Thread: Barack Obama's citizenship questioned

Status of Cases:

Berg vs. Obama, Third Circuit Court of Appeals No. 08 – 4340
Berg filed Brief on 1/20/09
Waiting for Response Briefs from Obama, DNC and the other Defendants (Appellees)

Berg vs. Obama, U.S. District Court
Case filed under seal on 11/07/08 – cannot be discussed

Hollister vs. Soetoro a/k/a Obama,
U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, No. 08-cv-02254
Berg filed 1st Amended Complaint for Hollister on 2/09/09
after Soetoro/Obama and Biden filed Motion to Dismiss

For copies of all Court Pleadings, go to obamacrimes.com

Dr. Orly Taitz (http://defendourfreedoms.us/) today:

Yesterday evening Dr. Mike Ritze, Oklahoma state representative has announced on Plains Radio to some 250,000 listeners that he will be joining as an additional plaintiff, my upcoming legal action to unseal Obama's vital records and check if he is eligible/legitimate for presidency.

Dr. Ritze is one of the most outstanding members of the Oklahoma legislature and Oklahoma community as a whole. He is a veteran, he served as an army doctor, he worked as a family doctor for 33 years, he is a family man. Dr. Ritze and his wife have four children.

Please thank Dr. Ritze His e-mail address is Mike.Ritze@okhouse.gov

Please, send Dr. Ritze cards and banners and balloons and flowers.

Please, call his office and express your appreciation. Please call and write Oklahoma State and US Representatives and Senators and other elected officials, such as secretary of state, attorney general, Governor, Lt Governor, us attorneys for the district of Oklahoma and ask them to show solidarity with Dr. Ritze and 4 Tennessee Representatives and join my legal action. American citizens are entitled to know if a person occupying the White House is there legitimately.

You can hear Dr. Ritze speak on Plains Radio archives.

Dr. Orly Taitz, Esq
DefendOurFreedoms.US
dr_taitz@yahoo.com

I HIGHLY recommend The Bill Cunningham Show..!

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He's got a regular daily show, this is his LIVE 3 Hour weekend edition.

Dr. Jerome Corsi ..of www.WND.com will be on in the third hour..

..speaking of THE usurper's LACK of a USA birth certificate..

Conrad wrote:

http://www.alipac.us/ftopicp-850658.html#850658

Tennessee — The controversy over President Barack Obama’s birth certificate simply won’t go away.

Two Knox County legislators have joined House Republican Caucus Chairman Glen Casada in signing up as supporters of a lawsuit trying to force President Barack Obama to turn over a copy of his birth certificate.

http://lastreporter.com/?p=62

A person that has nothing to hide, hides nothing.

OBAMA WATCH CENTRAL
Keyes: President 'has something to hide' about eligibility
Says Dem 'asked to be chosen, therefore must answer'


Posted: February 16, 2009
9:07 pm Eastern

By Bob Unruh
© 2009 WorldNetDaily


Alan Keyes, a 2008 presidential candidate who now is a plaintiff in one of the many lawsuits seeking to verify whether Barack Obama qualifies under the U.S. Constitution's requirements to occupy the Oval Office, says the tactics adopted by lawyers for the president confirm there is an issue for the courts to investigate.

Keyes, who was the candidate of the American Independent Party, cited a recent exchange with lawyers representing Obama in which they warned they might seek monetary penalties against those raising the question of Obama's eligibility under the Constitution's requirement that the president be a "natural born" citizen.

"It confirms the common sense suspicion that he won't act forthrightly in this matter because he has something to hide," Keyes wrote on his blog after WND reported the warning about "sanctions" was raised by Obama's defense lawyers.

The onetime U.S. ambassador explained on his posting that those raising questions over Obama's elibigility – so far – have simply been ignored by courts.

"In effect, the courts are refusing to admit plaintiffs on this matter into the courtroom, thereby denying them justice," he wrote. "Madison wrote, 'Justice is the end of government. It is the end of civil society. It will be pursued either until it be obtained or until liberty be lost in the pursuit.'"

"The denial of justice is thus a despotic act that violates the basis not only of just government, but of civil society itself," Keyes wrote.

Obama voluntarily placed himself in the position of being asked to provide his information, he said.

"Given the Constitutional requirement, the only fact citizens need to justify their suit is the fact that Obama ran for president. He asked to be chosen, and therefore must answer the eligibility question," Keyes wrote,

"In the final analysis if the courts refuse to respect the Constitution, they are not the judges of their own action. The people must ultimately decide. Which is why I and others will use every outlet to inform them of the injustice being done not just to individuals but to the sovereign people as a whole," Keyes said.

WND has reported on multiple legal challenges that have alleged Obama does not meet the "natural born citizen" clause of the U.S. Constitution, Article 2, Section 1, which reads, "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."

Some claim he was not born in Hawaii, as he insists, but in Kenya. Obama's American mother, the suits contend, was too young at the time of his birth to confer American citizenship to her son under the law at the time.

Other challenges have focused on Obama's citizenship through his father, a Kenyan subject to the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom at the time of his birth, thus making him a dual citizen. The cases contend the framers of the Constitution excluded dual citizens from qualifying as natural born.

Several details of Obama's past have added twists to the question of his eligibility and citizenship, including his family's move to Indonesia when he was a child and on what nation's passport he traveled to Pakistan in the '80s, as well as conflicting reports from Obama's family about his place of birth.

The Keyes case is being handled largely by Gary Kreep of the United States Justice Foundation, but others playing a key role in the legal actions include Orly Taitz of California as well as Philip Berg, both of whom already have had their arguments rejected as not worthy of hearing by the U.S. Supreme Court.

In a commentary on the dispute, Keyes wrote that the suggestion of sanctions "confirms Obama's ruthless determination to destroy anyone who continues to seek the information the Constitution requires.

"Why should they demand penalties against citizens who are simply seeking the enforcement of the Supreme Law of the Land? It is simply because their persistence runs contrary to the will of a supposedly popular demagogue? This smacks of tyrannical arrogance. That Obama thus signals his intent to bring financial ruin on those who won't accept his cover-up of the circumstances of his birth is a tactical escalation," Keyes said.

"As one of the targets of this escalation, I need no more convincing proof of the ruthless disposition so far successfully masked by his empty rhetoric of hope and change. Obviously he means to offer hope only to those willing to surrender their most basic rights. To any who insist on questioning his actions, he offers the drastic change of ruin and destruction. So be it. We shall be among those who learn firsthand the meaning of the sacrifices made by the Founders of our free republic, as they pledged and gave up their lives, their fortunes and the world's esteem," Keyes said.

The legal sanctions being sought are not the only obstacle facing those who say they want to investigate the truth of Obama's eligibility. Four state lawmakers in Tennessee recently agreed to act as plaintiffs in a case being assembled by Taitz, and immediately were attacked by columnist Gail Kerr in the Nashville Tennessean, who compared their plan to "a resolution honoring the Easter Bunny for doing such a great job with the annual colored egg delivery system."

The columnist wrote that Obama's campaign already has released documentation of his birth.

"They put it on their Internet site. Obama's mother was a U.S. citizen. His father was from Kenya. The man was born on Aug. 4, 1961, in Hawaii. That, fellows, is a state. As in the 'United STATES of America.' It counts. See?" Kerr wrote.

Critics, however, have pointed out that the "Certification of Live Birth" posted by the Obama campaign and cited by various "truth" organizations is not the same as a birth certificate, and in fact under Hawaii law at the time was granted to babies who were not born in Hawaii.

Taitz wrote that her supporters should send "flowers, candy, banners, appreciation cards, teddy bears with big love sign and thank you sign to these courageous lawmakers: Eric Swafford, Glen Casada, Stacey Campfield and Frank Niceley."

The suggestion for sanctions came after Kreep sought records from Occidental College about Obama's attendance there.

The lawyer for the college, Stuart W. Rudnick of Musick, Peeler & Garrett, urgently contacted Fredric D. Woocher of Strumwasser & Woocher.

"This firm is counsel to Occidental College. The College is in receipt of the enclosed subpoena that seeks certain information concerning President-Elect Barack Obama," he wrote via fax. "Inasmuch as the subpoena appears to be valid on its face, the College will have no alternative but to comply with the subpoena absent a court order instructing otherwise."

Within hours, Woocher contacted Kreep regarding the issue, telling him, "It will likely not surprise you to hear that President-elect Obama opposes the production of the requested records.

"In order to avoid the needless expense of our bringing and litigating a Motion to Quash the subpoena, I am writing to ask whether you would be willing to agree voluntarily to cancel or withdraw the subpoena."

Woocher warned, "Please be advised, in particular, that in the event we are forced to file a motion to quash and we prevail in that motion, we will seek the full measure of monetary sanctions provided for in the Code of Civil Procedures."

Here is a partial listing and status update for some of the cases over Obama's eligibility:

New Jersey attorney Mario Apuzzo has filed a case on behalf of Charles Kerchner and others alleging Congress didn't properly ascertain that Obama is qualified to hold the office of president.

Philip J. Berg, a Pennsylvania Democrat, demanded that the courts verify Obama's original birth certificate and other documents proving his American citizenship. Berg's latest appeal, requesting an injunction to stop the Electoral College from selecting the 44th president, was denied.


Leo Donofrio of New Jersey filed a lawsuit claiming Obama's dual citizenship disqualified him from serving as president. His case was considered in conference by the U.S. Supreme Court but denied a full hearing.

Cort Wrotnowski filed suit against Connecticut's secretary of state, making a similar argument to Donofrio. His case was considered in conference by the U.S. Supreme Court, but was denied a full hearing.

Former presidential candidate Alan Keyes headlines a list of people filing a suit in California, in a case handled by the United States Justice Foundation, that asks the secretary of state to refuse to allow the state's 55 Electoral College votes to be cast in the 2008 presidential election until Obama verifies his eligibility to hold the office. The case is pending, and lawyers are seeking the public's support.

Chicago attorney Andy Martin sought legal action requiring Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle to release Obama's vital statistics record. The case was dismissed by Hawaii Circuit Court Judge Bert Ayabe.


Lt. Col. Donald Sullivan sought a temporary restraining order to stop the Electoral College vote in North Carolina until Barack Obama's eligibility could be confirmed, alleging doubt about Obama's citizenship. His case was denied.


In Ohio, David M. Neal sued to force the secretary of state to request documents from the Federal Elections Commission, the Democratic National Committee, the Ohio Democratic Party and Obama to show the presidential candidate was born in Hawaii. The case was denied.


In Washington state, Steven Marquis sued the secretary of state seeking a determination on Obama's citizenship. The case was denied.


In Georgia, Rev. Tom Terry asked the state Supreme Court to authenticate Obama's birth certificate. His request for an injunction against Georgia's secretary of state was denied by Georgia Superior Court Judge Jerry W. Baxter.

California attorney Orly Taitz has brought a case, Lightfoot vs. Bowen, on behalf of Gail Lightfoot, the vice presidential candidate on the ballot with Ron Paul, four electors and two registered voters.

In addition, other cases cited on the RightSideofLife blog as raising questions about Obama's eligibility include:

In Texas, Darrel Hunter vs. Obama later was dismissed.


In Ohio, Gordon Stamper vs. U.S. later was dismissed.


In Texas, Brockhausen vs. Andrade.


In Washington, L. Charles vs. Obama.


In Hawaii, Keyes vs. Lingle, dismissed.

The governor's office in Hawaii said there is a valid certificate but rejected requests for access and left ambiguous its origin: Does the certificate on file with the Department of Health indicate a Hawaii birth or was it generated after the Obama family registered a Kenyan birth in Hawaii, which the state's procedures allowed at the time?

http://wnd.com

Originally Posted by kniggit

5) We have the expert analysis and testimony of three fraud and counterfeiting consultants. The "Certification of Live Birth" posted by Daily Kos and FactCheck is both Photoshopped (digitally edited), which makes it legally invalid, and a counterfeit... a very mediocre counterfeit.
http://www.youtube.com/v/fDIVEfVGLBQ

Youtube says "video has been removed by user" is it available somewhere else?

FIXED. A working link is www.youtube.com/v/fDIVEfVGLBQ

I corrected the dead link at
www.alipac.us/ftopic-137238-days0-orderasc-150.html
(post #19 of 25) and added a link to "Dr. Polarik's" text explanation.

Weighty legal articles sometimes shed light on history.

http://faculty.maxwell.syr.edu/jyinger/ ... istory.htm

The Origins and Interpretation of the Presidential Eligibility Clause in the
U.S. Constitution: Why Did the Founding Fathers Want the President
To Be a "Natural Born Citizen" and What Does this Clause
Mean for Foreign-Born Adoptees?
by John Yinger(1)
Revised Version, April 6, 2000

Introduction

In Article II, Section 1, the U.S. Constitution says:



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 (emphasis added).

This commentary focuses on the first eligibility requirement in this clause, namely the requirement that the President be a "natural born citizen." What are the origins of this requirement? What does it mean?

The full answers to these questions are lost in the back room discussions between the Founding Fathers during 1787, but some evidence has survived over the centuries. I first take a look at the evidence from the Constitutional Convention, then I turn to other evidence. In the conclusion I consider the implications of this history for the presidential eligibility of foreign-born adoptees.

Evidence from the Constitutional Convention

The presidential eligibility clause appeared in constitutional drafts near the end of the Constitutional Convention in 1787. The surviving notes on the deliberations at the Convention, and other related material, provide some evidence concerning the origins of this clause.

The John Jay Letter

The most direct evidence about the origins of the "natural born citizen" clause comes from a letter that John Jay wrote to George Washington, who was at the time serving as President of the Constitutional Convention.(2) John Jay was not a delegate to the Convention; his views conflicted with those of the majority in his state, New York, and he was not elected by the state legislature.(3) However, he was a well-known figure who had been President of the Continental Congress. Moreover, he would become an author, along with Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, of some of the famous Federalist Papers, written to encouraged New Yorkers to ratify the proposed constitution, and, after the Constitution had been ratified, he would be appointed as the first Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.(4) It seems reasonable to suppose, therefore, that his letter carried some weight.

In this letter, dated July 25, 1787, Jay wrote:

Permit me to hint, whether it would not be wise & seasonable to provide a strong check to the admission of Foreigners into the administration of our national Government; and to declare expresly that the Command in chief of the american army shall not be given to, nor devolve on, any but a natural born Citizen (emphasis in the original).(5)

The meaning of this letter is not entirely clear. In today's usage, the word "administration" might be thought to limit the focus of the first part of the letter to the executive branch. According to one historian, however, this part was primarily directed at members of the legislative branch.(6) Moreover, the second part of the letter, where the expression "natural born" appears, also may not have been directed at the President; at that point Jay had no way of knowing that the Convention would ultimately make the President the commander-in-chief. Nevertheless, this letter is the only document connected to the Constitutional Convention that explicitly argues for a "natural born" citizen in a high executive position.

According to one scholar, Charles Gordon, "Possibly this letter was motivated by distrust of Baron von Stuben, who had served valiantly in the Revolutionary forces, but whose subsequent loyalty was suspected by Jay. Another theory is that the Jay letter, and the resulting constitutional provision, responded to rumors that the convention was concocting a monarchy to be ruled by a foreign monarch."(7) However, Gordon does not give much weight to Jay's letter, and he concludes that "no explanation of the origin or purpose of the presidential qualification clause appears anywhere in the recorded deliberation of the Convention."(


Madison's Convention Notes

My own reading of James Madison's notes, which are the principal record of the debates in the Constitutional Convention, leads me to a different conclusion about the origins of this clause. On July 25, 1787, when John Jay's letter was dated, the Convention was debating the nature of the Executive branch. In particular, the delegates were considering a clause that called for the Executive to be elected by the Legislature. If this provision were adopted, Madison said,

the ministers of foreign powers would have and make use of, the opportunity to mix their intrigues & influence with the Election. Limited as the powers of the Executive are, it will be an object of great moment with the great rival powers of Europe who have American possessions, to have at the head of our Governmt a man attached to their respective politics and interests. No pains, nor perhaps experience, will be spared to gain from the Legislature an appointmt favorable to their wishes. Germany & Poland are witnesses of this danger. In the former, the election of the Head of Empire, till it became in a manner hereditary, interested all Europe, and was much influenced by foreign interference. In the latter, altho' the elected Magistrate has very little real power, his election has at all times produced the most eager interference of foreign princes, and has at length slid entirely into foreign hands.(9)

Several other delegates reinforced Madison's point. Pierce Butler said "The two great evils to be avoided are cabal at home, & influence from abroad. It would be difficult to avoid either if the Election be made by the Natl Legislature."(10) According to Madison, Hugh Williamson "was sensible that strong objections lay agst an election of the Executive by the Legislature, and that it opened a door for foreign influence."(11)

There is a striking similarity between the words in Jay's letter and in these statements at the Convention. Jay is concerned about "the admission of Foreigners into the administration of our national Government." Madison worries that foreign powers will attempt "to have at the head of our Governmt a man attached to their respective politics and interests." Apparently, however, this timing was nothing more than coincidence. In fact, Jay was in New York when he wrote the letter, engaged in other duties, and "he was still in the dark about the direction toward which that body was moving."(12) Moreover, the letter was undoubtedly not delivered to Washington until days, if not weeks, after July 25.

In addition, Madison, backed up by Butler and Williamson, appears to be addressing a different issue than is Jay. After all, Madison's comments focus on the method for electing the President, whereas Jay is concerned about the President's, or at least the commander-in-chief's, qualifications.

In fact, however, these two issues are inextricably linked in the Convention debate. The Founding Fathers were very concerned about foreign influence and went to great lengths to design a government that would be insulated from it. At first, they focused on finding a mechanism for electing the President that would minimize foreign influence. Indeed, even though the issue of Presidential qualifications was raised, as we will see, on July 26, the Convention did not turn to that issue in earnest until almost a month later, and it did not restrict eligibility to "natural born citizens" until it had dropped the idea that the Legislature should elect the President. In other words, the Convention regarded Presidential qualifications as a secondary tool for limiting foreign influence, and the delegates put off the debate on this secondary tool until it had succeeded in designing a method for electing the President that could not be manipulated by foreign powers.

The next day, July 26, 1787, the Constitutional Convention returned to the issue of foreign influence on the Executive. Specifically, on that day George Mason moved "That the Committee of Detail be instructed to receive a clause requiring certain qualifications of landed property and citizenship of the United States in members of the legislature...."(13) Because, at that point in the Convention, the Legislature was still expected to elect the President, this motion can be seen as a way to limit foreign influence on the Executive.

At this point, Charles Pinckney and Charles Cotesworth Pinckney "moved to insert by way of amendmt the words Judiciary & Executive so as to extend the qualifications to those departments which was agreed to nem. con."(14) This is the first mention of presidential qualifications at the Convention. It appears almost as an aside. Along with an amendment to strike out the word "landed," it was incorporated into Mason's motion and passed by the Convention.

However, several comments during the debate reveal that the issue of legislative and presidential qualifications was far from settled. Right after the original Mason motion, Gouverneur Morris stated that "If qualifications are proper, he wd prefer them to be in the electors rather than the elected."(15) This comment is directed toward qualifications for members of the Legislature, but it also suggests that Morris and other delegates might have been more concerned about the qualifications of the people electing the President than about the qualifications of the President. Moreover, right after the Pickney and Pickney amendment was accepted, John Dickinson stated that he "was agst any recital of qualifications in the Constitution."(16) In any case, the Convention then referred its recent proceeding to the Committee on Detail, which consisted of Delegates Rutledge, Randolph, Gorham, Ellsworth, and Wilson. This committee was specifically instructed "to receive a clause or clauses requiring certain qualifications of property and citizenship in the United States, for the executive, the judiciary, and the members of both branches of the legislature of the United States."(17)

The Committee on Detail's first report was presented to the Convention on August 6. It included qualifications for members of the Legislature (three years of U.S. citizenship for the House of Representatives and four years of citizenship for the Senate) but did not mention qualifications for the Executive, who was, in that report, still elected by the Legislature.(1 This report also proposed that: "The Legislature of the United States shall have the authority to establish such uniform qualifications of the members of each House, with regard to property, as to the said Legislature shall deem expedient."(19) There followed a long debate on the propriety of a legislature determining the qualifications of its members, the appropriateness of an requirement based on land or wealth, and the number of years of citizenship required for each house. Before the debate was over, the Convention decided not to let the Legislature determine the qualifications of its members, rejected land or wealth qualifications, and raised the citizenship requirement to seven years for House members and to nine years for Senators.(20)

The Convention returned to these issues on August 13. The session began with a motion, by James Wilson and Edmund J. Randolph, to cut the citizenship requirement for House members back to four years. Then Elbridge Gerry stated his concerns about the role of foreigners. One historian thinks that Gerry's concerns were stimulated by John Jay's letter, which by that time had surely arrived in Philadelphia.(21) In any case,

Mr. Gerry wished that in future the eligibility might be confined to Natives. Foreign powers would intermeddle in our affairs, and spare no expense to influence them. Persons having foreign attachments will be sent among us & insinuated into our councils in order to be made instruments for their purposes. Every one knows the vast sums laid out in Europe for secret services. He was not singular in these ideas. A great many of the most influential men in Massts reasoned in the same manner.(22)

The following debate was quite lively, with delegates weighing in on both sides of this proposal. Alexander Hamilton "was in general agst embarassing the Govt with minute restrictions." He recognized that there was a "possible danger" from foreign influence, but also said:

the advantage of encouraging foreigners was obvious & admitted. Persons in Europe of moderate fortunes will be fond of coming here when they will be on a level with the first citizens. He moved that the section be altered so as to require merely citizenship & inhabitancy. The right of determining the rule of naturalization will then leave a discretion to the Legislature on this subject which will answer every purpose.(23)

This statement is important for two reasons. First, it recognizes that disqualifying people who are not "Natives" from public office will make them second-class citizens and discourage them from even coming to the United States. Second, it links naturalization and the rules of eligibility for public office. As discussed below, the Constitution leaves this link unclear, but Hamilton explicitly states that the naturalization process should be used to determine the rules of citizenship.

James Madison seconded Hamilton's motion. He also recognized the importance of avoiding second-class citizenship for immigrants. Specifically. "He wished to invite foreigners of merit & republican principles among us."(24) Wilson, who was himself foreign-born, then "cited Pennsylvania as proof of the advantages of emigration, and withdrew his motion in favor of Hamilton's." In contrast, Butler "was strenous agst admitting foreigners into our public councils," and Hamilton's motion was eventually rejected.(25)

The debate then turned to the treatment of current citizens, who, like Wilson and several other delegates, were foreign-born. Gouverneur Morris moved that current residents be exempted from the seven-year rule for eligibility to the House.(26) Again, a lively debate ensued. John Rutledge declared that "The policy of the precaution was as great with regard to foreigners now citizens; as to those who are to be naturalized in the future."(27) In contrast, Nathaniel Gorham re-stated the principle of equal citizenship for all when he said that "when foreigners are naturalized it wd seem as if they stand on equal footing with natives."(2 Ultimately, Morris's exemption was rejected, although it later reappeared in the presidential eligibility clause.

The issue of qualifications for the President next appeared on August 20, when Elbridge Gerry moved "that the committee be instructed to report proper qualifications for the President."(29) He was talking about the Committee on Detail. On August 22, Rutledge presented the Committee's report, which called for the insertion of a presidential qualifications clause. This clause did not include the "natural born citizen" expression. Instead it said that the President "shall be of the age of thirty five years, and a citizen of the United States, and shall have been an inhabitant thereof for twenty one years."(30)

Madison did not record any debate on this clause. Instead, on August 31, the Convention referred various issues, including presidential qualifications and the method of electing the President, to a Committee of Eleven, which had one member from each state.(31) This committee presented its report on September 4, 1787.(32) The words "natural born citizen" first appeared in this report. Indeed, these words appeared in a form that is identical to the final version in the Constitution: "No person except a natural born citizen ... shall be eligible to the office of President." The record of the Constitutional Convention provides no explanation for the introduction of the words "natural born." On September 7, "The section requiring that the President should be a natural-born citizen &c, & have been resident for fourteen years, & be thirty five years of age, was agreed to nem. con."(33)

The report presented on September 4 also included the provisions calling for the creation of the Electoral College -- the first formal proposal eliminating the election of the President by the Legislature. Although, as discussed below, this step was seen as a way to help insulate the presidency from foreign influence, it also broke the clear link between the citizenship requirements for legislators and the selection of the President and hence opened the door for stronger presidential qualifications.(34) The report itself consisted of a series of "additions & alterations," and it may not be just coincidence that the entry calling for the Electoral College, number four, was followed immediately by the entry on presidential qualifications, number five.(35)

At this point another Committee of Five, also known as the Committee on Style and Arrangement or the Committee on Revision, was appointed to produce the final version of the Constitution. This committee retained the presidential eligibility clause with no change in the "natural born citizen" expression. This version of the clause also was adopted without debate.(36)

Summary

In summary, the delegates at the Constitutional Convention were deeply concerned about foreign influence on the national government, and in particular on the President. At the beginning of the debate, they wanted the Legislature to select the President, and they tried to limit foreign influence on the President by devising time-of-citizenship requirements for members of the Legislature. Presidential qualifications as such were mentioned, but they received little attention at this stage in the debate. Ultimately, however, the Convention decided that a President elected by the Legislature could not be insulated from foreign influence and it turned, instead, to the Electoral College.

In one sense, the switch to the Electoral College lowered the need for explicit presidential qualifications because it minimized the line of potential foreign influence running through the Legislature. In another sense, however, this switch broke the clear connection between the citizenship requirements of legislators and the selection of the President, and therefore boosted the symbolic importance of a citizenship requirement for the President. This change in context, along with the Convention's decision to make the President the commander-in-chief of the army, gave new weight to the arguments in Jay's letter, and in particular to the suggestion in that letter that the presidency be restricted to "natural born" citizens. When Jay's letter arrived, probably sometime before August 13, the Convention was not ready to deal with it, and indeed was somewhat hostile to its ideas. But between August 31 and September 4, when the Committee of Eleven did its work, the context changed and the seed that Jay had planted bore fruit.(37)

Evidence from Other Sources

Additional evidence about the origins and interpretation of the "natural born citizen" expression is available from sources other than the Constitutional Convention. To a large degree, this evidence reinforces the above interpretation based on the Convention, but it also raises some additional issues, particularly about the term "natural born" citizen and its relationship to "naturalization."

Natural-born, Native-born, and Naturalization

The term "natural born" citizen has a long history in British common law.(3 In fact, a law passed in 1677 law says that "natural born" citizens include people born overseas to British citizens. This usage was undoubtedly known to John Jay, who had children born overseas while he was serving as a diplomat.(39) It also appears to have been employed by the members of the first Congress, who included many of the people who had participated in the Constitutional Convention. To be specific, The Naturalization Act of 1790, which was passed by this Congress, declared "And the children of citizens of the United States, that may be born beyond the sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born citizens; Provided, that the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never been resident of the United States."(40)

This history suggests that the Founding Fathers used the term "natural born" as an expansive definition of citizenship, that is, as a way to make certain that people born overseas to American citizens would have the full rights of other American citizens.(41)

A particularly compelling version of this interpretation, with language that applies, inadvertently, no doubt, to foreign-born adoptees, can be found in an article written almost 100 years ago by Alexander Porter Morse.(42) He writes that by drawing on the term so well known from English law, the Founders were recognizing "the law of hereditary, rather than territorial allegiance."(43) In other words, they were drawing on the English legal tradition, which protected allegiance to the king by conferring citizenship on all children "whose fathers were natural-born subjects," regardless of where the children were born.(44) Thus, according to Morse, "the framers thought it wise, in view of the probable influx of European immigration, to provide that the President should at least be the child of citizens owing allegiance to the United States at the time of his birth."(45) He goes on to say that the presidential eligibility clause "was scarcely intended to bar the children of American parentage, whether born at sea or in foreign territory.... A natural-born citizen has been defined as one whose citizenship is established by the jurisdiction which the United States already has over the parents of the child, not what is thereafter acquired by choice of residence in this country."(46)

Although this legal history was never explicitly addressed at the Constitutional Convention, Morse's view is similar to a statement by Charles Pinckney in 1800, namely, that the presidential eligibility clause is designed "to insure ... attachment to the country" on the part of the President. This statement is discussed in more detail below.

Morse also emphasizes the difference between the terms "native-born" and "natural-born." The dictionary, which follows the English precedents, defines "native-born" as "belonging to or associated with a particular place (as a country) by birth therein" and "natural-born" as "having a specified status or character by birth."(47) If the Founders had not wanted an expansive definition of citizenship, Morse writes, "it would only have been necessary to say, 'no person, except a native-born citizen.'"(4

Another terminological issue concerns the process of "naturalization." Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution gives Congress the power "To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization." Unfortunately, however, the Constitution does not indicate whether people can be declared "natural-born" through the naturalization process.(49) In common usage and according to the dictionary definition, a person who is a "natural-born" citizen would appear to be someone who does not have to be naturalized. Moreover, the dictionary definition of "naturalize" is to "admit (an alien) to the rights and status of citizenship." These definitions appear to rule out the possibility of overlap between the categories "natural-born" and "naturalized."

This issue arises in interpreting The Naturalization Act of 1790. One interpretation is that this act is designed to make it clear that people born overseas to American parents are already "natural-born" and do not need to be "naturalized." As Morse put it,

whoever drew the act followed closely the various parliamentary statues of Great Britain; and its language in this relation indicates that the first congress entertained and declared that children of American parentage, wherever born, were within the constitutional designation, "natural-born citizens." The act is declaratory: but the reason that such children are natural born remains; that is, their American citizenship is natural -- the result of parentage -- and is not artificial or acquired by compliance with legislative requirements.(50)

However, the 1790 Act employs the Congressional power to regulate naturalization as a way to clarify the "natural born" citizen category. In fact, the caption of the 1790 Act, "to establish a uniform rule of naturalization," is taken straight from the Constitution. Thus, a literal interpretation of this action by the first Congress is that the Founding Fathers, who dominated this Congress, believed that the right to define "natural born" was conferred by the "naturalization" clause.(51) This interpretation is entirely consistent with the statement made by Alexander Hamilton on August 13.

A strict, some might say strained, reading of the dictionary definitions also provides some support for this alternative interpretation. An second phrasing of the definition of "naturalize" is "to confer the rights and privileges of a native subject or citizen" (emphasis added). Because the dictionary also makes "natural-born" a broader category than "native-born," people who are not "native-born," including people born overseas to American parents, must be "naturalized."

Unfortunately, the link between "natural born" and "naturalization" was never made explicit by the Founding Fathers, and the term "natural born" does not appear in any naturalization legislation passed since 1790.(52) Moreover, the few related statements by the U.S. Supreme Court are not very helpful. In perhaps its clearest such statement, in Luria v. United States, the Court declared, "Under our Constitution, a naturalized citizen stands on an equal footing with the native citizen in all respects save that of eligibility to the Presidency."(53) This statement appears to rule out the possibility that "naturalized" citizens could be considered "natural-born," but it does not indicate whether any people other than "native" or "native-born" citizens can be considered "natural-born" and it does not reveal whether the naturalization clause gives Congress the power to determine what "natural-born" means.

Foreign Influence and Presidential Eligibility

Evidence from the period right after the Constitutional Convention also supports the notion that the Founding Fathers were very concerned about foreign influence on the federal government, and in particular on the President.

The most direct evidence comes from a statement made by Charles Pinckney to the U.S. Senate in 1800. Pinckney had been a delegate to the Constitutional Convention and, on July 26, 1787, had been the first delegate to raise the issue of presidential qualifications in the debate. On March 25, 1800, the Senate was debating a bill "prescribing the mode of deciding disputed elections of President and Vice President of the United States."(54) Pinckney gave a detailed explanation for the Electoral College, emphasizing that the rules governing the Electoral College were designed so "as to make it impossible ... for improper domestic, or, what is of much more consequence, foreign influence and gold to interfere."(55) Pinckney then made the only documented statement by one of the Founders connecting the Electoral College and the presidential eligibility clause. The Founders "knew well," he said

that to give to the members of Congress a right to give votes in this election, or to decide upon them when given, was to destroy the independence of the Executive, and make him the creature of the Legislature. This therefore they have guarded against, and to insure experience and attachment to the country, they have determined that no man who is not a natural born citizen, or citizen at the adoption of the Constitution, of fourteen years residence, and thirty-five years of age, shall be eligible....(56)

This statement by one of the Founders, thirteen years after the Constitutional Convention, therefore supports the interpretation, given earlier, that the Electoral College and the presidential eligibility clause were intended primarily as the two sides of a plan to protect the President from foreign influence.

Additional evidence can be found throughout the famous Federalist Papers, "a series of 85 essays written by Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison between October 1787 and May 1788."(57)

Essays number 2 through 5 were written by John Jay and they were titled "Concerning Dangers from Foreign Force and Influence." Although the main focus of these essays is on the need for a strong central government to protect a nation from foreign military action, they also suggest that a strong central government can help protect a nation from "foreign influence." Concern about foreign influence also appears in essay number 20, written by Hamilton and Madison; essay number 43 by Madison; and essays number 66 and 75 by Hamilton. Moreover, the role of the presidential selection mechanism in limiting foreign influence is explicitly discussed by Hamilton in essay number 68. Here is what Hamilton says:

Nothing was more to be desired than that every practicable obstacle should be opposed to cabal, intrigue, and corruption. These most deadly adversaries of republican government might naturally have been expected to make their approaches from more than one quarter, but chiefly from the desire in foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils. How could they better gratify this, than by raising a creature of their own to the chief magistracy of the Union? But the convention have guarded against all danger of this sort, with the most provident and judicious attention. They have not made the appointment of the President to depend on any preexisting bodies of men, who might be tampered with beforehand to prostitute their votes; but they have referred it in the first instance to an immediate act of the people of America, to be exerted in the choice of persons for the temporary and sole purpose of making the appointment. And they have excluded from eligibility to this trust, all those who from situation might be suspected of too great devotion to the President in office. No senator, representative, or other person holding a place of trust or profit under the United States, can be of the numbers of the electors.

The Federalist Papers do not mention the issue of presidential qualifications. However, a well-known treatise on the Constitution published in 1803, like Charles Pinckney's statement in the U.S. Senate in 1800, explicitly discusses the linkage between the "natural born citizen" clause and the need to avoid foreign influence. In particular, this treatise says:

That provision in the constitution which requires that the president shall be a native-born citizen (unless he were a citizen of the United States when the constitution was adopted,) is a happy means of security against foreign influence, which, whereever it is capable of being exerted, is to be dreaded more than the plague. The admission of foreigners into our councils, consequently, cannot be too much guarded against; their total exclusion from a station to which foreign nations have been accustomed to, attach ideas of sovereign power, sacredness of character, and hereditary right, is a measure of the most consummate policy and wisdom. It was by means of foreign connections that the stadtholder of Holland, whose powers at first were probably not equal to those of a president of the United States, became a sovereign hereditary prince before the late revolution in that country. Nor is it with levity that I remark, that the very title of our first magistrate, in some measure exempts us from the danger of those calamities by which European nations are almost perpetually visited. The title of king, prince, emperor, or czar, without the smallest addition to his powers, would have rendered him a member of the fraternity of crowned heads: their common cause has more than once threatened the desolation of Europe. To have added a member to this sacred family in America, would have invited and perpetuated among us all the evils of Pandora's Box.(5

This interpretation is echoed in another well-known treatise published 30 years later.

But the general propriety of the exclusion of foreigners, in common cases, will scarcely be doubted by any sound statesman. It cuts off all chances for ambitious foreigners who might otherwise be intriguing for the office; and interposes a barrier against those corrupt interferences of foreign governments in executive elections, which have inflicted the most serious evils upon the elective monarchies of Europe. Germany, Poland, and even the pontificate of Rome, are sad but instructive examples of the enduring mischiefs arising from this source.(59)

Neither treatise provides any evidence that it has accurately characterized the views of the Founding Fathers. However, the first treatise was published only sixteen years after the Constitutional Convention by St. George Tucker, who was, according to the title page of his treatise, "Professor of Law, in the University of William and Mary, And One of The Judges of The General Court in Virginia." He also served as a major in the Revolutionary War and was present at the Battle of Yorktown.(60) It seems reasonable to presume that such an author might know something about the Founders' beliefs. As a result, this treatise provides more support for the view, implicit in the debate at the Constitutional Convention, that the "natural born" citizen expression is designed to exclude from the Presidency those people most likely to represent or to be under the influence of a foreign power.

Note that the Tucker treatise, like the statement to the Constitutional Convention by Elbridge Gerry on August 13, uses the term "native-born," not "natural-born." This suggests that Tucker and Gerry did not make a distinction between these two terms, although Gerry might have made a distinction and wanted to confine legislative eligibility to people literally born in the United States.

Conclusion: Implications for Foreign-Born Adoptees

The adoption of foreign-born children was unheard of in 1787, and it is inconceivable that the Founding Fathers considered such adoptees when they wrote the presidential eligibility clause. Nevertheless, it is instructive to explore the implications of this clause for the elibility of foreign-born adoptees to be President.

First, a strict interpretation of the language in the Constitution seems to imply that foreign-born adoptees are not "natural born" citizens and hence are not eligible to be President. Even if a child is matched with adoptive parents before he or she is born in a foreign country to a citizen of that country, he or she is not considered a U.S. citizen at birth. Instead, he or she only becomes a citizen after a formal process of adoption and naturalization.(61) By the language of the Supreme Court's Luria decision, foreign-born adoptees are therefore not eligible to be President.

Second, in this case, as in many others, a strict interpretation of the Constitution may not be the final answer. Legal scholars have clearly pointed out ambiguity in the meaning of "natural born" and "naturalization," and the Founding Fathers did not leave a record that clears things up. Even the Luria decision cannot be regarded as definitive because it was not directly ruling on the "natural born" citizen clause. Thus, it is conceivable that legislation declaring foreign-born adoptees to be "natural born" citizens could be upheld by the Supreme Court.

Third, none of the above interpretations of the "natural born citizen" phrase conflicts in spirit with presidential eligibility for foreign-born adoptees. The historical record contains two, possibly overlapping, interpretations of the "natural born citizen" clause: It is designed to grant full citizenship to all people with American parents and/or to prevent pernicious foreign influence on the President.

The first interpretation was not intended, of course, to cover foreign-born adoptees, but it is consistent with the notion that American parents build families under many different circumstances and that these circumstances should not influence whether their children are eligible to be President. Although the Founding Fathers did not contemplate the possibility of adopting foreign orphans, their apparent desire to confer full American citizenship, including presidential eligibility, on the children of American parents who give birth overseas is entirely consistent with a desire to confer full American citizenship on the children of American parents who turn to the adoption of a foreign orphan as a way to build their family.

The language used by Morse is particularly favorable to foreign-born adoptees, each of whom is, in fact, "the child of citizens owing allegiance to the United States at the time of his birth." Moreover, foreign-born adoptees, who grow up as Americans, also meet the more modest criteria expressed by Charles Pinckney, namely, that the President should exhibit "attachment to the country." If these statements accurately reflect the Founder's intentions, therefore, then they would support presidential eligibility for foreign-born adoptees.

The second interpretation is also perfectly consistent with presidential eligibility for foreign-born adoptees. No one could argue that a foreign-born adoptee, who after all grows up surrounded by American institutions and guided by American citizens, threatens the United States with foreign influence. Indeed, the idea that innocent orphans represent the foreign "instrument" in Gerry's August 13 statement to the Convention or the "plague" in Tucker's treatise is ludicrous on its face. Making foreign-born orphans eligible to be President would not open a "Pandora's Box"!

Overall, this history leaves foreign-born adoptees as second-class citizens in the sense first expressed by Alexander Hamilton in his statement to the Constitutional Convention on August 13. In fact, foreign-born adoptees are ineligible to be President, even though the Founding Fathers never considered these adoptees' situation and even through all the interpretations offered for the "natural born citizen" clause in the Constitution are consistent with presidential eligibility for people in this category.

This unfair situation might be remedied through legislation. One could argue that Congress has the authority to define constitutional terms, such as "natural-born" that are left ambiguous by the Constitution and the debate at the Constitutional Convention. One might also build on the view, expressed in Hamilton's statement on August 13 and in the 1790 naturalization act, that the "naturalization" power awarded to Congress by the Constitution allows Congress to define the meaning of "natural born citizen." However, the legal uncertainty surrounding an even more basic question about the "natural born citizen" clause, namely whether it covers people born overseas to American parents, indicates that a legislative solution may be illusive.(62)

The inescapable conclusion is that it will at least take path-breaking legislation, and may take a constitutional amendment, to ensure that foreign-born adoptees are full American citizens, eligible to run for President if they choose to do so.

The footnotes are interesting paragraphs of information in some cases, and can be viewed by clicking the link. Some of the smileys above seem to be the number "8" followed by a parenthesis.

Kerchner v. Obama: Summons and Second Amended Verified Complaint on the Way to Defendants
Submitted by Phil on Tue, Feb 17, 2009

Mario Apuzzo, attorney for the Plaintiffs in Kerchner v. Obama, reports this evening that the several Defendants, including President Barack Hussein Obama, are in the process of being served Mr. Apuzzo’s Summons and Second Amended Verified Complaint:

Just a quick announcement and update on the case. The wheels are in motion. The copies of the federal court Summons and 2nd Amended Verified Complaint were electronically delivered to professional legal process servers yesterday morning, President’s Day, February 16th, 2009, for delivery to, and official serving on the Defendants. As my client Mr. Kerchner noted to me, an ironically befitting day and an interesting footnote for history in our goal to remove this usurper from the Oval Office.

Case Doc Link: http://www.scribd.com/doc/11317148/

Mario Apuzzo, Esq.
185 Gatzmer Avenue
Jamesburg NJ 08831
Email: apuzzo [AT] erols.com
Tel: 732-521-1900
Fax: 732-521-3906

This would be funny if it weren't so true.

A Letter from an English Woman

Now let me get this straight: You hired a man with virtually no experience, and mysterious past who might not even be a natural born citizen to be your president... and who derives all his experience from the seat of all corruption.. Chicago. His first act was try to give a trillion of your dollars to Wall Street crooks with absolutely no accountability and he is still trying mightily.. The people who already got your money were caught trying to buy a jet plane bought outside your country. The parties who have received your money and spent it are already legend. We think that within six months the next monies will be partied out and they will be back for more!

His nominee for Sec of the Treasury is a tax evader. He was confirmed nevertheless. The next three whom he nominated were all tax evaders. Two of them had to withdraw on the same day. Your President promised that absolutely no lobbyists would be part of his administration. Already three of the biggest lobbyists in the country are on his team. Who fed you Americans a whopping dose of stupid? We grieve for the loss of your Constitution, common sense, and morality. I doubt if the Crown would take you back.

Greta Marley
London SW1

Posted by Defend Our Freedoms Foundation at 2/20/2009 5:13 AM