Thread: No automatic citizenship for illegal aliens' children

http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observe...n/13148994.htm

`Birthright citizenship' makes the children born here Americans

TOM ASHCRAFT

Special to the Observer

Among the many broken parts of U.S. immigration enforcement, one stands out as relatively easy to fix. It is the problem of expectant mothers who come into the country for the purpose of giving birth so their children, once born here, automatically have American citizenship. When foreign family members have an "anchor child" as a U.S. citizen, opportunities often arise for them to bootstrap their way into permanent residency and ultimately naturalization and citizenship.

Illegal aliens have used this technique for years to get around normal immigration rules. By exploiting the sympathy of Americans for poor pregnant women and keeping families intact, they have opened up a major loophole in immigration enforcement.

How big a problem is it? Estimates vary widely, anywhere from 200,000 to 500,000 such births a year. Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colorado, an expert on immigration law and a leading advocate for immigration enforcement, puts the number of U.S. births to illegal-alien mothers at 300,000 to 350,000 per year. If correct, these figures represent about 8 percent of all U.S. births annually.

Can we change the rule?

When most other countries in the world require more than mere geographical birth for citizenship, why does the United States persist in the rule of "birthright citizenship"? Can we readily change it? Should we?A growing number of members of Congress are answering in the affirmative. According to a recent report in The Washington Times, Tancredo and other Republicans have identified elimination of "birthright citizenship" for illegal aliens and construction of a barrier along the entire U.S.-Mexico border as the top two consensus priorities for immigration reform.

Though the Constitution originally granted Congress the power to establish a "uniform Rule of Naturalization," the states played a large role in citizenship issues until after the Civil War. The 14th Amendment, ratified in 1868 and intended primarily to guarantee citizenship to freed slaves, states: "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."

The federal statute implementing this provision contains virtually identical language. This law has long been interpreted to mean that all persons born here, apart from children of foreign diplomats and a few others, are U.S. citizens. Included have been children of illegal aliens.

The old legal name for citizenship granted in this way is jus soli, or right of the land. Jus sanguinis, or right of the blood, denotes citizenship flowing from the citizenship of the parents regardless of where birth occurs.

Questions have been raised about whether children born to mothers illegally in the country are really "subject to the jurisdiction" of the United States in the way meant by the 14th Amendment. If they are not, then birth alone would not confer U.S. citizenship. Congress could simply amend the existing statute and stop further "birthright citizenship" for children of illegals. (Legislation to this effect is pending, co-sponsored by about 50 U.S. House members, including N.C. Republicans Sue Myrick, Charles Taylor and Walter Jones.) If they are, then the fact of birth on American soil would be definitive, and they'd be U.S. citizens irrespective of the legal status of their parents. Under this interpretation, it would take a constitutional amendment, not just a new statute, to stop children of illegals born in the United States from automatically becoming citizens.

What did framers intend?

The debate, of course, turns on what the framers of the 14th Amendment meant when they included "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof" in the text. In short, the most persuasive evidence comes from two sources, the original American understanding of citizenship and the legislative history of the 14th Amendment.

Several commentators point out that the traditional idea of citizenship implies a mutuality of obligation and consent on the part of both the sovereignty and the citizens. Such mutuality could not exist where a foreign national is present in the United States in violation of its laws.

Further, the author of the 14th Amendment language in question, Sen. Jacob Merritt Howard of Michigan, said at the time that "this will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons."

Automatic citizenship for children born in the United States of illegal-alien mothers provides a perverse incentive for illegal immigration. It defies common sense and has gone on for too long. Congress should stop it.

Tom

Ashcraft