The Constitutional Meaning Of "Natural Born Citizen"Skip to comments. Vanity: The Constitutional Meaning Of "Natural Born Citizen"Vanity Essay. January 2. 01. 2. Posted on 0. 1/3. PM PST by sourcery. The Constitution requires that the President of the United States must be a natural born citizen: Article II, section 1, pa.
No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States." If "natural born citizen" is a synonym for "citizen," then there is no reason for adding the exception "or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution." None at all. Being a citizen is not sufficient, unless you happened to be alive when the Constitution was adopted.
So what, then, is a "natural born citizen"? To answer that question definitively will require a full examination of the concepts and history of citizenship. Types Of Citizenship: Jus Soli, Jus Sanguinis, Natural Born, Native Born, Naturalized. Jus soli citizenship: "Jus soli" is a Latin phrase meaning "law of the soil." Jus soli citizenship is any citizenship that inheres in a person based on the location of his or her birth.
Jus sanguinis citizenship: "Jus sanguinis" is a Latin phrase meaning "law of the blood." Jus sanguinis citizenship is any citizenship that inheres in a person based on his or her ancestry. Native born citizenship: A native born citizen is one whose citizenship derives from the facts of his birth, and who becomes a citizen at the moment of birth. In both US and British law, those born within the sovereign territory of the country or born to parents who are citizens (subjects) of the country when the person is born are native citizens (subjects.) Native born persons are said to have "birthright citizenship." Note that one can be "native born" either by the "jus soli" principle or by the "jus sanguinis" principle. Naturalized citizenship: A naturalized citizen is one whose citizenship is granted as a political act—by law or by the decision or act of a sovereign. Natural born citizenship: A natural born citizen is one whose citizenship is not granted by law or by any act of a sovereign, but inheres naturally in the person from birth according to principles that don't depend on laws or decisions of a sovereign.
The rest of this essay will fully justify this definition. The Constitution of the United States did not originally explicitly define who did or did not not qualify as citizens. It originally had clauses where the general term citizen occurs, and had one clause where the specific term natural born citizen occurs (quoted above.) But the Constitution does grant Congress the power to define by law who shall be citizens: Congress shall have power…. To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization [Article I, Section 8] Why did the Constitution limit the power it granted Congress over matters of citizenship to naturalization? Because Citizenship acquired solely by any law passed by Congress cannot logically be anything other than naturalized citizenship—by definition of naturalization. It's logically impossible for any act of Congress to make anyone a citizen by natural law. At most, such a law would be declaratory of natural law—because a citizen by natural law is a citizen no matter what laws Congress may or may not enact.
In this exercise, students get an overview of the principle of legality. Legality is divided into four subtopics: legislativity, retroactivity, vagueness, and lenity. Constitutionalism is 'a complex of ideas, attitudes, and patterns of behavior elaborating the principle that the authority of government derives from and is limited. 2016 Freshman Football 8th graders coming to Baker next year from Causey are invited to attend the 2nd Annual Baker Football. Iberian Constitutional History, 600-1492. May have inspired development of constitutional thought in England and other countries. Brevissima Relacion, or Short.
In fact, given the Founders' understanding of natural law versus man- made law, it would have been a logical contradiction to grant Congress the power to change or define natural law on any subject, not just regarding citizenship—because natural law, by late 1. That's why Congress was granted no such powers in any domain at all. Such a power could be used, among other things. Constitution itself. The dangers of that should be obvious. If Congress had the power to make anyone a natural citizen, it would also necessarily have the power to strip citizenship from anyone it chose. The fact it cannot logically have any such power—and is granted no such power by the Constitution—is one of the fundamental protections against tyranny.
The power to revoke even natural law citizenship by law is the power to commit any act against anyone that the sovereign power of war permits. So why didn't the Constitution define the term natural born citizen?
For the same reason it could only grant Congress the power to define naturalized citizens. For the Constitution to actually define the term "natural born citizen" would necessarily mean that that status would be granted by man- made law, and not by natural law. That's why the Constitution provides no definition, and why it must be a court that decides who is and who is not a natural born citizen by applying natural law principles—which is exactly how English common law handled questions of natural citizenship. But the ratification of the 1. Amendment introduced into the Constitution a rule of citizenship that declared anyone who (a) was born in the United States, and (b) was subject to U.
S. jurisdiction at the time of his or her birth, to be a citizen. Since the 1. 4th Amendment is a man- made law, and is not natural law, the 1. Amendment logically cannot make anyone be a natural citizen. Nor does it create the logical contradiction of attempting to do so, since it makes no mention of natural citizenship of any kind, and does not use the term "natural born citizen." The 1. Amendment created an implicit distinction among 1. Amendment native- born citizens, and statutory native- born citizens. A statutory native- born citizen is a person who does not qualify for birthright citizenship under the 1.
Judicial attitudes inextricably shape and mould the results of constitutional interpretation. This is because, during the process of constitutional interpretation.
Amendment, but receives U. S. citizenship, at birth, by laws enacted by Congress. For example, foreign- born children of American parents do not receive citizenship from the 1. Amendment; such children acquire U. S. citizenship, at birth, by statute.
So those born outside the United States to parents who are US citizens at the time of the person's birth are both native citizens and also naturalized citizens, since their citizenship is a) granted to them by an Act of Congress, and b) effective from the instant of their birth, based on the fact that the person's parents were US citizens at that moment. Even those born in the United States, if they qualify as a citizen per the 1.
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Amendment, but do not also qualify as natural born citizens without reliance of the 1. Amendment, are naturalized citizens.
Why? Because the US Constitution is a law whose formulation and adoption are political acts of man. The Constitution is the supreme law of the land, but it is not natural law. So it does not matter that the law that grants citizenship happens to be a clause of the Constitution—the grant of citizenship is nevertheless an act of naturalization, because it's a grant made by law—a political act, not one based on natural law.
Those who were not citizens up until the moment of the ratification of the 1. Amendment, but who instantly became citizens upon ratification, cannot possibly have ever been native- born citizens. They were not citizens from the moment of their birth. And their grant of citizenship was a political act effected by the passage of a law, and not based on principles of natural law.
The 1. 4th Amendment naturalizes anyone who does not also qualify as a natural born citizen. And that's true by definition of the term naturalization, as will be fully and comprehensively shown later. Therefore, to handle all the possible classes of citenship in the US, it is necessary to distinguish between natural law citizens, Constitutional citizens and statutory citizens, and also to distinguish between native citizens and non- native citizens: Native (from birth)Non- native (post birth)Natural Law.
Native citizen per natural law. Natural born citizen. Non- native citizen per natural law(Those who become citizens of a newly- created nation)Constitutional Law. Naturalized native citizen per Constitutional definition.
Naturalized non- native citizen per Constitutional definition—Does not (currently) exist—Statutory Law. Naturalized native citizen per statutory definition.
Naturalized non- native citizen per statutory definition. Of course, in other countries, other classes of citizenship may exist, and classes of citizenship that exist in the US may not. For example, some countries don't have Constitutions or even legislatures, and others have monarchs who may have the power to grant citizenship (a power the US President lacks.) We can use the term "Constitutional natural born citizen" to refer to someone who is a "natural born citizen" according to the natural- law based definition intended by those who wrote and ratified the Constitution. The term must be understood in that sense when it appears in the Constitution or in a Constitution- related document such as a Supreme Court decision. We canl use the term "statutory natural born citizen" to refer to someone who is deemed a "natural born citizen" by Federal or State law. These distinctions are not my invention. The U. S. Department of State Foreign Affairs Manual—7 FAM 1.
Constitutional purposes If we were to define "natural born citizen" to mean anyone who is a "citizen at birth", our definition of "natural born citizen" would be statutory because it would depend on the statute or law which defines "citizen at birth." Under existing law, all children born outside the United State to parents who are citizens are "citizens at birth". Therefore, using our hypothetical definition of "natural born citizen" as anyone who is a citizen at birth, all those born abroad to US- citizen parents would be statutorily defined as "natural born citizens" because their status as citizens at birth would be granted by statute.