Just when you were settling down to see what happens with the birther bills, Georgia has added another bill to its list. This one will delight the heart of any birther, since it goes farther than any before it, demanding irrelevant information and making it a crime for a presidential elector to vote for anyone not certified by the Georgia Secretary of State.
I know that many you you readers (at least those in the US) are worrying whether this bill is going to keep you off the ballot in Georgia. I’m particularly troubled since I can’t seem to put my hands on my original long-form birth certificate at the moment. Here’s the requirement:
A certified exact copy of the candidate’s first original long-form birth certificate that includes the candidate’s date, time, and place of birth; the name of the specific hospital or other location at which the candidate was born; the attending physician at the candidate’s birth; the names of the candidate’s birth parents and their respective birthplaces and places of residence; and signatures of the witness or witnesses in attendance at the candidate’s birth.
I do have an image of my birth certificate to compare with the requirements. Darn, I can’t be president — my Alabama birth certificate doesn’t list my father’s residence address. Guess what? Neither do long forms from Hawaii. Foundlings and adoptees need not apply.
There are also criminal penalties for electors:
It is unlawful for any presidential elector from this state to cast his or her electoral college vote for a candidate who is not approved by the Secretary of State as having submitted adequate evidence of eligibility. Any person who violates this Code section shall upon conviction be guilty of a misdemeanor of a high and aggravated nature.
Oh a happier note, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports that 28 Georgia legislators have removed their names as backers of HB 401, leaving 65 supporters — all Republicans.
Par for the course. Georgia excels in lynchings, not education.
The Knights of Mary Phagan still meet in Georgia. I hope this becomes law. Unlimited entertainment. Even better, the public funds Georgia will spend defending it, and then cry there isn’t enough money for schools.
What a waste of time!
If time equals money, how can these people even call themselves conservatives?
You quoted only the first sentence in the Evidence of Eligibility section of the proposed Georgia HB 401 bill. Let’s see what second sentence says:
“..If the foregoing described certified exact copy of the candidate’s first original long-form birth certificate is not attached and the candidate’s affidavit indicates that a first original long-form birth certificate for the candidate does not exist, the candidate shall attach certified exact copies of other original documentation, including, but not limited to, the candidate’s birth records, adoption records, baptism records, Social Security records, medical records, school and college records, military records, and passport records showing, either individually or collectively, that the candidate meets the natural born citizenship, age, and residency requirements prescribed by Article II, Section 1 of the United States Constitution…”
This takes wind out of sails for your attempt to smear those trying to ensure that future elections are conducted according to the requirements prescribed by the Constitution. Birth certificate is not the only document that can be submitted to prove one’s eligibility.
As you can see adoption records are mentioned in the bill as well.
I brought up that part of the GA bill on the Tennessee bill thread when Black Lion first mentioned it there. You may want to review and respond to Expelliarmus’ comment at 9:23 p.m. here since it is now the topic of its own thread.
NC One,
Notice also passport records. If a valid passport alone satisfies the requirements, then Mr. Obama’s place on the Georgia ballot is assured; he has a very nice one. Notice also that birthers are sill fishing for the adoption record that is not proven to exist.
The legislation requires the Secretary of State to make the determination of eligibility. It also allows for electors to make objections:
(i) Within two weeks after any evidence of eligibility is filed with the Secretary of State, any elector of this state may challenge the eligibility of the candidate submitting the evidence of eligibility in the manner prescribed by Code Section 21-2-5.
I can’t see what the manner prescribed is for a challenge.
Brian Kemp is Secretary of State. Some relevant background
http://www.votebriankemp.com/tourArchive.aspx?date=2-2010
Relevant background should have a ?
My 1950s California birth certificate doesn’t have any space for “residence of father”, only “residence of mother”. There’s no space for any witnesses to sign or even be listed. The only signatures on it are the local hospital registrar, my mother’s, and her doctor’s, who also happened to be her employer. Very suspicious.
Since when does the Constitution require “medical records” or “baptism records” and what would they even remotely have to do with eligibility? Does the Constitution exclude certain faiths or medical conditions from being present in a president?
Yes, the passport is not only proof of US Citizenship, but it shows the place of birth. In the case Obama’s passport: Hawaii, USA.
http://www.obamaconspiracy.org/2010/08/white-house-releases-obama-passport/
We’ve seen the passport on YouTube, and as you know “the YouTubes are infallible.”
You apparently are unaware of the fact that adoption records in most states are sealed.
Are we making the none to subtle hint that some state is going to demand Obama’s adoptions records? How would that work? Are you expecting to demand the adoption record and when he does not produce one, because it does not exist, kick him off the ballot? That may work well in the former Soviet Union, other former Warsaw Pact governments and various other authoritarian regimes such as Iran, but not here.
Are we making laws to keep particular classes of citizens off a ballot due even if they are NBC? There is a word for that, and it was relegated to the trash heap of history.
My 1970s “true copy of the Certificate of Birth on file…” (that is what the county registrar’s stamp says), does not even contain my mothers signature. It only has the Doctor’s signature, and he (or she) only used initials for the first and middle name (both signed and typed). It also contains only my mother’s residency. There were no witnesses. Uh-oh.
In addition, I have always been confused on how I can submit a sworn statement (I do hope they allow affirmation for those who will not swear) to my parents citizenship. My BC may state they were born in the Midwest, but, not being them, I cannot state their citizenship at any time. I would have the advantage right now that my parents could state their citizenship, though we could run in to issues of a “sworn” statement from my Quaker mother.
This is not a rocket science. There are only three pages in the bill. The primary evidence is the original birth certificate. As an option, other documents are listed. It does not mean that a candidate has to provide all those other documents.
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I mentioned adoption records because proposed law contradicts the following statement written by Dr. C in the article on top of this thread:
“…Darn, I can’t be president — my Alabama birth certificate doesn’t list my father’s residence address. Guess what? Neither do long forms from Hawaii. Foundlings and adoptees need not apply…”
The law does not say that all listed documents must be produced – it is an option that presidential candidate has in the process of proving eligibility to run.
Yet birthers will cry “Coverup!” when Obama merely produces the COLB, and they will demand to see every scrap of paper that ever had his name on it.
Going by past history, of course.
Here, let me ask you this simple question NC1:
If the Georgia law passes and Obama simply orders up another COLB from HI and hands that to the state of Georgia:
1.) Will that suffice under the proposed law? (Why or why not)
2.) And would that suffice to you?
Well I don’t have any baptism records either because the church where I was baptized burned down with all its records, and the hospital where I was born isn’t even there any more so no medical records either.
The point of the article was to ridicule the bill for describing a birth certificate that doesn’t exist in some, states, and maybe not any.
Does any adult here have a birth certificate with their father’s address listed on it?
A passport shows date and place of birth and is proof of citizenship. One might reasonably say that a US Passport is sufficient documentation to prove eligibility. If it is, then why do birth certificates have to have all that other information irrelevant to eligibility in order to be accepted? I can think of no rational explanation other than to disparage Obama’s published birth certificate.
COLB would not meet the requirement.
The proposed law asks for a copy of the first (original) birth certificate. If Obama submitted a certified actual copy equivalent to Nordykes’ certificates that would be fine (I am not talking about an image posted on the web, but an actual document issued by DoH and submitted to the Secretary of State). That would prove his birthplace.
The COLB does not answer the question about possibility that his foreign birth was fraudulently registered as an unattended Hawaii birth. Since we don’t have access to the original birth index – we don’t have evidence that his birthplace story is true. Quite the opposite, COLB is in contradiction with the Kapiolani hospital birth claim.
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It is one thing to ridicule the law using accurate information. You used false claims to ridicule the law.
The law provides flexibility – it describes desired information and asks for copy of the original birth certificate and/or any other document that can be used to support the eligibility claim.
If the official birthplace story were true, Obama has nothing to fear. His long form (Nordyke type) certificate is in the DoH archive and he will be able to use it for proving his birthplace in the US. You believe that Abercrombie’s “written down” comment was issued for something in the State archives – not the DoH historical records storage, don’t you?
The birth certificate fraud is rampant in many places in the USA. That is why passport should not be used as a proof of eligibility for POTUS.
It is much more difficult to alter original birth records.
The same law would apply to ALL presidential candidates, no special treatment for anyone.
nc1, let me ask you this one question…
The Federal Government, which under the Constitution (Article IV, Section 1) has the ability to determine what proves the birthplace to the Federal Government, has already said many times (including the United States Supreme Court saying that the COLB is the official Hawaii state Birth Certificate) proves the place of birth of the Presidency. What gives Georgia the right, when it is expressly forbidden in the U.S. Constitution (Article IV, Section 1), to say, “I’m sorry. Even though the Federal Government has said that the COLB is sufficient to prove the place of birth, we say that it’s not sufficient. So, we’re going to require another document that the State of Hawaii doesn’t give certified copies out to the general public to prove the place of birth to our satisfaction.” Read Article IV, section 1 and get back to me on how this is constitutional, when the Constitution seems to expressly say that the State of Georgia must accept the documents of another state, and that Congress (not the State of Georgia) may pass laws on how they may be proved.
And now, you’re basically saying, “The Federal Government accepts this as proof of the place of birth. However, I’m going to say without any evidence that birth certificate fraud is rampant in places, so despite the Federal Government accepting this, the State of Georgia should violate the constitution, and set up their own rules on which documents qualify as proof of place of birth.”
Read Article IV, Section 1 of the United States Constitution, and get back to me.
Re-read my post. I clearly stated Obama ordering another COLB from the state of HI to present to GA.
That *IS* the only official document they release for such birth certification requests. The document received by them *is* the official document and hence, due to Full Faith and Credit, would have to be accepted by any other state as sufficient.
If your answer is NO, that the new GA law would not accept such a COLB, then you have just answered why the GA law simply not survive a federal court challenge. If the HI COLB is not a sufficient one of those alternatives you like to point out in that little 3-page bill, then the GA law is terminally flawed.
Then again, you seem to totally be unable to grasp what the COLB actually is in the first place, so your opinion on such matters is likely as flawed as all your others.
Utter nonsense and untrue. Just because you wish that were so, doesn’t make it true. Sorry.
Ah, more hyberbolic exaggeration, completely unsupported by any facts. So far, you birthers can point to two border states, out of the fifty we have…and somehow that is rampant fraud?
And you wonder why you are not taken seriously by anyone. Screaming that the sky is falling because a few raindrops splash on your head only makes you look crazy, Chicken Little.
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Does Federal government mandate how a state conducts presidential elections?
Some states have rule that winner gets all electoral votes, some states divide electoral votes based on votes received. To go even step further, in many states there is no obligation on part of electors to vote according to results of elections.
If Congress is unwilling to adress the eligibility rules, states should do it as they see fit. If a state is willing to accept a COLB from another state, fine. If they require a copy of the original birth certificate that should be OK too.
Please don’t tell me that original birth certificates are not kept in the archive.
We re talking about the proof for natural born citizenship. If Georgia law violated the Constitution as you claim, I am sure that Obama supporters will file a lawsuit. We need to force the SCOTUS to rule on eligibility issue.
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What part of the first sentence in my previous post was not clear to you:
“COLB would not meet the requirement”
Nice avoiding my question, nc1.
Here’s Article IV, Section 1: “Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.”
This section clearly gives Congress (hense the Federal Government) the ability to prescribe the manner in which the records shall be proved, and the effect thereof.
Now, we have a record from the State of Hawaii (the COLB). Congress has said that this record proves the place of birth (as we’ve shown multiple times from public statements from the Federal Government, to them using the document for things such as passports, to the United States Supreme Court recognizing it as Hawaii’s Official State Birth Certificate). If Georgia is saying, “No, it doesn’t prove the place of birth”, how are they not in violation of the Constitution, which clearly forces the states to accept the records, and gives the power to Congress to determine whether or not the records are compliant?
As far as ruling on eligibility, the Supreme Court will not do so on any Birther bill, because no birther bill will ever get to the Supreme Court. This is because every birther law, that is so blatant in constitutional violations as every one of them has been written, will be struck down in District Court, and upheld in the Court of Appeals (as every one of the 70+ lawsuits that have been done through these laws). The Supreme Court will deny cert on this.
There are only two types of cases that they take, and the birther bills will never reach any of them.
The first is cases where different appeals courts have ruled differently on a section of the Constitution. A prime example of this is: Kyllo v. U.S. This case had to do with whether or not using Thermal Imagers without a warrant constituted an unreasonable search and seizure under the 4th Amendment to the Constitution. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that it did not. Another Court of Appeals had ruled that it did. In fact, with case law, the circuits were split about 50-50 on whether or not it did violate the 4th Amendment. So, the case was taken to clarify and unify the precedence between the circuits. So far, the Birthers have gotten zilch from the lower courts, and it’s very unlikely that they will in the future, considering the legal precedent of U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark, even if a case was to get past the standing issue.
The second is a case where the Supreme Court clearly thinks that the lower court got it wrong, and wants to overturn it. Again, for the Supreme Court to do this, the Court of Appeals would have to rule in the favor of the Birthers, and no appeals court would do this, considering the strong precedent of U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark.
The Supreme Court will not take this. And even if they did, they’d rule 9-0 at least that anybody born in the United States was a Natural Born Citizen. The one way that you may get the Supreme Court to rule on the definition of NBC is having a candidate who is a Citizen at Birth, but one that wasn’t born in the United States. I think that this is even a 9-0 decision in favor of the Citizen at Birth being a Natural Born Citizen.
So, you want the State of Georgia to pass a clearly unconstitutional law, and spend money defending that clearly unconstitutional law, so that the Supreme Court will deny it cert when the Court of Appeals says that it’s unconstitutional? I thought that Birthers were for defending the Constitution. Why are you suggesting that Georgia pass a law that clearly violates the Constitution?
You know what, please remind me what happened last time someone got elected President without being on the ballot in a number of states -surprise, surprise, including Georgia. And no Taft oes not count because he did not get elected that time (and he was a potential French citizen anyway).
Then consider what it would mean if someone got elected without being on the ballot in a state because some nutters there refused to accept an official document from another state.
Basically, if Georgia wants to secede from reality and the united States, let them do so. I am sure Obama will not repeat Abraham Lincoln’s mistake.
Doc, something funny here. Not only did my comment get mixed up with the quote by nc1, but I never wrote that “So then, what do you think”.
Weird. I fixed your comment.
I agree. If Georgia or Texas want to secede, I say let them. The nation’s dental health would improve by 100%, overnight.
Which is why the Georgia law is unconstitutional on its face.
Yes, and this has to be seen in the light that this bill also (falsely, of course) claims natural born citizenship means you never had dual citizenship.
The bill does not say whether the SOS will consider the data (birth place and nationality) on the adoption record or the data on the birth record, which may be discovered much later. Meaning the SOS can do what he or she pleases, of course. Long live Moldova, land of liberty and moonshine (just quoting Groucho Marx)!
Adoptees may be re-adopted later in life. Since adoption records are not public information even to the adoptee, who will be able to swear with confidence that they never had dual citizenship?
In case the birfers are thinking of switching away from Donofrio and dual citizenship towards the Vattel misinterpretation of both citizen parents, adoption may actually hurt the birther cause. Since you cannot really get at the names of the real parents, you will have to stick to the adopting parents – or face a multitude of lawsuits from adoptees who will rightly claim discrimination if they are excluded from the ballot.
Hint: look how this “guy” DID IT:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publius_Clodius_Pulcher
Birfers, who are by now notorious for misreading, will now think he DID IT in a dress, of course.
Yes. Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98.
You state it is a foreign birth… provide evidence.
We have less evidence that your foreign birth story is true.
We have heard of limited issues with midwive births in Texas and California. What evidence do you have of “rampant” fraud in “many places?
Do you want others to believe you? Provide evidence.
The part that is unclear is how you fail to understand that the COLB is the official HI birth certificate and has been for well over a decade. That you cannot comprehend that is beyond belief.
That you think any state could enact a law that would not accept the HI COLB is laughable.
So, my conclusion remains the same: If the GA bill or any other similar state bill will not accept the current HI COLB, they will be struck down as unconstitutional. FFAC.
I have a question about the FFAC clause. Does it mean that all states must accept CA & TX short form BCs which are not accepted by the Federal government?
No, it does not. However, states cannot add requirements to Constitutionally defined offices. Requiring that an individual provide a series of documents, unrelated to the requirements to hold that office, is adding requirements.
And none of these add requirements to holding office. Apples and oranges. The Georgia statute would prohibit a person to be on the ballot unless they provide documentation that has nothing to do with the requirements of the office. The examples you listed off are how electoral votes are distributed once the person is on the ballot.
Except that it would be unconstitutional. The requirement is that the person be a natural born citizen. A state issued birth certificate is proof of that. The full faith and credit clause of the constitution requires that other states honor eachother’s documents, including documents certifying birth. A Hawaiian issued COLB is all any state would need to satisfy any questions. Requiring anything more would violate either the full faith and credit clause, or the prohibition that states cannot add requirements to constitutionally defined offices. Why is it that birthers believe they get to pick and chose which parts of the Constitution should be enforced?
It’s irrelevant if they do or not. See above.
And if it passed, they would. A district court would put an immediate injuction on the implementation of the law, and then strike it down. If the state wanted to waste their money they would appeal to the Circuit court, which would affirm the decision. If the state wanted to waste even more money, they would petition the SCOTUS for cert., and the SCOTUS would deny cert without comment.
Sef, the second part of the Full Faith and Credit Clause says that Congress can pass laws on how they’re accepted, and what they prove. So, if the Federal Government doesn’t accept them as proof, then the States don’t have to either. However, if the Federal Government does accept it as proof, then the States must, because of the Full Faith and Credit Clause.
If by flexibility you mean violates various provisions of the Constitution…yes.
That’s like saying, “if you aren’t guilty, why are you worried if the federal government taps you phones without a warrant or probable cause, or for that matter, if they search your home?” Oh yeah….because it’s not consitutional.
If by “rampant” you mean a very narrow section of the US along the Mexican border, specifically related to a handful mid-wives fraudulently testifying that they attended births they didn’t, I suppose you have a point. However, the definition of “rampant” used by the rest of the English speaking world doesn’t apply here. Birth certificates in the US are generally reliable, and thus so are US Passports. If you have evidence of fraud, the burden is on you to provide it, and show that the birth certificate or passport are unreliable in a particular situation.
Passports are based on certified copies of state birth records which are based on the the original birth records. They are all legal documents, and all are sufficient under the law. If you have evidence of fraud, the burden is on you to provide it for a particular case, and show why the legal documents should not be afforded the respect the law mandates they should be treated with.
And no states should get special treatment to ignore parts of the constitution. I have no problem with a state that has a requirement that an individual show with legal documentation they are eligible to hold the office. That would include any state certified birth records, or a passport.
Why are you worried that Obama would not qualify?
He has a long form birth certificate in the DoH archive. After all he was born in the Kapiolani Hospital, wasn’t he?
That is what Obama supporters on this blog have been saying all along.
You believe that Obama told the truth about his birthplace. Therefore, it will be a formality to prove his birth officially, without relying on digital images posted on a friendly web site.
Which would mean the statute would fail under the Full Faith and Credit Clause.
As stated above, the proposed law unconsitution. The state of Hawaii no longer issues copies like the Nordykes’ nor can the state of Georgia require they they start issuing them again. However, in our wonderful system, Hawaii’s COLB is prima facie evidence of the facts it attests to, so unless you have evidence as to why it should not be relied on, it proves his birthplace.
Actually it does. It’s prima facie evidence of his Hawaiian birth. That’s all you need. You don’t get to assume fraud. You have to prove it. So unless you have evidence of fraud, the COLB does answer the question of fraud. Just because you think it is remotely possible that fraud occurred doesn’t mean the rest of the world has to stop to answer your questions. Neither do you lame protestations about the index numbers, which can be explained away under several mundane occurances that don’t involve fraud. Short of actual evidence of why the COLB should not be relied on, it is legally sufficient to establish the President was born in Hawaii.
The COLB was not good enough evidence for Hawaii authorities when determining whether a person is a Hawaii native. The same is true with the proof whether one is a natural born Citizen.
No one is worried that the President would not qualify. Some of us just take the issue of the Constitution a little more seriously than birthers who don’t care two squats about the Consitution, and just use it as an excuse to attack the legitimacy of a properly elected President, and are perfectly willing to ignore the Constitution in that goal.
Again, would you object to the police randomly showing up at your house every couple weeks and performing a full body cavity search on you and your family every couple of week? I mean, if you’re not guilty of anything, what do you have to hide?
Wrong for so many reasons. First off, Hawaii does accept the COLB. Secondly, the reason there would be a need for additional information is that there are very different requirements in proving Hawaiian herigate and proving one is a NBC.
To prove one is a NBC, all one needs to show is birth in Hawaii, which the COLB does. Therefore, the COLB is sufficient….afterall, the Department of State accepts it.
If you cared about the Constitution you would have welcomed the resolution of eligibility issue by the SCOTUS. You would have supported the release of PUBLIC information about Obama’s birth index, his mother’s passport records,…
Your behavior is contradictory to the claim that you care about Constitution. Unless you are talking about Constitution of another country?
Only in upside down world would supporting the constitution be considered a removal of privacy rights especially after the first Black President released more information than his predecessors. The eligibility issue was resolved by Scotus when the Chief Justice swore him in and denied every birther lawsuit that’s come before them.
I consider the eligibility issue resolved. Apparently so does the Supreme Court. If there was an issue, I would expect the courts to act within the entire consitution, including the case and controversey clause, full faith and credit, and all precident established by the court. I also consider the words “cert. denied” resolution by the SCOTUS.
I do support the release of Public information. However, you have yet to show that the state of Hawaii hasn’t done so. At this time, index numbers are not public information under the laws of Hawaii. Pointing to an amended law, and an AG Opinion based on that law, doesn’t change that. I don’t think you have raised any evidence that would require changing the laws and regulations of the State of Hawaii at this point. Come up with some evidence, and I may change my mind. I would even go so far as to call for a Congressional investigation, with subpoena power if you could produce some information…but until then, I have to go by the actual evidence out there, which all points to the President being born in Hawaii.
As for the passport records, again, I do believe the government should comply with FOIA as a general rule. I wish the government could be more responsive to the requests…but as everyone is crying about how evil big government is, and how they want to evicerate it, I am not surprised when it takes forever to get a response, or that the response may have been done quickly, and may not be everything what I envisioned. I also don’t think just because I believe there is a document, that that is conclusive evidence that the document currently, or ever existed.
So where you have consistently asked for states, the courts, and the federal government to ignore the constution and the laws of US and its states, I am waiting for you to point out exactly where I have done so? Perhaps we aren’t speaking of the same constitution? Or perhaps you really don’t know (or don’t care) the first thing about the US Constition?
What NC1 doesn’t seem to understand is that the American system of jurisprudence has worked EXACTLY the way it was designed to work with regard to the eligibility of Barack Hussein Obama II to be President of the United States.
There have been more than 90 legal adjudications challenging Obama’s eligibility in courts at every level of the judiciary in nearly every state in the Union. It is not Obama’s fault that he has not been adjudicated as being ineligible in any of those proceedings.
The Supreme Court of the United States has conferenced thirteen times on appeals related to Obama’s eligibility:
1) Berg v Obama; (2) Beverly v F.E.C.; (3) Craig v US; (4) Donofrio v Wells; (5) Herbert v Obama; (6) Hollister v Soetoro; (7) Hollister v Soetoro rehearing; (8) Kerchner v Obama; (9) Lightfoot v Bowen; (10) Rhodes v MacDonald; (11) Schneller v Cortes; (12) Taitz v Obama; and (13) Wrotnowski v Bysiewicz.
In three years of trying, no judge and no Court has ruled that Barack Obama is ineligible and he continues as the 44th President of the United States.
The Constitution guarantees the right of the people to petition the government for redress of grievances. It does not guarantee that any of the people will prevail in their attempt to redress their grievances and the “Obama is ineligible” movement has lost every single time.
I am reminded of a case back in the ’60s, possibly apocryphal, of a person requesting everything on a certain subject from one of the government departments and receiving a boxcar load of stuff. I doubt it would happen today.
I am not from Bulgaria, so stop Pollanding me and claiming Obama relies on digital images. Digital images on the net which were the result of scanning and photographing (Factcheck) a COLB. Which you said would not suffice. That is where your borderline begins. And where Full Faith and Credit will sink this bill.
And of course, there is the little detail of dual citizenship, which is a birfers’ phantasmagoria.
Wrong. It is not good enough to determine whether someone is a NATIVE HAWAIIAN, meaning that they were descended from the original Polynesian inhabitants of the Hawaiian Islands. The President has never once claimed to be a Native Hawaiian, so your statement is completely irrelevant.
Then again, this, like every single other point you raise, has been pointed out to you dozens of times….
Obama qualifies automatically to be President, based on the fact that he IS President. Such quallification is bestowed, in a democratic republic, by the voters. You can turn on CNN and observe people in several countries dying for that very principle.
And that’s no different from mainland indigenous Americans in some tribes who want to claim tribal membership needing to have a blood quantum level taken while Americans who aren’t American Indian never have to prove their blood percentage.
> Again, would you object to the police randomly showing up at your house every couple weeks and performing a full body cavity search on you and your family every couple of week?I mean, if you’re not guilty of anything, what do you have to hide?
The ironic thing is that it is the birthers who, along with a couple of other wingnuts, complain the loudest about the “sexual harrassment” of being searched at airports. Yet they are the ones who request everything from last week’s laundry list to the tax papers of every former Obama client just to see if some dirt shows up. Or, more precisely, to keep the “he is not releasing everything” meme alive.
Funny you should mention that. I was just reading excerpts from Duggin and Collins’ article in the Boston University Law Review from 2005, NATURAL BORN’ IN THE USA: THE STRIKING UNFAIRNESS AND DANGEROUS AMBIGUITY OF THE CONSTITUTION’S PRESIDENTIAL QUALIFICATIONS CLAUSE AND WHY WE NEED TO FIX IT.
They wrote:
I do not have a hyperlink to the original article that still works. You can buy a copy from Lexis Nexis.
If YOU cared about the Constitution you would have accepted the outcome of the Constitutional process for selection of a President. If YOU cared about the Constitution you would have been happy to see Congress doing its job of counting the electoral votes. If you had doubts about Obama’s qualifications, you would have written to your congressional representatives prior to January of 2008 to express those doubts, because if YOU cared about the Constitution you would have known that Constitution provides a way for those doubts to be raised in Congress, after the election but prior to the inauguration of each President.
I’m not sure that last bit is either well founded or fair to be honest. Complaints about the alleged “sexual harrassment” of passengers at airports tend to be more common amongst for want of a better description the more “liberal” of US citizens who in general are more likely to be Obama supporters or at the very least less opposed to Obama than people of other political views, whereas birthers/ doubters etc tend to in general identify themselves with right wing thinking.
While I fully realise we can’t pigeon hole everybody, I’d think that speaking in very broad terms there could well actually be, on the contrary, a lower probability of a birther complaining about intrusive airport searches than a birther-basher doing so.
As a frequent flying birther-basher who has no significant problem at all with the principle or practice of airport security, it sticks in my throat a little bit to say the above….but staying objective is important to me.
Expelliarmus, if he cared about the Constitution, he would not be advocating for Georgia to pass a clearly unconstitutional bill that will get struck down on it’s first challenge…
That’s what reasonable people of all political persuasions have been saying.
There is just one little gotcha. The Georgia law requires the residence address of the father, which isn’t on a Hawaiian long form.
That said, I’m beginning to think none of the “birther bills” are going to pass.
Wow. Do you get dizzy from being wrong so often, or have you found an effective medication for vertigo?
The requirements for establishing that you are a native Hawaiian are different than the requirements for being a natural born citizen. It would be different if the Constitution required that a natural born citizen be a direct descendant of one of the original citizens of the U.S., but it doesn’t.
When I got my first job out of college, I had to produce a copy of my transcript because being a college graduate was a requirement for that job. There is no requirement that the President of the United States be a college graduate, so a candidate for President does not have to produce a copy of his or her transcript. To join the American Legiion, I have to provide proof that I served in the U.S. military. There is no requirement that the President of the United States has to have served in the military, so John McCain didn’t have to produce his service record. Get it? Different situations, different qualifications.
How does any of this prove where someone was born?
Well a birth record or a passport will prove exactly that, and we have seen evidence of both of those.
In fact, what was the issue again?
PoltiiFact Georgia has an article on this bill today. http://www.politifact.com/georgia/statements/2011/mar/09/loren-collins/birther-foe-says-ga-bill-gets-constitution-wrong/
It completely supports Loren’s editorial on the bill.
Natural born requires US citizen patrents.
Voters are free to elect Shwartzenegger to be US president, right?
“…And the children of such person so naturalized, dwelling within the United States, being under the age of twenty one years at the time of such naturalization, shall also be considered as citizens of the United States. And the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond Sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born Citizens: Provided, that the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never been resident in the United States…”
How could a natural born citizen been born to a foreigner? At the time when Constitution was written such a child was not considered a citizen.
> Natural born requires US citizen patrents.
Repeating falsities does not magically make them true.
Let me repeat Thrifty’s question:
“Where do […] adoption records, baptism records, Social Security records, medical records, school and college records, military records […] prove where someone was born?”
For the 80th time, no it does not.
Yes, absolutely. And if Congress ruled him qualified, he would be in the White House. And I would call him, “Mr President”. I’m sorry you grew up in a dictatorship. This is a democracy. Here, the people choose their leaders. Perhaps you should have gone to Iran or Saudi Arabia instead.
That applied ONLY, repeat ONLY to those born outside the US.
At the time the Constitution was written any free, white person born in the United States was a citizen, regardless of who their parents were.
Arnold Schwarzenegger was born in Thal, Austria on July 30, 1947.
Could someone please slowly and carefully explain to the obstinate birther troll why the nation of Austria is not and has never been a part of or under the jurisdiction or sovereignty of the United States of America?
Yes, but that’s a big if. Especially now.
How certain are we that his father wasn’t an American GI?
Yes, once again nc1 FAILS at reading comprehension.
Prove that his mother was not a US Citizen, then.
Will be a pretty tough task; she has a direct ancestor who arrived on (a later voyage of) the Mayflower.
If she’s not a citizen, nobody is.
Somehow I seriously doubt that:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustav_Schwarzenegger
This question was carefully researched by the court in the case of Lynch v Clarke:
http://books.google.com/books?id=ERgvAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA236
The Schwarzenegger “argument” is similar to the birther fantasy of Osama bin Laden’s child being born in the U.S. and getting elected President. Both scenarios are theoretically possible, but neither would ever occur in the reality-based world. I have a better chance of winning the lottery than seeing Schwarzenegger elected President.
Havent most of Bin Ladens children turned against him anyway?
“…And the children of such person so naturalized, dwelling within the United States, being under the age of twenty one years at the time of such naturalization, shall also be considered as citizens of the United States. And the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond Sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born Citizens: Provided, that the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never been resident in the United States…”
Why don’t you put the emphasis where it belongs – on the sentence that says “And the children of citizens of the United States THAT MAY BE BORN BEYOND SEA, OR OUT OF THE LIMITS OF THE UNITED STATES,..”
President Obama was born in the US therefore this clause does not apply to him.
But what exactly would be WRONG with Schwarzenegger or Jennifer Granholm being President? They were 2-term governors of large, diverse states, which gives them more experience than Obama had in 2008 and more than any of the likely Republican challengers. If you thought they did a bad job, then you certainly don’t have to vote for them, but they should be able to run.
Look, I know a lot of people believe the Constitution is holy writ, but it isn’t. It’s a set of rules and it’s over 220 years old and showing its age. We don’t play baseball or run stock markets or anything else by 220 year old rules. Most countries have Constitutions that are much more modern documents. It’s time to clean out the stuff that doesn’t work and high on the list is the natural born citizen nonsense.
If any citizen could run for President, the birthers would be out of business and Doc too (or he’d have to move on to conspiracy theories about tsunamis or something that actually affected people’s lives). All a candidate would have to do is show a US passport and it would be discussion over. Simple, clean and sensible.
It doesn’t apply to anyone, since it’s a law from 1790 that has superseded many times. Currently, if both parents are citizens, one of them has to have lived in the US at some point prior to the child’s birth. If one parent is a citizen then they had to live in the US for 5 years, at least 2 of which were after the 14th birthday.
We need to all stop pretending it’s still the 18 the century. I am typing this on a laptop, not writing with a quill on parchment. Just like in science, the latest version is what guides us, not outdated ones.
But wouldn’t an electronic parchment tablet with a quill input pen be kind of cool?
English not your first language? What part of “may be born beyond Sea, or out of the limits of the United States” do you fail to comprehend?
You mean like this…
http://besttabletreview.com/a-wacom-graphire3-tablet-gets-the-steampunk-treatment/
LOL! Cool stuff. Now someone’s gotta get to work on the electronic quill input pen that Majority Will suggested. (I’d like to see a laser-based quill pen)
🙂
More back to the future:
http://steampunkworkshop.com/keyboard.shtml
I agree, I probably should have said that it will never happen absent a constitutional amendment, which I would support.
According to you Julia Lynch was a natural born citizen, right?
“A natural born citizen would be one who by nature, that is by inheritance, so to speak, was a citizen, as distinguished from one who was by nativity or locality of birth a citizen. ”
http://naturalborncitizen.wordpress.com/2011/03/12/the-boston-globe-%e2%80%9cnative-born%e2%80%9d-does-not-equal-%e2%80%9cnatural-born%e2%80%9d-for-presidential-eligibility/
There are only two types of US citizens: natural born citizens and naturalized ones. Lynch was never naturalized. She could not be naturalized, because she was born in the US, and not of parents who were diplomats or members of an invading army.
Although, of course, at that time, some people in New York did consider all those Irish immigrants an invading army. Do you think she was part of an invading army?
====================================================================
The first US Naturalization act (1790) mentions that child born abroad to US citizens is a natural born citizen. This phrase was changed in the subsequent legislation (1795) where such child was considered as citizen (at birth). There would have been no reason for changing this part of the law if two phrases had the same meaning.
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.”
“The first US Naturalization act (1790) mentions that child born abroad to US citizens is a natural born citizen. This phrase was changed in the subsequent legislation (1795) where such child was considered as citizen (at birth). There would have been no reason for changing this part of the law if two phrases had the same meaning. ”
Good grief. That one again. So, legislators re-wrote “natural born citizen” as “born citizen” for people born abroad and somehow that changed the status of people born in the US. They silently changed the interpretation of all common law on the issue (I was almost tempted to write “on the subject” but knowing that would wake up MichaelN) since 1608. Sorry, you cannot change the leaw silently, by way of using code. I am sure it is in Vattel somewhere.
In fact, you are barking up the wrong tree. The argument here was that Congress cannot decide who is a natural born citizen, they can only naturalize. What is happening here is the legislators trying to avoid taking a decision.
It does not matter, because this question was decided by Wong Kim Ark and Ankeny. Same thing with whatever Minor said – they just avoided taking a decision on that point – Wong Kim Ark decided it for once and for all.
Oh, and your quote from Minor proves that even the Justices in Minor did not know your imagined difference between natives and natural born citizens. Wrong tree again.
It’s interesting that you bring up Congress and their findings on who is a natural born citizen. Let’s look at what Congress did more recently, specifically in January 2009:
1. They found Barack Obama and Joe Biden qualified for the offices of President and Vice President.
2. Among the qualifications for those offices are being a natural born citizen,
3. Therefore, they found Barack Obama and Joe Biden to be natural born citizens.(as well as having won the election, being over 35 years of age and having lived in the US for 14 years).
In fact, of more than 300,000,000 living Americans, there are only 10 who have been deemed natural born ciitizens by Congress. These are: Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale , George Bush Sr and Jr., Dan Quayle, Bill Cllinton, Al Gore, Dick Cheney, Barack Obama and Joe Biden. “Of everyone else, there have been doubts, but never of these 10 indiviiduals”.
I’m happy you brought this up, because I have grave concerns about Angel, my Afghan hound.
She came from a shelter, and all her paperwork has been lost. Do you have any suggestions where I should start?
Hey, it’s zombie week, remember?
I wouldn’t worry until she gets 35 years old.
But what if she was listed in the 1999 Kabul telephone directory?
Old buddy Kerchner’s opinion on the bill in GA…
CDR Kerchner (Ret) says:
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 at 11:55 AM
In my opinion the Republican leadership of the states are caving in to pressure from Republican leaders in Washington DC and the national RNC leadership which is still trying to keep a lid and cone of silence on the complicity of both political parties in the fraudulent 2008 presidential election cycle. They are protecting their anointed one John McCain who also had his natural born Citizenship issues. Who knows, maybe they secretly want to run McCain again as a last minute white knight candidate. Or maybe they want to run Jindall of Louisianna who is also not an NBC. Read this article I wrote about why the RNC is blocking the investigation of Obama as much or more so than the DNC is: The Fix was in for the 2008 Presidential Election. All three political candidates … DNC, RNC, and Socialist Party had issues with the Article II, Section 1, natural born Citizenship status and the coverup was put in place. The Perfect Storm for a Constitutional Crisis:
http://puzo1.blogspot.com/2010/01/i-believe-fix-was-in-for-2008-election.html
So the short answer is the the Republican leadership does not want to go there because they know if they out Obama … he will out McCain and the RNC complicity in the 2008 cover up and fraudulent election.
CDR Kerchner (Ret)
Leo Is back with more commentary that makes no sense…Below is a excerpt…Also interesting are his usual comments to his “fans”….
The Boston Globe: “native born” does not equal “natural born” for Presidential eligibility.
You may add The Boston Globe to the growing list of influential media sources who have expressed the opinion that simply being born in the United States does not qualify one to be President. Recently, this blog pointed to a similar opinion in the New York Tribune. These pre-dated Breckenridge Long’s similar opinion as stated in the Chicago Legal News.
Recently, one of my readers uncovered this crucially relevant article published in the Boston Globe on November 9, 1896 by Percy A. Bridgham, aka “The People’s Lawyer“. (Mr. Bridgham’s book, One Thousand Legal Questions Answered by the “People’s Lawyer” of the Boston Daily Globe, can be found in the Harvard Law School library.)
The People’s Lawyer, upon answering a reader’s question regarding the Constitution’s natural born citizen clause, stated:
“The fact that the Constitution says “natural” instead of native shows to my mind that the distinction was thought of and probably discussed. A natural born citizen would be one who by nature, that is by inheritance, so to speak, was a citizen, as distinguished from one who was by nativity or locality of birth a citizen. A child born to Irish parents in Ireland cannot become a citizen except by naturalization, while his brother born in the United States is a native born citizen; the former is neither naturally nor by nativity a citizen, the latter is not naturally, but natively a citizen.”
It’s important to note that, while this article was written two years before the controversial decision in Wong Kim Ark, Bridgham adopts a similar conclusion as Justice Gray did in that case by stating that children born of aliens on US soil are citizens. But Bridgham also states that while these children are “native born” citizens, they are not “natural born” citizens and therefore cannot be President.
Bridgham further states:
“A comparison of the meanings of native and natural as given by Webster bears me out in my opinion of the intent of the constitution. The very definition of natural is “fixed or determined by nature,”…I do not find that our courts have ever passed upon the meaning of the word natural in connection with citizenship, so we must take its ordinary meaning.” (Link to full article.)
So, The People’s Lawyer (and the Boston Globe) can now be listed as “birthers”.
Your legislators continue to dodge the issue claiming that it’s a “distraction”. The Constitution is a distraction? Only to a traitor. Everyone should note with very careful particularity the name of each elected official who refers to the Constitution as a distraction. These are traitors to their oath of office.
The question we are raising is not something made up to deal with Obama alone. As I have stressed many times throughout the history of this blog, those who are “native born” are not necessarily “natural born”. The Boston Globe published this back in 1896. In that same year, the New York Tribune echoed the sentiment with regard to the Labor Party Candidate, Johannes Schurmann. And in 1916, former Assistant Secretary of State and Ambassador to Italy, Breckenridge Long, wrote the following in the Chicago Legal News:
“It is not disputed that Mr. Hughes is not a citizen of the United States, but if he had the right to elect, he must have had something to choose between. He was native born because he was born in this country, and he is now a native born citizen because he is now a citizen of this country; but, had he been a “natural born” citizen, he would not have had the right to choose between this country and England; he would have had nothing to choose between; he would have owed his sole allegiance to the government of the United States, and there would have been no possible question, whether he found himself in the United States or in any other country in the world, that he would be called upon to show allegiance to any Government but that of the United States.”
………….
If Obama is eligible, so are the potential sons of foreign despots who hate this country. Take your pick. If Kim Jong Il or Osama bin Laden were to impregnate an American woman who gave birth in the US, that child could be Commander In Chief of the US Armed Forces based upon the precedent set by Obama.
Those states considering bills which would require Presidential candidates to prove they did not have dual allegiance at the time of their births are on the front lines of this battle. I have come back to this blog in order to support their effort. I hope there is at least one state in the union which has legislators who care enough about this nation’s future to risk the scorn of media propaganda.”
http://naturalborncitizen.wordpress.com/2011/03/12/the-boston-globe-%E2%80%9Cnative-born%E2%80%9D-does-not-equal-%E2%80%9Cnatural-born%E2%80%9D-for-presidential-eligibility/
This doesn’t jive with there being only two types of citizens according to minor v happersett. You’re either born a citizen or you’re naturalized. Born citizens aren’t naturalized.
Accepting only for the sake of argument that the US electorate would ever knowingly elect a child of Kim Jong or Osama Bin Laden as President (despite all common sense dictating that such an eventuality is to all practical intents so thoroughly unlikely as to be not really worth contemplating as a possibility), it simply isn’t factual that any precedent set by Obama is what would then make that child CIC.
No competent lawyer would use such faulty logic.
Judge, you forget that the birthers are neither competent, legal experts, nor logical….A perfect example is NC1….
“If Kim Jong Il or Osama bin Laden were to impregnate an American woman who gave birth in the US, that child could be Commander In Chief of the US Armed Forces based upon the precedent set by Obama.”
That’s an over the top insult to the intelligence of American voters. Is that spoken by someone who is from a foreign nation with such obvious disrespect for the people of the United States?
Birther desperation has reached a new level of putrid stink.
By that logic then why do they have no problem with someone like Timothy McVeigh, Ted Kazcinsky, Jeffrey Dahmer being able to be eligible for POTUS, well before they did what they did. It also totally ignores reality. Many of Bin Laden’s children want nothing to do with him.
Did you know that all squares are rectangles but not all rectangles are squares?
Similarly, all natural born citizens are citizens, but not all citizens are natural born citizens.
When the Constitution says “citizen” alone, that means that it includes both natural born citizens and naturalized citizens. It doesn’t imply that there is some third type of citizen that can be born here but not be a natural born citizen.
That would be like assuming there’s some four-sided object with 4 equal-sized sides and 4 90-degree angles that wasn’t a square simply because some rectangles are not squares!
But, please, keep demonstrating that basic conditional reasoning is beyond you.
My favorite example of a natural born traitor, who would have been eligible to be President, is Adam Gadahn, who is currently living in a cave in Pakistan with Osama Bin Laden.
This ignores the words of Alexander Porter Morse,
“In the law of nations, ”citizen” is a term applicable to every member of the civil society, every individual who belongs to the nation.
“This character is acquired in various ways, according to the laws of each state. In many states birth is sufficient to confer it; so that the child of an alien is a citizen from the fact of having been born within the territorial limits and the jurisdiction.2‘
And in his footnote #2: ”It is so in England and in the United States [but the births must be ” within the jurisdiction”‘].”
He goes on to say,
“The Constitution does not make the citizens (it is, in fact, made by them) ; it only recognizes such of them as are natural, home-born, and provides for the naturalization of such of them as are alien, foreign-born, making the latter, as far as nature will allow, like the former.” (“A Thesis on Citizenship”, 1881).
According to A. P. Morse under the law of nations each country gets to make their own laws on citizenship. And in the US, citizenship is based on place of birth. And also in the US, there are only two types of citizens, natural born and naturalized.
I agree. Moreover, there is an important philosophical point here. Do the citizens of a democratic republic have the right to elect even noxious leaders, whether the children of foreign dictators or domestic criminals? My response is that they do, though I certainly don’t advocate that they exercise that right. And why would some think the American people are fools (and yet, somehow, that Georgia state legislators are paragons of wisdom)? In the end, we have no choice but to trust in the good sense of the people over that of self-appointed “guardians”. As Lincoln said, “You can fool all of the people some of the time and some of the people all of the time, but you can’t foool all of the people all of the time”.
Yes, the “people” can cast their vote for whomever, even “Lizard people”. Congress, however, has the final say. They can choose not to accept the votes of the Electoral College and then Congress would choose a President & VP.
Wow…a birther “lawyer” citing a pre-WKA newspaper….you’ve got us beat. Forget Supreme Court precident…you’ve got the pre-WKA Boston Globe on your side.
You realize how silly pointing to this makes you look?
Uh, oh: ملاك (93) 799654000
“If Obama is eligible, so are the potential sons of foreign despots who hate this country. Take your pick. If Kim Jong Il or Osama bin Laden were to impregnate an American woman who gave birth in the US, that child could be Commander In Chief of the US Armed Forces based upon the precedent set by Obama.”
I just don’t get this birther argument. If that really remote situation did occur…yes, they would be eligible (and of course, there is a world of difference between being eligible and being elected). So why is that so shocking (I remember Mike Dukakis constantly using the fact that the son of Greek imigrants could run for president like it was a good thing when he ran for president)? And it’s not a precedent set by Obama, it’s a precedent set by WKA. So much for not judging a child by the sins of their parents…and is it any worse than the son or daughter of any other nut job running for President?
So do they think that by saying an absurd, but factual statement, we’re supposed to deny reality….oh wait, they do, so I suppose I must be missing the point.
> Do the citizens of a democratic republic have the right to elect even noxious leaders, whether the children of foreign dictators or domestic criminals? My response is that they do
Exactly. The birfer always pretend that anyone who is “true blue American” is automatically exempt from being evil, traitorous and/or stupid, though they themselves betray that notion.
We’ve had similar discussions here in Germany when we had the first state official with Turkish descent and right-wing people said “do we really want some Ali Ãœzgürüz as chancellor one day?” and my only though was “can’t be worse than the chancellors we’ve had so far”. And that I take an honest Turkish person over a German crook any time.
Somehow the birthers have a big problem with that.
Maybe they’ll learn in 2069 when the first gay hermaphrodite Asian-Pakistani (and NBC even in their book) becomes US president. Or they’ll come up with more ways why you can’t be president unless you’re a white Christian male from the South.
The OK Birther bill is finalized….
Oklahoma’s Senate Bill 91.
“The candidates shall further be required to provide proof of identity and United States citizenship to the State Election Board. A candidate shall present a current state or federal government-issued photo identification to provide proof of identity, and shall also present one of the following documents to provide proof of United States natural-born citizenship:
1. An original birth document issued by a state, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, or the District of Columbia, or a certified copy thereof;
2. An original birth certificate issued by the federal government, or a certified copy thereof;
3. An original United States Certificate of Birth Abroad; or
4. An original Report of Birth Abroad of a Citizen of the United States.”
So President Obama’s COLB is suffcient for proof of birth in OK….I wonder how many birther heads have exploded…
Jo, NC1 got this from Leo….You know the birthers think he is the best lawyer this side of Matlock….Leo somehow felt that this old article was somehow germane to his argument…Hilarious…
The Birfoons are already squealing like stuck pigs over this one…HOW DARE THE TRAITORS LET BARKY OFF THE HOOK” etc etc.
Relevamt bit
Qu’elle suprise, the COLB meets the requirements. Birfoon tears of anguish are so sweet…….
Wish I could honestly say I was forgetting those factors BL, but alas the shameful truth is that I was just impishly enjoying the opportunity to toss fuel on to the already ablaze bonfire of Leo’s competence. Forgive my weakness.
NC one,
What counts is not what some lawyer quoted in the Boston Globe in the pre-WKA 1890s says, but what living U.S. Supreme Court justices in our time say. If Justice Scalia remains true to his stated principles of legal construction, he would toss aside a statement such as this with withering scorn:
“The fact that the Constitution says “natural” instead of native shows to my mind that the distinction was thought of and probably discussed.”
PROBABLY DISCUSSED? Wow, that’s sure to carry great weight with a justice who disdains even documented legislative debate as a criterion for construing legislation.
With Scalia; it is the commonly understood meaning of the terms in a statute or a constitutional provision, contemporary with its adoption, that counts Birthers avoid the plain fact that the pre-independent British colonies that became the United States attributed citizenship to place of birth
Since the colonies pre-existed Vattel, there was no one (that the birthers can cite, at any rate) making a distinction between being born a natural born subject of the British monarch, and merely being born a subject.
Nothing in the words of the Constitution points to any change in the commonly understoord meaning of the term “natural born citizen” with the creation of the new nation.
Birthers claim that the founding fathers somehow fixed a different meaning, citizenship inherited through parentage. But they supply no evidence at all that the common ordinary citizens of the new republic were even apprised of any such change.
So the commonly understood meaning, to Scalia’s way of thinking, of natural born citizen would have to be what ordinary citizens at that time considered it to be.
If you credit the birthers’ reasoning, the founding fathers must have changed the requirements for natural born citizenship WITHOUT TELLING THE PEOPLE.
Without Scalia: it’s hard to imagine the birthers gaining five votes on the Supreme Court in favor of any of their legal theories as to why Obama is ineligible. Come to think of it, it’s very hard to imagine the birthers gaining five votes on the Supreme Court, period.
Georgia’s specific requirements really do seem to be over the top compared to some of the other bills. I’ve noted that California’s current BC form doesn’t even list residences. I saw a few examples of 1990s Vermont BC forms, and they don’t even include a space for an attendant (physician or midwife). Hasn’t Vermont also moved to computer generated forms?
Birther bill sponsor tries, fails to get vote
By April Hunt
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The sponsor of a “birther” bill that has stalled in the Georgia House made a last-ditch effort Tuesday to get a vote on the proposal.
Rep. Mark Hatfield, R-Waycross, failed in his attempt to get the powerful Rules Committee to amend a bill setting the date for Georgia’s presidential primary. He tried to add language from House Bill 401, which would force presidential and vice presidential candidates to prove their U.S. citizenship before landing on the Georgia ballot.
The attempt would have led to a Crossover Day vote on Wednesday, the last day for a measure to pass from one chamber for review in another. The primary bill is up for a vote on Wednesday, but without any amendments.
Hatfield’s bill, which originally had 93 co-sponsors, had just 65 backers by this week. Most of the 28 lawmakers who dropped off said they hadn’t seen the language in the proposal and felt the state had more important matters to address.
Hatfield’s bill was inspired by the “birther” movement, which believes President Barack Obama was not born in the United States. Hawaii has released records of Obama’s birth, but it remains a popular sentiment among some factions.
http://www.ajc.com/news/georgia-politics-elections/birther-bill-sponsor-tries-873634.html
Hopefully, the next update will be that the god-awful thing failed to make it through the Wednesday vote and is dead and gone for good….
‘Birther Bill’ Stalls at the Gold Dome
Updated: Wednesday, 16 Mar 2011, 7:21 PM EDT
Published : Wednesday, 16 Mar 2011, 7:01 PM EDT
By: PAUL YATES/myfoxatlanta
ATLANTA – A last-minute effort to pass a so-called “Birther Bill” at the Capitol appears to have failed Wednesday.
The bill would require that candidates for president and vice-president prove their citizenship.
Critics said the bill would have embarrassed the state and they say it was inspired by claims that question President Barack Obama’s citizenship.
The bill is likely dead for this legislative session.
The bill initially had 94 signers, but that number dropped to 65 as co-sponsors deleted their names.
The measure would force candidates for president and vice president to certify their citizenship with the Georgia secretary of state’s office before going on the ballot in the state.
Democratic state Representative Glenn Baker of Jonesboro said he did not fully understand the bill’s ramifications when he signed it and quickly removed his name.
Representative Mark Hatfield is the bill’s main sponsor and he tried and failed to get a vote on the measure before the deadline for legislation to pass from one chamber to the other.
The measure could potentially be attached to other legislation, but that’s not likely to happen.
The House speaker sent signals days ago that he did not favor a vote on the bill.
Hurrah for sanity!
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Why did you choose rectangle as a starting point? Why not start at something more generic, like quadrilateral?
quadrilateral (four sides) = citizen
parallelogram (parallel sides, non 90 degree angles) = naturalized citizen
rectangle (parallel sides, 90 degree angles) = citizen at birth
square (equal sides, 90 degree angles) = natural born citizen
Now citizens at birth and natural born citizens do not have to be one and the same as in your example.
What did I prove here – only one thing: Both analogies (yours and mine) are completely arbitrary.
==================================================================
What precedent are you talking about? When did SCOTUS rule on nbC definition?
It is not just Boston Globe:
http://naturalborncitizen.wordpress.com/2011/03/08/new-york-tribune-1896-those-born-of-non-citizen-parents-may-not-be-eligible-for-potus/
The Trib from 1896?! What have you been smoking?
You might want to open the entire image on that site and read the right column. That would be the column that states:
The author may have had “questions,” but it appears, they were his questions and not shared by all.
> It is not just Boston Globe
Having come to be suspicious about anything the birthers cite, I would ask you the question: why doesn’t Leo show the full scan of the article if he quotes it in its entirety? Maybe because the second page would show that this is a reader’s letter?
> If you credit the birthers’ reasoning, the founding fathers must have changed the requirements for natural born citizenship WITHOUT TELLING THE PEOPLE.
That’s what I’ve been saying all along. Additionally, they exposed themselves as real pranksters when they hid their secret reference to Vattel in plain sight by referring to the “Law of Nations” elsewhere in the Constitution.
You see, the Constitution was originally meant to be an April fool’s joke and just by coincidence happened to make it past April 2nd.
So the Founders are now laughing in their graves because they succeeded in having all courts and Congresses and constitutional scholars of the last 200+ years fall for their prank.
That pretty much sums up what the birthers are saying.
The Gnostic Constitution.
When I went to school, we had this subject that is apparently absent from schools these days. That subject was called American History.
And our American History class one of the episodes that was studied was called “The Yellow Peril and the Chinese Exclusion Act”. I don’t have my 6th grade history book anymore, but here is a comment from the Wikipedia article on “The Yellow Peril”:
Wikipedia Article => “The Yellow Peril”
The phrase “yellow peril” was common in the U.S. newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst.[2] It was also the title of a popular book by an influential U.S. religious figure, G.G. Rupert, who published The Yellow Peril; or, Orient vs. Occident in 1911. Based on the phrase “the kings from the East” in the Christian scriptural verse Revelation 16:12,[3] Rupert, who believed in the doctrine of British Israelism, claimed that China, India, Japan and Korea were attacking England and the U.S., but that Jesus Christ would stop them.
But Hearst wasn’t the only one beating the drum, the Boston Globe and the New York Tribune were not Hearst papers, but the whole idea of Chinese as immigrants and citizens was a hard fought issue with the newspapers back then, as today, competing with each other for the most sensationalist stories and continually trying to insense public outrage over these issues. Then, as today, race was a powerful flash point and the newspapers of the day had their Beck’s, their Limbaugh’s, their Farrah’s all spouting racist filth, not because they necessarily believed it (though they probably did), but because it sold newspapers. There is nothing new under the sun folks.
Wikipedia Article => “Chinese Exclusion Act”
The Chinese Exclusion Act was a United States federal law signed by Chester A. Arthur on May 8, 1882, following revisions made in 1880 to the Burlingame Treaty of 1868. Those revisions allowed the U.S. to suspend immigration, and Congress subsequently acted quickly to implement the suspension of Chinese immigration, a ban that was intended to last 10 years. This law was repealed by the Magnuson Act on December 17, 1943.
…One of the critics of the Chinese Exclusion Act was the anti-slavery/anti-imperialist Republican Senator George Frisbie Hoar of Massachusetts who described the Act as “nothing less than the legalization of racial discrimination.”[11]
The laws were driven largely by racial concerns; immigration of persons of other races was unlimited during this period.
Wikipedia Article => “Chinese Exclusion Act”
The Magnuson Act also known as the Chinese Exclusion Repeal Act of 1943 was immigration legislation proposed by U.S. Representative (later Senator) Warren G. Magnuson of Washington and signed into law on December 17, 1943 in the United States. It allowed Chinese immigration for the first time since the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, and permitted some Chinese immigrants already residing in the country to become naturalized citizens. This marked the first time since the Naturalization Act of 1790 that any Asians were permitted to be naturalized. However, the Magnuson Act provided for the continuation of the ban against the ownership of property and businesses by ethnic Chinese. In many states, Chinese Americans (including US citizens) were denied property-ownership rights until the Magnuson Act itself was fully repealed in 1965.[
Notice how this ties in to one of our favorite themes:
Wikipedia Article => “United States v. Wong Kim Ark”
United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898), was a United States Supreme Court decision that set an important legal precedent about the role of jus soli (birth in the United States) as a factor in determining a person’s claim to United States citizenship. The citizenship status of a man born in the United States to Chinese parents was challenged[1] because of a law restricting Chinese immigration and prohibiting immigrants from China from becoming naturalized U.S. citizens,[2] but the Supreme Court ruled that the citizenship language in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution could not be limited in its effect by an act of Congress.
Background
Wong Kim Ark[4] (???; Toisanese: wong11 gim33 ‘ak3; Cantonese: wong4 gam1 dak1; Mandarin: huáng ji-n dé) was born in San Francisco, California, sometime between 1868 and 1873.[5] His father, Wong Si Ping and his mother, Wee Lee[6] were immigrants from Taishan, China and were not United States citizens.
In 1890 Wong’s parents returned to live in China. Later that year Wong himself traveled to China and, when he returned to the U.S., authorities granted him entry “upon the sole ground that he was a native-born citizen of the United States.”[7] Four years later, Wong, who was employed in San Francisco as a cook,[8] sailed to China on another temporary visit in 1894. When he returned to the U.S. in August 1895, he was detained at the Port of San Francisco by the Collector of Customs, who denied him permission to enter the country, arguing that Wong “although born in the city and county of San Francisco, state of California, United States of America, is not, under the laws of the state of California and of the United States, a citizen thereof, the mother and father of the said Wong Kim Ark being Chinese persons, and subjects of the emperor of China, and the said Wong Kim Ark being also a Chinese person and a subject of the Emperor of China.”[1]
In 1882, the Congress of the United States had enacted the Chinese Exclusion Act, limiting entry into the United States of persons of the Chinese race. Chinese immigrants already in the U.S. were allowed to stay, but they were ineligible for naturalization, and if they left the U.S., they needed to obtain approval all over again if they subsequently wished to return. Chinese laborers and miners were specifically barred from coming (or returning) to the U.S. under the terms of the law.[2] However, the “citizenship clause” of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified in 1868 after the Civil War, states the following concerning citizenship: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.[9] A federal district court sided with Wong, declared him to be a citizen,[10][11] and ordered him to be released from custody by immigration officials,[12] but the government appealed this decision to the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court considered the key question in Wong Kim Ark’s case to be “whether a child born in the United States, of parents of Chinese descent, who, at the time of his birth, are subjects of the Emperor of China, but have a permanent domicile and residence in the United States, and are there carrying on business, and are not employed in any diplomatic or official capacity under the Emperor of China, becomes at the time of his birth a citizen of the United States”[13] via the Fourteenth Amendment.
Opinion of the Court
In a 6–2 decision, the Supreme Court held that Wong Kim Ark had indeed acquired U.S. citizenship at birth and that “the American citizenship which Wong Kim Ark acquired by birth within the United States has not been lost or taken away by anything happening since his birth.”[14]
The 14th Amendment’s citizenship clause, according to the court’s majority, had to be interpreted in light of English common law,[15] which had included all native-born children except for those who were: (1) born to foreign rulers or diplomats, (2) born on foreign public ships, or (3) born to enemy forces engaged in hostile occupation of the country’s territory.[16][17] The majority held that the “subject to the jurisdiction” phrase in the 14th Amendment specifically incorporated these exceptions (plus a fourth — namely, that Indian tribes “not taxed” were not considered subject to U.S. jurisdiction[18][19])—and that since none of these exceptions applied to Wong’s situation, Wong was a U.S. citizen, regardless of the fact that his parents were not U.S. citizens (and were, in fact, ineligible ever to become U.S. citizens because of the Chinese Exclusion Act). The opinion emphasized the fact that “during all the time of their said residence in the United States, as domiciled residents therein, the said mother and father of said Wong Kim Ark were engaged in the prosecution of business, and were never engaged in any diplomatic or official capacity under the emperor of China”
The point being that newspapers most surely would have had this discussion in the 1890’s. So what? They were opinion pieces, written to sell newspapers. Their racist views stoked public opinion and produced the racist “Chinese Exclusion Act” that took something like 80 years to fully repeal. America has moved on (at least most of America has). Even in 1898, with the Exclusion Act in FULL FORCE, and public opinion, driven by the fear of the Yellow Peril just a couple of years after the articles quoted by NC1, SCOTUS confirmed that the 14th Amendment confirms the already existing and understood definition of Natural Born Citizen as a person born in territory (i.e. in the jurisdiction of) the United States of America.
I take it you are new to the subject, so I’ll rehash what, for most people here, is rather old hat:
United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898), was a United States Supreme Court decision that set an important legal precedent about the role of jus soli (birth in the United States) as a factor in determining a person’s claim to United States citizenship. The citizenship status of a man born in the United States to Chinese parents was challenged because of a law restricting Chinese immigration and prohibiting immigrants from China from becoming naturalized U.S. citizens, but the Supreme Court ruled that the citizenship language in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution could not be limited in its effect by an act of Congress.
The ruling of the court was that the 14th Amendment confirmed the already existing definition as understood from English Common Law.
In 1898, in the case described above, just a couple of years after the opinion pieces to which you point. It further refined that decision in Perkins v. Elg 307 U.S. 325 (1939) and Plyler v. Doe, 457 U.S. 202 (1982).
Happy to help.
You know, the very one the Leo mentions in the Boston Globe article (and the one Keith points out).
You do realize we are talking about the law here? Newspapers are not judicial opinions (as much as Leo wishes they were). They are not precidential. Newspapers get things wrong on a variety of thing every day, some intentionally so. Just like Fox news is designed to spin the news to represent a certain political view, newspapers did that in the 19th century, and were even worse (Yellow journalism). All it is merely evidence someone who did not know the law on this particular subject, wrote something that slipped by the editorial process. The fact that a case went to the Supreme Court a few year later on the very topic shows that there were people a need for the Court to make a clear statement on the law. However, that was over 100 years ago. The Court did examin the question and the definition has not been in question ever since.
Where is the SCOTUS decision on nbC definition?
I asked about nbC definition not about citizenship. Could you point out to a specific line in the decision where WKA was declared a nbC?
From the Supreme Court decision in US v Wong Kim Ark (1898)
[An alien parent’s] allegiance to the United States is direct and immediate, and, although but local and temporary, continuing only so long as he remains within our territory, is yet, in the words of Lord Coke in Calvin’s Case, 7 Coke, 6a, ’strong enough to make a natural subject, for, if he hath issue here, that issue is a natural-born subject’
The Wong court also said:
“Subject’ and citizen’ are, in a degree, convertible terms as applied to natives; and though the term citizen’ seems to be appropriate to republican freemen, yet we are, equally with the inhabitants of all other countries, ’subjects,’ for we are equally bound by allegiance and subjection to the government and law of the land.’
What follows is an example of the use of the Wong Kim Ark precedent as a basis for a decision on the eligibility of Barack Hussein Obama II to receive Indiana’s Electoral College votes: “Based on the language of Article II, Section 1, Clause 4 and the guidance provided by Wong Kim Ark, we conclude that persons born within the borders of the United States are “natural born citizens” for Article II, Section 1 purposes regardless of the citizenship of their parents.”–Indiana Court of Appeals, November 12, 2009, Ankeny, et. al. v The Governor of Indiana, Mitch Daniels.
The part where Wong Kim Ark was determined to be Born a Citizen. You can’t be naturalized if you are born a citizen in this country. There are only two ways citizens are made either you’re Born one or you are naturalized. Also if you bothered to read the appellate briefs Scotus was only upholding the lower court’s decision that said WKA was natural born.
I’m sorry you don’t understand how to read a judicial opinion. But your ignorance does not change how the law works. The underlying opinion declared WKA an NBC. The SCOTUS opinion in WKA went into great detail explaining the history of NBC and NBS. The fact that you only understand x=y does not put a requirement for the Supreme Court to follow your “simpleton’s rules of law” standard. The Court upheld a lower court opinion. They did that based on what is known as the “rationale.” In WKA, the Court’s rationale was quite lenghty. There is your definition. In all but the simplest of matters, you will never have your x=y. You don’t make the rules. You don’t get to demand that the SCOTUS spoon feed you the law to the equivalent of “law for dummies.”
So quit being obtuse with you “point me to a specific line” garbabe.
NC1 just wants a confirmation of the confirmation that confirms it.
Nooooo because then she’ll want the SCOTUS justices to march down to her house and give the opinion themselves. She better start the digging.
I think people like nc1 show a fundamental misunderstanding about what SCOTUS and courts in general do. They are not a legal dictionary whose job it is to “define” every term used in the Constitution. Rather, they decide actual cases. Sometimes, even when they decide a case that turns on a phrase in the Constitution, they don’t define the term in so many words. For example the First Amendment prohibits “an establishment of religion”. Yet, despite having decided dozens of Church/State cases over the years, SCOTUS has never precisely defined the meaniing of the term. Scholars can still spend hours arguing over how courts might decide a particular case involving religion and the government.
Let’s look at how the Supreme Court has handled President Obama. They all attended his inauguration and the Chief Justice administered the oath. They hear arguments involving the President in the same manner that they did for all previous Presidents. , Moreover, they have rejected (likely unanimously, based on not asking for briefs from the other side) a multitude of appeals of lower court rulings against the birthers. There is not a shred of evidence to suggest that they consider President Obama anything other than the fully legitimate President (whether they like him or his policies or not).
Given that they live in Washington, DC, as opposed to the caves of Afghanistan, there can be no doubt that they (and their clerks) are well aware of the citizenship status of Obama Sr. Putting all the facts together, it is clear that they do not consider that having a non-citizen father makes one ineligible for the Presidency. Therefore, we can conclude they don’t require 2 citizen parents to be a natural born citizen.
Do they require birth in the US? Do they require 1 citizen parent? Would they accept the US-born child of 2 illegal immigrants as President? While I strongly suspect the answers are “No, no and yes”, we can’t be sure unless and until someone who fits in those categories becomes President. We can, however, be quite confident that someone with the same facts as Obama (born in the US with 1 citizen parent) would not raise a judicial eyebrow.
Now, I’m sorry if that doesn’t please the birthers. However, the courts don’t exist to define terms, nor for your convenience. Even a case involving Obama that was actually heard by SCOTUS might not produce a clear definition of natural born citiizen. I will note that a court (Ankeny) did in fact state that birth in the US, regardless of parental citizenship makes one a natural born citizen. You guys had the opportunity to appeal Ankeny to SCOTUS. While it is almost certain that they would have refused to hear it without comment, your failure to even try an appeal speaks volumes as to your belief in the strength of your own arguments.
I believe that the following appeals that have reached the Supreme Court for Cert Conferences have used the “de Vattel-two citizen parents required” argument: Hollister v Soetoro (twice), Kerchner v Obama, and Taitz v Obama. None of the Justices has requested an appellee brief from Obama’s attorneys; which means none of the nine Justices found the appellant’s arguments compelling or constitutionally relevant.
Of course the birthers will say those failed on standing, which is true. However, if the Court considered the matter important, rest assured they would have found some way to confer standing. Obviously, they did not.
In any case, when someone was put on the ballot in all 50 states, elected by a clear majority and approved by Congress without an objection as specified by law (which only requires a single Representatiive and a single Senator) then he has to be presumed eligible, unless there is a clear ruling to the contrary. Since Obama is eligible, we can conclude that whatever the definition of natural born ciitizen is, it includes those with only 1 citizen parent.
Read the government’s brief in Wong Kim Ark. Read it all the way through.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/23965360/Wong-Kim-Ark-US-v-169-US-649-1898-Appellants-Brief-USA
The government acknowledged that the District Court ruling said that Wong Kim Ark was a natural born citizen:
The question presented by this appeal may be thus stated: Is a person born within the United States of alien parents domiciled therein a citizen thereof by the fact of his birth? The appellant maintains the negative, and in that behalf assigns as error the ruling of the district court that the respondent [Wong Kim Ark] is a natural-born citizen… (p.2)
The government went on to ask:
Are Chinese children born in this country to share with the descendants of the patiots of the American Revolution the exalted qualification of being eligible to the Presidency of the nation, conferred by the Constitution in recognition of the importance and dignity of citizenship by birth? (p. 34)
The government would have had no reason to ask that question but for the fact that a ruling in favor of Wong Kim Ark meant that he would eligible to be president. The question also shows that the government understood that the only requirement for natural-born citizenship is citizenship by birth – i.e., if Wong Kim Ark was a citizen by birth, he was eligible to be president.
The Supreme Court, by a vote of 6-2, upheld the District Court ruling without exception. The District Court said that Wong Kim Ark was a natural born citizen, and the Supreme Court affirmed.
That is what is known as precedent.
NC1 needs the Twitter summary of Wong Kim Ark.
> Could you point out to a specific line in the decision where WKA was declared a nbC?
This reasoning is akin to the following:
Suppose A sues B because B owes him $50,000. A wins. B appeals the decision to SCOTUS (arguendo). SCOTUS can affirm the lower court’s decision without ever explicitly stating “B owes A $50,000”.
According to NC1’s perception of legal process, B does not owe A $50,000 since SCOTUS never explicitly, in a “specific line”, wrote the sentence “B owes A $50,000”.
Are you telling me that there is a sentence in the lower court ruling declaring WKA a natural born Citizen?
No, it doesn’t use those words, but it was understood at the time (even by those appealing the district court decision) that this is what they meant, that if Wong was born a citizen in the United States, then he was a natural born citizen.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/23965360/Wong-Kim-Ark-US-v-169-US-649-1898-Appellants-Brief-USA
On page 2 it says:
Here we go:
1. In UK, NBS meant anyone born there, even to aliens.
2. In US, NBC = NBS
3. WKA was born here, so WKA = citizen.
~~~~~
At no point in the case is anything described that could make WKA anything less than an NBC. There is no mechanism, no logic at all that could allow anyone to be born here and become a citizen, UNLESS the term “natural born citizen” was exactly the same in the US as “natural born subject!”
nc1, you’ve read the case, right? Show me any reasoning in the case that is not based on NBC meaning the same exact thing as NBS?
If WKA isn’t an NBC, then he’s not a citizen.
What is your bizzare fasciation with “a sentence”? Perhaps you and Christine O’Donnell can sit down and have a deep conversation about separate of church and state while you’re at it.
I’m sorry legal opinions and concepts are over your head. If the law judicial opinions are too difficult for you to understand, you should probably not get into discussions about them.