Observations by a Citizen: “Natural Born,” a Presidential Qualification
By Hal Rounds
The only rules our Constitution has for a person to be electedPresident are found in Article II, §5 “No Person except a natural born Citizen, . . . attained to the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.” To be a Representative or Senator, the requirement is “citizen,” not “natural born citizen.”
What is the difference?
“Natural” doesn’t disqualify caesarian or in vitro children, of course. Many “experts” condescendingly direct us to the 14th Amendment, which states that “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States . . . “. “See,” they tell us; “it says born in the United States, case closed.”
For some reason, they ignore the qualification “and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” How could a person be born here and NOT subject to the jurisdiction of the United States? Well, if your parents are foreigners – say, French – visiting, or temporarily residing here, they can find refuge or other help in the French embassy. That means they are not completely under our jurisdiction – and neither is their newborn child. The courts and many academics prefer the shorter version, but that was not the intent of those who drafted the 14th Amendment. That’s why they added the thing about “jurisdiction.”
So, “natural born” isn’t about birth location.
Our Constitution empowers – and thus requires – Congress to enforce “the Law of Nations” when dealing with foreign affairs. Our founders relied on a body of law among the civilized nations of the time, and the volume referred to, was by Emer deVattel. In Section 212 of Book 2, his “The Law of Nations,” the standard rule for citizenship was explained:
“…the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights . . . in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is a citizen; for, if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country . . . The natural . . . is that which we acquire by birth, in the place where our father has his…”
Why would the drafters of our Constitution allow our representatives to be plain citizens, or even naturalized, but limit the President to be in the lineage of an existing citizen? Because the President, more than any other official, has the duty and power to act solely in the interest of our sovereignty, our values and our future, without loyalty to any foreign heritage.
Just because an immigrant wants to live here, and have what we have, does not mean she wants the process and values that made it all. What we have is the product of a value system and processes that have proven better than all the others of the world. We can look at immigrants, now naturalized citizens, who have risen to Congress, relying on our values and processes, but who condemn everything important to us, from borders that mean something, to policing, to our economic foundations – everything. Like Ilhan Omar, who has clearly expressed special support for her homeland, Somalia, a place with values and systems radically different from ours, which she condemns. The same for Rashida Tlaib, who identifies with Palestine.
Interestingly, Nikki Haley was born in 1972, but her father was not naturalized until 1978, and her mother in 2003, after they immigrated from India in 1969.
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