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Title: Lawyers say Canadian-born Cruz eligible to run for president
Source:
FoxNews
URL Source: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201 ... eligible-to-run-for-president/
Published: Mar 14, 2015
Author: Dan Gallo
Post Date: 2015-03-14 09:30:11 by cranky
Keywords: None
Views: 6665
Comments: 38
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, speaks at the International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) Legislative Conference and Presidential Forum in Washington. While questions about Canadian-born Sen. Ted Cruz’s eligibility to be president haven’t drawn much attention, two former Justice Department lawyers have weighed in with a bipartisan verdict: Cruz, they say, is eligible to run for the White House.
Neal Katyal, acting solicitor general in the Obama administration, and Paul Clemente, solicitor general in President George W. Bush’s administration, got out in front of the issue in a Harvard Law Review article.
“There is no question that Senator Cruz has been a citizen from birth and is thus a ‘natural born Citizen’ within the meaning of the Constitution,” they wrote.
Anti-Cruz “birthers” had questioned the Texas Republican senator’s eligibility to be president, challenging his citizenship status because he was born in Canada. Two years ago, Cruz released his birth certificate showing his mother was a U.S. citizen born in Delaware, presumably satisfying the requirements for presidential eligibility as a “natural born citizen.”
The law review article, “On the Meaning of ‘Natural Born Citizen”, asserts that the interpretation of the term was settled in Cruz’s favor as early as the 1700’s. The lawyers wrote that the Supreme Court has long used British common law and enactments of the First Congress for guidance on defining a “natural born citizen.”
“Both confirm that the original meaning of the phrase ‘natural born Citizen’ includes persons born abroad who are citizens from birth based on the citizenship of a parent,” they wrote. They concluded someone like Cruz had “no need to go through naturalization proceedings,” making him eligible. Cruz is still weighing a presidential run.
Last month, Cruz addressed the citizenship issue during a question-and-answer session with moderator Sean Hannity, of Fox News, at the Conservative Political Action Conference. “I was born in Calgary. My mother was an American citizen by birth,” Cruz said. “Under federal law, that made me an American citizen by birth. The Constitution requires that you be a natural-born citizen.”
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 27.
#1. To: cranky (#0)
So even if Obama was born in Kenya he meets the requirement. How about that? Boy, how opinion changes when it's "our" guy, huh?
No. Citizenship regarding an overseas birth is passed according to then current U.S. law. Had Obama been born outside the United States (evidence of which is lacking), the applicable law at the time of Obama's birth would have required that his citizen mother "was physically present in the United States or its outlying possessions for a period or periods totaling not less than ten years, at least five of which were after attaining the age of fourteen years." As his mother was 18 years old at the time of his birth, it was physically impossible for her to have lived in the United States at least five years after attaining the age of fourteen years. This is all academic as Obama has a birth certificate from Hawaii, certified by the appropriate official in Hawaii, and which must be accepted in all courts in all states. There was a serious question about John McCain being a natural born citizen because of another quirk in the law, in effect at the time of his birth, regarding birth in Panama. McCain never produced a birth certificate. Military bases have no special status. The Base and the Canal Zone were sovereign territory of Panama. By treaty, Panama permitted the U.S. to exercise jurisdiction as if it were the sovereign (but it was not actually the sovereign). The CZ was, for a time, outside the territory of the United States but within its jurisdiction. For a short time, during which McCain was born, the CZ fell outside the 14th Amendment (inside the territory and jurisdiction) and outside a the Federal statute (outside the territory and jurisdiction), in a legal no man's land. 66 Stat 163 (27 Jun 1952) Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. This was current law at the time Obama was born. CHAPTER 1—NATIONALITY AT BIRTH AND BY COLLECTIVE NATURALIZATION NATIONALS AND CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES AT BIRTH SEC. 301. (a) The following shall be nationals and citizens of the United States at birth: (1) a person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof; (2) a person born in the United States to a member of an Indian, Eskimo, Aleutian, or other aboriginal tribe: Provided, That the granting of citizenship under this subsection shall not in any manner impair or otherwise affect the right of such person to tribal or other property; (3) a person born outside of the United States and its outlying possessions of parents both of whom are citizens of the United States and one of whom has had a residence in the United States or one of its outlying possessions, prior to the birth of such person; (4) a person born outside of the United States and its outlying possessions of parents one of whom is a citizen of the United States who has been physically present in the United States or one of its outlying possessions for a continuous period of one year prior to the birth of such person, and the other of whom is a national, but not a citizen of the United States; (5) a person born in an outlying possession of the United States of parents one of whom is a citizen of the United States who has been physically present in the United States or one of its outlying possessions for a continuous period of one year at any time prior to the birth of such person; (6) a person of unknown parentage found in the United States while under the age of five years, until shown, prior to his attaining the age of twenty-one years, not to have been born in the United States; (7) a person born outside the geographical limits of the United States and its outlying possessions of parents one of whom is an alien, and the other a citizen of the United States who, prior to the birth of such person, was physically present in the United States or its outlying possessions for a period or periods totaling not less than ten years, at least five of which were after attaining the age of fourteen years: Provided, That any periods of honorable service in the Armed Forces of the United States by such citizen parent may be included in computing the physical presence requirements of this paragraph.
The key phrase, imho.
There are no replies to Comment # 27. End Trace Mode for Comment # 27.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest"Both confirm that the original meaning of the phrase ‘natural born Citizen’ includes persons born abroad who are citizens from birth based on the citizenship of a parent”
#24. To: misterwhite, cranky, A K A Stone (#1)
So even if Obama was born in Kenya he meets the requirement. How about that?
TITLE III—NATIONALITY AND NATURALIZATION
#27. To: nolu chan (#24)
subject to the jurisdiction thereof
Replies to Comment # 27.
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