Thread: GOP mulls ending birthright citizenship and building Border

GOP mulls ending birthright citizenship and building Border Fence!

House Republicans are looking closely at ending birthright citizenship and building a barrier along the entire U.S.-Mexico border as they search for solutions to illegal immigration.

Topics: Southern Border Fence, illegal immigrants, Congress, Republican, Democrat, Senate, President, Laws, state, security

11/4/2005
By Stephen Dinan
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

A task force of party leaders and members active on immigration has met since the summer to try to figure out where consensus exists, and several participants said those two ideas have floated to the top of the list of possibilities to be included either in an immigration-enforcement bill later this year or in a later comprehensive immigration overhaul.

"There is a general agreement about the fact that citizenship in this country should not be bestowed on people who are the children of folks who come into this country illegally," said Rep. Tom Tancredo, Colorado Republican, who is participating in the "unity dinners," the group of Republicans trying to find consensus on immigration.

Birthright citizenship, or what critics call "anchor babies," means that any child born on U.S. soil is granted citizenship, with exceptions for foreign diplomats. That attracts illegal aliens, who have children in the United States; those children later can sponsor their parents for legal immigration.

Most lawmakers had avoided the issue, fearing that change would require a constitutional amendment -- the 14th Amendment reads in part: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States."

But several Republicans said recent studies suggest otherwise.

"There's been recent scholarship that says we can do it by statute, and we ought to try," said Rep. Jeff Flake, Arizona Republican, who usually finds himself on the opposite side of immigration issues from Mr. Tancredo.

"How in the world can you explain that's a good policy to have? It simply doesn't promote respect for the rule of law," Mr. Flake said. Several lawmakers said the U.S. and Mexico are the only major Western countries to have birthright citizenship. Most European countries have moved away from birthright citizenship in recent decades.

"I am as surprised as anyone that this thing has got legs," Mr. Tancredo said, adding that he views it as a major step forward for the immigration debate. "This is the issue that motivated me to deal with immigration."

While some members said it could be part of an immigration bill later this year, Rep. Dan Lungren, California Republican, said it will take longer to drum up public support for such a major change, though he backs ending the policy.

"Some of us believe we have depreciated the value of citizenship," he said.

Meanwhile, the idea of a fence or other barrier also is gaining support.

At this week's "unity dinner," House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, Illinois Republican, said he supports a barrier system of fences in some places and electronic surveillance or vehicle barriers in others, one participant said.

Mr. Hastert's spokesman said the speaker would not talk about the private meetings.

Border barriers received a big boost yesterday when Rep. Duncan Hunter, California Republican and chairman of the Armed Services Committee, announced a broad enforcement bill with a fence as its centerpiece.

"The fence works," Mr. Hunter said. He led the fight earlier in this Congress to complete a 14-mile section of fence near San Diego, and he and other members said the success there gives the idea momentum.

"Those who say the fence won't work, frankly, don't have experience with fences," said Rep. Geoff Davis, a Kentucky Republican who is supporting Mr. Hunter's bill.

But Mr. Flake and fellow Arizona Republican Rep. Jim Kolbe, who both support legalizing illegal aliens and raising legal immigration levels by 400,000 per year, said a fence would not work.

Mr. Flake said it would not affect those illegal aliens -- about half of the total immigrant population -- who came to the United States on legal temporary visas and have overstayed. He also said he does not want it to sap energy from a comprehensive solution.

"My fear is people will say let's build a fence and put off any guest-worker, border enforcement, interior enforcement for years," he said.

Rep. John Shadegg, the Arizona Republican who runs the dinners, said they are reaching some areas of consensus, though he would not specify and said committee chairmen would have to write the eventual bill.

But he said the effort has convinced the White House to do more to enforce the borders -- something he said was reflected both in President Bush's remarks upon signing the homeland security spending bill and in congressional testimony by the Homeland Security secretary.

Mr. Shadegg said the group has talked about border barriers and electronic surveillance, and said he is a fan of using unmanned aerial vehicles to patrol the border, particularly because they can track criminal behavior, which is crucial in establishing a chain of evidence to convict drug or alien smugglers.

SOURCE LINK
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20051 ... -1048r.htm

ALIPAC HOMEPAGE
http://www.alipac.us/article847.html

If they're smart they'll drop Flake like a bad habit. He's the proverbial turd in their punchbowl. I'm surprised Tancredo even let him in the room.

BTW, does anyone know who the other Republicans are? I want to call their offices and thank them for actually acting like members of the GOP again.

Keep Mulling but Hurry UP becasue WE ARE READY TO BUILD THE FENCE AND GUARD IT!!

Now wasn't that an interesting fact to learn that over half the illegal immigrants are legal once but OVERSTAYED their visas?

ALL THE MORE REASON NOT TO ISSUE ANY MORE VISAS.

STOP THE VISAS, STOP HALF OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION

BUILD THE FENCE, STOP THE OTHER HALF

Half + Half = WHOLE PROBLEM SOLVED.

Veeeery simple.

(I hope they're planning to build a Great Fence like Israel's with the border towers and of course we would want special gates to let the wildlife through.)

The undocumented and illegal immigrant population should not be considered under the full jurisdiction of the United States if they have not turned themselves over to the ICE.

Good point Richard!!

What is there to mull? End this abomination and send these invaders home. This is nothing, but insanity. There is no other country on the face of this earth that has birthright citizenship. None, nada, zilch. End this garbage, build that fence and put troops on our borders. Deport the invaders and send the globalist employers to jail.

Originally Posted by nhantimassredrebel

BTW, does anyone know who the other Republicans are? I want to call their offices and thank them for actually acting like members of the GOP again.

Duncan Hunter is a good guy. He's very strong on border enforcement but from what I hear he's rather weak on workplace enforcement.

http://www.house.gov/hunter/

Yesterday, he introduced the "TRUE Enforcement and Border Security Act," which is supposed to be a very comprehensive immigration bill but I haven't had a chance to really look at it yet.

http://www.house.gov/hunter/TRUE.security.html

http://www.numbersusa.com/interests/...itizenship.htm

The United States currently grants automatic U.S. citizenship to almost all children born in the United States, regardless of whether the parents are U.S. citizens, legal residents, temporary visitors, or illegal aliens in the United States. Some 200,000 children are born in the United States each year to illegal-alien mothers, according to U.S. Census data. The only exceptions to this automatic granting of citizenship are the children of foreign diplomats stationed in the United States, whose citizenship at birth is governed by international treaty.

Birthright citizenship is based on the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which was originally enacted to ensure civil rights for the newly freed slaves after the Civil War. Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment 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 jurisdiction requirement was added to the original draft of the Fourteenth Amendment by the Senate after a lengthy and acrimonious debate. In fact, Senator Jacob Merritt Howard of Michigan proposed the addition of the phrase specifically because he wanted to make clear that the simple accident of birth in the United States was not sufficient to justify citizenship. Sen. Howard noted that the jurisdiction requirement is "simply declaratory of what I regard as the law of the land already." Sen. Howard said 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."

Sen. Reverdy Johnson of Maryland, who was the only Democrat to participate in the Senate debate, was even more explicit about the meaning of the jurisdiction requirement: “[A]ll persons born in the United States and not subject to some foreign Power -- for that, no doubt, is the meaning of the committee who have brought the matter before -- shall be considered as citizens of the United States.� Sen. Johnson's reading of the jurisdiction requirement also is consistent with our naturalization requirements. Since at least 1795, federal laws governing naturalization have required aliens to renounce all allegiance to any foreign power and to support the U.S. Constitution. Such allegiance was never assumed simply because the alien was residing in the United States; instead an affirmative oath was required.

In light of these and other statements made during the Senate debate over the Fourteenth Amendment, it appears clear that the authors intended only to grant citizenship to persons born here who were also "subject to the jurisdiction" of the United States. They understood that phrase to have the same meaning as the phrase "and not subject to any foreign Power," included in the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which these same Senators had earlier drafted. And by "subject to the jurisdiction," they meant "subject to the jurisdiction of the United States in every sense," and "[n]ot owing allegiance to anybody else."

It would be difficult to argue that illegal aliens and temporary visitors are "not subject to [a] foreign [p]ower" or that they do not "ow[e] allegiance to anybody" but the United States. The Supreme Court, however, has never decided the issue. The closest it has come is a case involving the U.S.-born child of lawful permanent residents in which, of course, it held the child to be a U.S. citizen. In the absence of a ruling by the Supreme Court, it will remain up to Congress to clarify the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment or to accept the status quo.

Between the Supreme Court and the Congress: the proverbial rock and a hard place.

To save our nation,

Deport the Wackident, Congress AND the US Supreme Court.

We need to get all new people and start over.

It was the US Supreme Court that applied our educational system to illegal aliens. Now they come not only for jobs but bring all their mamalitas and under-age children to schooling pushing our kids to trailers parked in the back in a mud-hole.

Grrrrrrrrr

I hope they don't mull too long over that fence. And if they are looking for cheap labor, how about all us retirees go apply for the jobs and take the jobs away from the illegals?????