Thread: Ted Cruz 'birther' row focusing on Cruz's MOTHER

Cruz's father had Canadian citizenship. His father and mother went to Canada at the same time. The other day when Jake Tapper or someone was interviewing him on the subject, Cruz said his mother couldn't have had Canadian citizenship because of the "residency requirement". Well, they would have both had the same residency. So was Cruz born to a father who was still a Cuban citizen?

See, this is why only natural born citizens are eligible to run for the office of President and Vice President so that our determination of citizenship eligibility for the office does not depend upon the records or citizenship laws of other countries. We're a sovereign nation and in order for our Constitution to rule properly, it must be based upon those matters domestic that we control and know about. We can't have a Presidential election dependent upon what someone in Canada did while they were registering Canadian citizens to vote. We can't have a Presidential election dependent upon when someone left Cuba or when they moved to Canada or how long they stayed or whether they denounced US citizenship. It's beyond absurd.

The rule is simple:

1. born in the USA
2. born to 2 US citizens

Period.

Based on what we know, the children of Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio can run for President and Vice President, but their fathers can not. Cruz and Rubio already have nice jobs with a lot of power, perhaps too much, but at least they're eligible for the spots they hold. They are neither one eligible for the Big Promotion in more ways than one, but the one stops their trains now and that's what needs to be done. Their trains need to be stopped.

Thank you Trump for applying the brakes.

All of the accusations and claims seem to come from news articles

so I don't see as how some are "proof" and others are just "false claims".

Her birth certificate means nothing when the question is,

did she become a Canadian citizen before his birth.

The only thing we have are news articles.

None of them PROVE anything.

Originally Posted by JohnDoe2

All of the accusations and claims seem to come from news articles

so I don't see as how some are "proof" and others are just "false claims".

Her birth certificate means nothing when the question is,

did she become a Canadian citizen before his birth.

The only thing we have are news articles.

None of them PROVE anything.

There's really nothing to prove. He wasn't born in the US to 2 US citizens. He was born in Canada to either 1 US citizen or 0 US citizens, either way, he's not a natural born citizen, just as Obama was not a natural born citizen whether he was born in Hawaii or somewhere else, he was ineligible because his father was not a US citizen.

None of this is complicated when you're a natural born citizen, which is another reason why we need to keep it that way. These candidates that are not natural born citizens create controversy, disrupt our domestic tranquility, and interfere with our elections as they were Constitutionally laid-out to occur. Federal and State Election Officials as well as our political parties better start doing their jobs and tell these Yahoo Wanna Be Prezidentes, "YOU'RE FIRED".

Is Ted Cruz a 'natural born Citizen'? Not if you're a constitutional originalist.

@ Is Ted Cruz eligible to be President?

Originally Posted by JohnDoe2

Op-Ed
Is Ted Cruz a 'natural born Citizen'? Not if you're a constitutional originalist.


Republican presidential candidates Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz interact during the CNN Republican presidential debate in Las Vegas on Dec. 15.
(Justin Sullivan / Getty Images)


Thomas Lee

Article II of the Constitution states: “No Person except a natural born Citizen . . . shall be eligible to the Office of President.” Donald Trump thinks Sen. Ted Cruz is not a “natural born Citizen” and that he is therefore constitutionally ineligible to be president. Is Trump right?

Cruz was born in 1970 in Calgary, Canada, to a U.S. citizen mother and a Cuban citizen father. As to his Article II status, it's all in how you read the Constitution.

There are three leading theories of how to interpret the Constitution today.

One is textualism: the Constitution means what its words say. The historical context of the words is important when a modern plain meaning is not self-evident.

A second theory, adopted by many liberals, relies on a “living Constitution”: the Constitution means what is most consistent with fundamental constitutional values as applied to present circumstances.

The third theory, championed by many leading conservatives, is originalism: The Constitution means what ordinary people would have understood it to mean at the time it was ratified, which is 1788.

People looking to the Supreme Court to settle the debate once and for all are likely to be disappointed.-


Under either a textualist or a “living Constitution” theory, Cruz is a “natural born Citizen,” eligible to be president; under an originalist view, however, he isn't. It's the conservative theory that would exclude the conservative Cruz from presidential eligibility.

To an originalist, a “natural born Citizen” is a person who is a citizen of the United States under “natural” principles of law in 1788. Two such principles were then in play in the U.S. Jus soli — the law of soil — was the principle that a child was subject or citizen of the sovereign who ruled the land or seas on which the child was born. Jus soli was viewed as a part of the common law of England, which was adopted by the American states. Jus sanguinis — the law of blood — held that a child's citizenship flowed from the parents' allegiance, regardless of place of birth. This principle was prevalent in continental Europe, and in England it was the basis for an exception to jus soli for children born there to foreign ambassadors.

The principle of jus sanguinis in 1788 applied to patrilineal descent only: A person born in a foreign country was viewed as a “natural born Citizen” of his or her father's country. However odious it seems today, a child born of a woman whose citizenship was different from her husband's — much rarer then than today — could not be a “natural born Citizen” of the mother's country. That idea wasn't even considered until 1844 in Victorian England.

The upshot is that to an originalist, someone like Cruz — born in a foreign country (and therefore not a natural born citizen of the United States by jus soli) and to a Cuban citizen father (and therefore not a natural born citizen of the United States by jus sanguinis ) — is not eligible to be president.


Hold the 'birther' controversy: Ted Cruz is a natural born American

In a textualist view of the Constitution, historical context is also important because “natural born Citizen” has no modern plain meaning and the words don't appear anywhere else in the Constitution. Textualists, by contrast to originalists, favor written statutes in mining historical context. In this case, two American laws enacted in 1784 and 1790 are applicable, along with older English statutes which use the similar words “natural born subject.”

In 1784, the Maryland Legislature extended “all the Immunities, Rights and Privileges of natural born Citizen” to the Marquis de Lafayette “and his heirs Male forever.” And, in 1790, Congress passed a law stating that “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.” It didn't specify which parent, mother or father or both, but the background principle of jus sanguinis leads to the conclusion that it referred to American fathers.

The 1790 statute, however, was not intended to address presidential eligibility. Rather, like earlier English statutes that referred to “natural born subjects,” it exempted children born abroad from the need to follow any other procedures (“to naturalize”) in order to be considered citizens. Then in 1940, Congress passed a statute dispensing with the need for a child born abroad to a U.S. citizen mother to naturalize.

Taken all together, these laws would cause a textualist to conclude that Ted Cruz, born in Canada to a U.S. citizen mother in 1970, is a “natural born Citizen” eligible to be president.

Finally, living constitutionalists would interpret “natural born Citizen” in accordance with present circumstances and social conditions. Supreme Court case law is their main source because judicial decisions reflect an accommodation of legal doctrine with contemporary reality.

But the Supreme Court has never directly decided the meaning of “natural born Citizen.” Today, a living constitutionalist would likely regard the ancient, sexist patrilineal rule governing the citizenship of a child born abroad as an anachronism. To a living constitutionalist, anyone born anywhere to a U.S. citizen mother or father would qualify to run for president.

People looking to the Supreme Court to settle the debate once and for all are likely to be disappointed. The federal courts have repeatedly refused to allow voters to bring lawsuits disqualifying presidential candidates on the basis of the “natural born Citizen” clause because voters don't have the proper “standing”— their alleged injury is too generalized to justify a court order of relief.

But voters do have recourse: The ballot box may be the final arbiter of the constitutional meaning of the clause. In other words, if you are an originalist, vote against Cruz because he is ineligible to be president.

It's a neat irony: The most conservative constitutional interpreters must find Cruz ineligible to be president; liberals must grin and bear him. Cruz himself purports to embrace originalism as the correct view of the Constitution. To be faithful to his understanding of what the Constitution means, the senator may have to disqualify himself.

Thomas Lee is a professor of constitutional law and international law at Fordham Law School.

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed...110-story.html

Exactly. Great article, JohnDoe2. Thank you for finding and posting it. The Los Angeles Times, too! Big readership. If Cruz really was a Constitutionalist, he would have never entered the race, neither would Rubio, both lawyers and know better. They just think since Obama got away with it, they should too. Wrong!! Americans won't let that happen again. At least I hope not.

Judy wrote:

Exactly. Great article, JohnDoe2. Thank you for finding and posting it. The Los Angeles Times, too! Big readership. If Cruz really was a Constitutionalist, he would have never entered the race, neither would Rubio, both lawyers and know better. They just think since Obama got away with it, they should too. Wrong!! Americans won't let that happen again. At least I hope not.

Exactly what? JohnDoe's article clearly states there are three paths of understanding on this issue according to Op-Ed writer Thomas Lee. One of those paths definitely supports Cruz's eligibility to run for President of the United States. By the way, who is Thomas Lee? Is he an expert in the field of constitutional law?

Harvard scholar: Ted Cruz's citizenship, eligibility for president ‘unsettled’

Liberal law professor Laurence Tribe cited by Donald Trump in his ‘natural-born’ citizenship attacks has questioned Cruz’s own constitutional positions

Ted Cruz: under his position as a constitutional ‘originalist’, he would not be eligible to be president, Laurence tribe said.

Ben Jacobs in Washington
@Bencjacobs

Sunday 10 January 2016 20.48 EST
Last modified on Sunday 10 January 2016 23.55 EST

The legal and constitutional issues around qualification for the presidency on grounds of US citizenship are “murky and unsettled”, according to the scholar cited by Donald Trump in his recent attacks on Ted Cruz.

Trump has sought to cast doubt on whether the senator, who was born in Canada to an American mother and a Cuban father, is a “natural-born US citizen”. In doing so he has referred to the work and words of Laurence Tribe, perhaps the most respected liberal law professor in the country.

Tribe taught both Cruz and Barack Obama at Harvard Law School. He also advised Al Gore in the 2000 Florida recount and has advised Obama’s campaign organisation.

“Despite Sen[ator] Cruz’s repeated statements that the legal/constitutional issues around whether he’s a natural-born citizen are clear and settled,” he told the Guardian by email, “the truth is that they’re murky and unsettled.”

Tribe has said previously that the question of Cruz’s eligibility is “unsettled”. On Sunday, Trump cited that position in an interview with NBC’s Meet the Press, in which he described Tribe “as a constitutional expert, one of the true experts”.

At a rally in Reno, Nevada later on Sunday, the real-estate billionaire, who has said Democrats will sue to stop Cruz running should he win the nomination, described himself as “a PhD in litigation”. Of Cruz’s eligibility, he said: “There is a doubt. We can’t have a doubt.”

Article II, section I, clause V of the US constitution states: “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.”

In his emails to the Guardian, Tribe discussed Cruz’s own approach to constitutional issues, noting that under “the kind of judge Cruz says he admires and would appoint to the supreme court – an ‘originalist’ who claims to be bound by the historical meaning of the constitution’s terms at the time of their adoption – Cruz wouldn’t be eligible because the legal principles that prevailed in the 1780s and 90s required that someone be born on US soil to be a ‘natural born’ citizen.”

He added: “Even having two US parents wouldn’t suffice for a genuine originalist. And having just an American mother, as Cruz did, would clearly have been insufficient at a time that made patrilineal descent decisive.

“On the other hand, to the kind of judge that I admire and Cruz abhors – a ‘living constitutionalist’ who believes that the constitution’s meaning evolves with the needs of the time – Cruz would ironically be eligible because it no longer makes sense to be bound by so narrow and strict a definition.”

Tribe said: “There is no single, settled answer. And our supreme court has never addressed the issue.”

Trump, who trails Cruz in polls in Iowa, first raised the issue last week. Cruz has since cited a bipartisan Harvard Law Review article by two former solicitor generals, Neal Katyal and Paul Clement, to back his contention that he is a natural-born citizen. Some of his rivals have pushed back; the Kentucky senator and presidential rival Rand Paul and Arizona senator John McCain, the 2008 candidate, have declined to support him.

Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, the Republican nominee in 2012, tweeted on Friday that Cruz was indeed a “natural-born citizen”.

Tribe, who became a hated figure to many on the right thanks to his role in derailing the supreme court nomination of Robert Bork in 1987, gave legal advice to McCain when similar “natural-born citizen” questions arose in 2008. McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone, to two Americans.

Working with Ted Olsen, a former solicitor general in the George W Bush administration, Tribe concluded: “[McCain’s] birth on a US military base within a territory controlled by the US from 1903 to 1979 … under a treaty with Panama probably (although not certainly) qualified him as a natural born citizen, especially because both his parents were US citizens at the time.”

On Sunday, he wrote: “That situation differed greatly from the one Sen[ator] Cruz finds himself in.”

Asked if he was surprised by Trump’s use of his name, Tribe wrote: “What I find surreal isn’t that a Republican presidential candidate would favorably cite my legal conclusions, but that anyone should find that phenomenon so shocking.

“The fact that I’m a lifelong liberal and a registered Democrat who taught constitutional law to President Obama (and, by the way, to Chief Justice Roberts and Senator Cruz) makes my citation by a likely Republican nominee for president surprising only because our political divisions have become so profound and so paralyzing that people no longer believe in the possibility of disinterested legal research.

“That’s really sad.”

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2...izen-president

An "originalist" would rely on the citizenship of the Father, NOT the Mother. At that time everything was based on the Fathers lineage. The following link explains the ties between The Constitution, Vattel, and "Natural Born Citizen"
http://www.newswithviews.com/Publius/huldah110.htm

Originally Posted by MW

Exactly what? JohnDoe's article clearly states there are three paths of understanding on this issue according to Op-Ed writer Thomas Lee. One of those paths definitely supports Cruz's eligibility to run for President of the United States. By the way, who is Thomas Lee? Is he an expert in the field of constitutional law?

. . . Fordham Law School constitutional law professor Thomas Lee informed me that the question of whether Cruz is a “natural born citizen” can be answered with two words: “It depends.”

Lee, who was an editor of the Harvard Law Review and clerked for Supreme Court Justice David Souter . . .

from: Hey Supreme Court, Please Settle This Ted Cruz Birther Thing
​
@ Is Ted Cruz eligible to be President?

JohnDoe2, would you mind editing your post above to delete "Judy wrote", since what is shown is not mine, but MW's. Thanks.