Ages back, I started a thread for expert renunciations of the Birther definition(s) of "natural born citizen."

But not only have Birthers been unable to produce any experts who agree with their definition (Corsi cites none in his book), they've also been unable to produce any books that put forth such a definition. Which is odd, considering those of them who swear that it was the definition they were taught in school (i.e., half a century ago).

So during my lunch break today, I walked down the street to the library and looked for books on the Presidency in both the adult and children's sections. What did I (and my iPod) find?

Beautiful!

Wait a minute. You mean to tell me that anyone can go to their local library & look up the requirements to be President of the USA?

I always figured as much, but really, does it shock any of us that it was Loren who actually bothered to search it and document said search?

Hey!



It does seem almost unbelievable that every writer, editor, professor, and publishing house in every decade for a hundred years has been in on the conspiracy to one day allow someone with foreign blood to usurp the Presidency.



Ohh, but wait, you filthy libtard obot (they say) the Statue of Liberty is all well and good, we know our history of welcoming the unwashed to our rabbled shores with bell-ringing like Paul Revere. But they were never intended to be SELF-GOVERNED. There's an aristocracy, doncha know, and folks like Tracy Fair Dorsey are IT, and the only rightful heirs of power, descended by blood from patriots.

I also find it interesting that we have a long list of presidential and vice-presidential candidates whose parents were not born in this country. I do not remember the question arising about their eligibility and demands for the papers of the parents of Spiro Agnew, Michael Dukakis (both parents immigrants) and Geraldine Ferraro (immigrant father), Edmund Muskie (his father here only 11 years before Muskie was born), That's just for starters.

Where were the 2 citizen-parent-parent definers of NBC for all those on that long list? Where were the demands for papers proving their parent's citizenship?

I wonder if anyone has made a list of all the candidates for all the parties who had one or more immigrant parent who may or may not have been a citizen when the candidate was born. It may turn out that having two native born US citizen parents may be the exception rather than the rule. How were immigrants naturalized in earlier times?

Yes, there were questions about candidates who were not themselves born on US soil.....George Romney, Goldwater, etc. but I don't recall questions about the parents and their citizenship status being an issue.

All the candidates? Major and minor? Or just major? Either way, that would be a huge job.

I do believe we've seen lists of all the POTUS's and maybe most of the VPOTUS's.

On Saturday, I visited the Emory University Library. Browsed a few shelves, but only found one book that attempted to define "natural born citizen." (Most, incidentally, seem to all but take it for granted that it's synonymous with 'native born'.)

But I can't complain when the one book I *did* find comes from the PoliSci professor who edits "Congressional Quarterly's Guide to the Presidency" and who's written extensively on the Presidency:

From an 1889 supplement to the Encyclopedia Britannica:

So Kenyan-born doesn't qualify after all. Just wait until O'rly finds out.

YEA but…. But... but they were all…..

Excellent finds, Loren! Thank you!!

pffffffft... What does something being in an encyclopedia prove?

That is refuted by internet keyboard constitutionalists.

Encyclopedias, even good ones, are only ever secondary sources. This supplement also incompletely states the law at the time, at least in my opinion. I believe the Fourteenth Amendment merely codified what had previously been the rule under the originalist interpretation of the phrase "natural-born citizen," as well as overturning Dred Scott's bogus pronouncements on black citizens.

In my view, that interpretation of the word "citizen," based on prior interpretations of the laws concerning "subjects" in English common and statutory law, would have at the very least also included the children of citizen parents born abroad, as had been the practice in England since at least the reign of Edward II.

"parents" or "parent(s)"?

great job, loren et al! is that another five or six books scrubbed? your soros checks will be a little fatter this week.

I've been buying up all of the copies in existence of Black's Law Dictionary and it's cost me a bundle. Can I get an advance on at least the cost portion of my next Soros check? $2.5M should do it.

Geez, are you paying retail ???

Thanks, y'all.

How about a few more, courtesy of FR?





You really can't ask for more specific renunciations of Vattelism than those two, can you?

I'm not completely sure. I believe the latter, but I was deliberately vague. Also, I don't think I could have invoked Edward II with the latter meaning. A subsequent King of England, I believe, extended the principle in Edward II's statute by also allowing subject fathers to convey natural-born status overseas. Therefore, there's a can of worms there.

Meh... patent attorneys run into this problem all of the time - something so blitheringly well known that it's not actually written down anywhere.

You see, of course these various texts didn't go into full detail on the meaning of natural born citizenship, because nobody anticipated that we'd elect a Kenyan to be president.

Clearly, the full definition of "natural-born citizen" - i.e. a child of two white married Christian citizen parents - would have just been too much detail to go into, since obviously there would be no risk of a person actually being nominated or elected who did not satisfy the definition anyway.

But then...

I don't think anyone is sure. Clive Parry writing in the 1950s was of the opinion that in the 17th century it was considered to only require one subject parent but that subsequent Acts restricted this to at least a subject father. On the other hand I see a rush of naturalization acts after the English Civil War refering to people who IMO would be subjects by De Natis ultra Mare anyway. My own view is that there was something of a loss of confidence in the staute of Edward III (not II) in the mid 17th century.

If memory serves the statutes of Geroge II and George III spoke only of the father being a natural born subject. I think they were said to clarify the ambiguity on such point from prior statutes such as Quenne Anne's statute. There was always confusion of people covered by these statutes in England. Some argued these statutes were merely declaratory of the common law which included jus sanguinis. This argument was eventually rejected in both England and the United States. After 1700, these statutory subjects were not eligible to sit in Parliament. It was never clear what allegiance these statutory subjects owed. Some said the same allegiance as native subjects. Others said they had to move to England to claim their birthright before they became subjects and owed allegiance. I believe the prevailing view was that England could not claim allegiance of such persons against the nation of their birth as, by the law of England, people owed natural allegaince to the nation of their birth. Hence, England didn't claim the right to impress English subjects born in the US and wouldn't protect such persons from the Civil War draft.

I'm curious, do you have a historical cite for that position? The Act of Succession required that members of Parliament be natural born subjects but the mechanism by which this was implemented was by inserting a restriction in each private naturalization act. No such restriction appears in the statute of George II:

and IIRC none appears in Anne & Geo III. I've assumed that such children would become eligible to sit in Parliament but I can't think of a case where the question came up.

When I read the statutes I agreed with you. It seemed the the George III statute said they were eligible. However, I believe Blackstone himself said they were not. I think Chitty said so as well. Framer James Wilson said so in his law lectures. As such, I presume my reading was wrong.