen” and cannot acquire that status later in life. Under the British Nationality Act 1948, when Obama was born in 1961 his father was a British subject/citizen and Obama himself was a British subject/citizen by descent from his father. Under the British Nationality Act 1981, today Obama can still be a British Overseas Citizen (BOC). See my April 7, 2009 article on this topic at this blog entitled, Obama, the President of the U.S., Is Currently Also a British Citizen. Hence, when Obama was born he failed to meet the two-U.S.-citizen-parent test which caused him to be born subject to a foreign power. See my article at this blog entitled, Being Born Subject to a Foreign Power, Obama Cannot be President and Military Commander. It is inescapable that Obama is not and cannot be an Article II “natural born Citizen” and is therefore not eligible to be President and Commander in Chief of the Military.

Mario Apuzzo, Esq.
185 Gatzmer Avenue
Jamesburg, NJ 08831
9-8-09
Amended on 12-20-09
  #109  
Old 02-24-2010, 10:50 AM
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Appeals court: We're listening to eligibility case
Judges grant permission for lengthy filing in case challenging Obama
Posted: February 23, 2010
11:08 pm Eastern

By Bob Unruh
© 2010 WorldNetDaily



An appeals court has indicated it is listening to arguments in a case that challenges Barack Obama's occupancy in the Oval Office with a ruling that gives special permission for an extra-long document to be filed in the case.

WND has reported on the case brought by attorney Mario Apuzzo in January 2009 on behalf of Charles F. Kerchner Jr., Lowell T. Patterson, Darrell James Lenormand and Donald H. Nelson Jr.

Named as defendants were Barack Hussein Obama II, the U.S., Congress, the Senate, House of Representatives, former Vice President Dick Cheney and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The case alleges Congress failed to follow the Constitution, which "provides that Congress must fully qualify the candidate 'elected' by the Electoral College Electors."

The complaint also asserts "when Obama was born his father was a British subject/citizen and Obama himself was the same." The case contends the framers of the U.S. Constitution, when they adopted the requirement that a president be a "natural born citizen," excluded dual citizens.

According to a posting on Apuzzo's website, the rules of procedure for the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals provide that an appellant's opening brief is not to exceed 14,000 words.

See the movie Obama does not want you to see: Own the DVD that probes this unprecedented presidential eligibility mystery!

However, Apuzzo wrote, "because of the extraordinary nature and complexity of the question of whether putative President Barack Obama is an Article II 'natural born citizen' and therefore eligible to be president, whether my clients … have standing to bring an action against Obama and Congress in which they maintain that Obama is not a 'natural born citizen' and that Congress failed to meet its constitutional duty to protect my clients by assuring them that Obama is a 'natural born Citizen…' I was compelled to file a brief which contained 20,477 words."

"By order dated February 22, 2010, the Honorable Circuit Judge Michael A. Chagares on behalf of the Motion's Panel of the 3rd Circuit Court of appeals granted plaintiffs' motion for leave to file the overlength brief."

"This is great news because the case will now continue forward as scheduled," he said. "Obama's and Congress's opposition brief was initially due on Feb. 22, 2010. The Department of Justice obtained a 14-day extension to file that brief, making the new due date March 8, 2010.

"After they file their opposition brief, I will then have 14 days within which to file a reply to that brief," he said.

He said his background information in the case confirms that two U.S. Supreme Court decisions reveal the definition for "natural born citizen" is found not in the Constitution but in common law.

"We maintain that Obama is not an Article II 'natural born citizen' because he lacks unity of citizenship and allegiance from birth which is obtained when a child is born in the United States to a mother and father who are both United States citizens at the time of birth," he said.

"Obama's father was only a temporary visitor to the United States when Obama was born and never even became a resident let alone a citizen. Not being an Article II 'natural born citizen,' Obama is not eligible to be president and commander in chief," he said.

He also argues that Obama has failed to prove that he was born in Hawaii by revealing his documentation.

"If he fails to do so, the alleged fact is not proven, even if the opposing party produces no further evidence," he said.

On Apuzzo's website, a forum page participant said, "It will be interesting to see how Mr. Obama's legal team stretches, 'We have nada!' into 14,000 words."

The lead plaintiff, Kerchner, has posted an online statement: "This is not going to go away until Obama stops hiding ALL his hidden and sealed early life documents and provides original copies of them to a controlling legal authority and reveals his true legal identity from the time he was born until the time he ran for president.

"Obama at birth was born British and a dual citizen. He holds and has held multiple citizenship during his lifetime. He's a citizenship chameleon as the moment and time in his life suited him and he is not a 'natural born citizen' with sole allegiance … to the USA as is required per the Constitution," he said.

The appeal further challenges that not only might Obama not be a "natural born citizen," he might not even be in the United States legally.

"If Obama was not born in the United States, there exists a possibility that Obama could be an illegal alien," it states.

WND has reported on dozens of legal challenges to Obama's status as a "natural born citizen." The Constitution, Article 2, Section 1, states, "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."

Some of the lawsuits question whether he was actually born in Hawaii, as he insists. If he was born out of the country, Obama's American mother, the suits contend, was too young at the time of his birth to confer American citizenship to her son under the law at the time.

Demand the truth by joining the petition campaign to make President Obama reveal his long-form, hospital-generated birth certificate!

Other challenges have focused on Obama's citizenship through his father, a Kenyan subject to the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom at the time of his birth, thus making him a dual citizen. The cases contend the framers of the Constitution excluded dual citizens from qualifying as natural born. And still others contend he holds Indonesian citizenship from his childhood living there.

Adding fuel to the fire is Obama's persistent refusal to release documents that could provide answers and the appointment – at a cost confirmed to be at least $1.7 million – of myriad lawyers to defend against all requests for his documentation. While his supporters cite an online version of a "Certification of Live Birth" from Hawaii as his birth verification, critics point out such documents actually were issued for children not born in the state.

WND also has reported that among the documentation not yet available for Obama includes his kindergarten records, Punahou school records, Occidental College records, Columbia University records, Columbia thesis, Harvard Law School records, Harvard Law Review articles, scholarly articles from the University of Chicago, passport, medical records, files from his years as an Illinois state senator, his Illinois State Bar Association records, any baptism records and his adoption records.

Because of the dearth of information about Obama's eligibility, WND founder Joseph Farah has launched a campaign to raise contributions to post billboards asking a simple question: "Where's the birth certificate?"


"Where's The Birth Certificate?" billboard at the Mandalay Bay resort on the Las Vegas Strip

The campaign followed a petition that has collected more than 490,000 signatures demanding proof of his eligibility, the availability of yard signs raising the question and the production of permanent, detachable magnetic bumper stickers asking the question.

The "certification of live birth" posted online and widely touted as "Obama's birth certificate" does not in any way prove he was born in Hawaii, since the same "short-form" document is easily obtainable for children not born in Hawaii. The true "long-form" birth certificate – which includes information such as the name of the birth hospital and attending physician – is the only document that can prove Obama was born in Hawaii, but to date he has not permitted its release for public or press scrutiny.

Oddly, though congressional hearings were held to determine whether Sen. John McCain was constitutionally eligible to be president as a "natural born citizen," no controlling legal authority ever sought to verify Obama's claim to a Hawaiian birth.
  #110  
Old 02-24-2010, 10:02 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Twoller View Post
The only reason that a child is "legally" declared a citizen if born on US soil is because of a perversion of the US constitution and a perversion of our whole institution of US citizenship. Just because you can collect enough people to say that Obama or anyone like him is a US citizen doesn't make him or them US citizens.

For anyone who actually cares about their own US citizenship and the citizens of any country where such a thing is respected, there simply is no other conclusion.

Well, the Supreme Court has reached another conclusion but ...

You're giving me a non-responsive answer. I understand what you're saying. You believe where Obama was born is irrelevant for the purposes of his citizenship status. What I don't understand is how you feel Obama's father's lack of U.S. citizenship impacts his right to be President.

Let me narrow it down for you:


1) What do you believe is required for a person to be born a U.S. citizen?

2) Is there anything besides citizenship, based upon your understanding of the Constitution, required to hold the presidency?

Last edited by DerailAmnesty.com; 02-24-2010 at 10:04 PM.
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