Birther

Vol. 1                                                                                      Issue 13

Permit me to hint, whether it would be wise and seasonable to provide a strong check to the admission of Foreigners into the administration of our national Government; and to declare expressly that the Commander in Chief of the American army shall not be given to nor devolve on, any but a natural born Citizen.

John Jay letter to George Washington  July 25, 1787:

Next to Millard Fillmore, Chester Alan Arthur is perhaps the most obscure individual to hold the office of President of the United States. A widower, the Gentleman Boss was known for his fashionable dress reportedly changing pants several times a day.  Lowering tariffs, reforming civil service, banning polygamy, limiting Chinese immigration and converting the Navy to steel warships were the hallmarks of his presidency.  Publisher Alexander K. McClure wrote, "No man ever entered the Presidency so profoundly and widely distrusted, and no one ever retired... more generally respected."  Even Mark Twain known to be quite cynical toward elected officials, conceded, "It would be hard indeed to better President Arthur's administration."

Taking an odd path to the Presidency, Arthur was a candidate in only one campaign.  Republicans were divided over the nomination for their Presidential candidate in1880. New York party boss, Senator Roscoe Conkling reluctantly supported James Garfield of Ohio for the nomination in 1880 only after failing to secure the nomination of Ulysses Grant for a third term.  Many were surprised when James Garfield asked Chester Arthur to join his ticket as Vice President. Arthur, a stalwart New York Republican, had never held elective office.  While he had served as Collector of Customs for the port of New York, he was generally considered a protégé of Senator Conkling who owed his public appointments to the influence of the New York party boss.  Even Arthur seemed surprised telling Conkling: "This is a higher honor than I have ever dreamt of attaining. I shall accept!"

James Garfield was elected President in 1880 owing his slim margin to the hard work of his running mate in the state of New York.   Nevertheless when Arthur sought to assert his influence over the appointments of officials favored by Senator Conkling, he lost favor with Garfield, the animosity being so severe that the new President would not even invite Arthur to the White House. 

Historic irony intervened.  Lunatic Charles Guiteau, an avid supporter of Garfield/Arthur ticket, angered over his failure to receive an appointment to a diplomatic post in Europe, shot James Garfield in a Washington railway station on July 2, 1881. Upon his arrest Guiteau shouted:  "'I am a Stalwart of the Stalwarts! I did it and I want to be arrested! Arthur is President now!'" Garfield never recovered from his wounds and died  September 19, 1881.  Chester Alan Arthur became the 21^st President of the United States.

Chester Alan Arthur was the son of a William Arthur and Malvina Stone.  His mother was a native to Vermont whose grandfather had fought with the Continental Army during the Revolution.  His father, a Scotsman, was a Baptist minister who immigrated from Ireland, first to Canada then after his marriage, to the state of Vermont. Reverend William Arthur was naturalized as an American citizen in August 1843, a fact not known until after President Arthur’s death.   Chester Alan Arthur was born in Franklin County Vermont on October 5, 1829.

Attorney Arthur Hinman was a staunch Democrat and supporter of Winfield Scott Hancock for President in 1880.  He was convinced that Chester Arthur was not born in Vermont, but in Canada.  He waged a campaign and authored a booklet entitled, How a British Subject Became President.  He was the original “birther”.  Fortunately, modern historians have discounted his suspicions and believe that Arthur was in fact born in Vermont and was a citizen of the United States.  The question still remains: “Was Chester Arthur a “natural born” citizen?”

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 (Article 2 Section 1 U.S. Constitution)

No Person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty Years, and been nine Years a Citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen. (U.S. Constitution, Article I, section 3, clause 3)

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… (14^th Amendment U.S. Constitution)

At common law there are two recognized ways to be considered a citizen of a country. The first is to be born to parents who are citizens of the country.  The Latin term “jus sanguinis” denotes the right of citizenship derived by the blood of one’s parents.   Another way to acquire citizenship is by birth within the boundaries of a country.  The Latin term “jus solis” denotes citizenship derived from the place of one’s birth. 

Understanding this principle of common law, the Framers of the Constitution coined a different term when setting forth the requirements of the President of the United States.  While to be eligible to serve as a Senator or Congressman, a person need only be a citizen, to be eligible to serve as President, a person must be a “natural born citizen”.  It is commonly believed that the Framers of the Constitution intended for the person occupying the Presidency and serving as Commander in Chief to be free of all foreign influence. It was essential that the sole and absolute allegiance, loyalty, and attachment of a person to whom so much power and authority was granted be to the United States of America alone and not some other country.

Emmerich de Vattel in his, The Law of Nations (1758)*, explains that a   “natural born Citizen” is a child born in the country of two citizen parents who have already entered into and become members of the society.   Thus to be “natural born” a person must derive his citizenship from jus sanguinis and jus solis.  Using this definition, to be eligible for the presidency, an individual must be born within the jurisdiction of the United States to parents who at the time of his birth are both citizens of the United States.

At the time of the birth of Chester Alan Arthur, his father was a citizen of Great Britain and President Arthur derived his citizenship in Great Britain jus sanguinis.  Because Chester Alan Arthur was born within the jurisdiction of the United States, he derived his citizenship in the United States jus solis.  Therefore he was a dual citizen of the United States and Great Britain at birth.  While he may have lost this status by the naturalization of his father in 1843, this ex post facto event does not change his status as a dual citizen at birth.

In September 1787 the Constitution was adopted by the Constitutional Convention.  At that time does anyone think the Founders would have looked with good favor upon the election to the Presidency of a person who was a dual citizen of the United States and Great Britain?  Was it this fear of foreign influence invading the Office of Commander in Chief that prompted future Supreme Court Chief Justice, John Jay to coin the term natural born citizen in his letter to George Washington in July 1787? ** Or would the admonition of our Lord have reminded them where true loyalty lies. “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other” (Mt. 6:24)

Why should historians be surprised that Chester Alan Arthur kept the fact of his father’s naturalization a secret?   So too, why should anyone be surprised that no court wants to opine as to the presidential eligibility of Barak Hussein Obama? Taken in the proper historical context, an honest analysis of the Constitution would be self evident.***

Atticus

Notes:

http://puzo1.blogspot.com/2009/08/why-natural-born-citizen-clause-is.html

http://puzo1.blogspot.com/2010/03/obama-maybe-citizen-of-united-states.html

* Section 212 The citizens are the members of the civil society; bound to this society by certain duties, and subject to its authority, they equally participate in its advantages.  The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens.  As the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of its citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights.  The society is supposed to desire this, in consequence of what it owes to its own preservation; and is presumed, as matter of course, that each citizen, on entering into society, reserves to his children the right of becoming members of it. The country of the fathers is therefore that of the children; and these become true citizens merely by their tacit consent.  We shall soon see whether, on their coming to the years of discretion, they may renounce their right, and what they owe the society in which they were born.  I say, that, in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is citizen, for, if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country. http://www.lonang.com/exlibris/vattel/vatt-119.htm

  **  Benjamin Franklin’s (a signer of our Constitution) letter to Charles W.F. Dumas, December 1775
“I am much obliged by the kind present you have made us of your edition of Vattel. It came to us in good season, when the circumstances of a rising state make it necessary frequently to consult the Law of Nations. Accordingly, that copy which I kept (after depositing one in our own public library here, and send the other to the College of Massachusetts Bay, as you directed) has been continually in the hands of the members of our congress, now sitting, who are much pleased with your notes and preface, and have entertained a high and just esteem for their author”?

***  This link provides a contrary view and is well documented by opinions provided after the ratification of the Consitution.  The accepted definition for "natural born citizen" may have changed over the last 200 years.  Political necessity and public acceptance often is reflected in court opinions. Still this does not change the historical context of the phrase  Atticus

If you’ve read the quotations preceding, and taken the links to the larger sources, you will know that throughout our nation’s history there has been a widespread belief that (except for Indians, Ambassadors and invading armies) that everyone born in the United States is a natural born citizen. In all of my extensive study in preparation for this page, I found the most important items from a legal perspective are the New York decision in Lynch v. Clarke which is cited over and over again by later courts including the US Supreme Court, and the United States Supreme Court decision in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, which again is cited over and over by later courts. These two cases make up the legal precedent by which any court would conclude that Barack Obama is eligible to be President of the United States under Article 2 of the Constitution.

I will not mislead you by saying that there are no quotations (such as de Vattel above) that argue that citizen parents are required before someone is a  citizen (de Vattel) or a “natural born citizen”. Nevertheless, these are few and far between and they are never in legislation and they are never in court decisions (except in dissenting opinions — and in Dred Scott, but that’s another story).

What I hope the reader learns from this exercise is that anyone who claims that it is self-evident, and widely known and generally accepted, that a natural born citizen must have citizen parents, is either ignorant of the body of evidence to the contrary, or deliberately perpetrating fraud.        http://www.obamaconspiracy.org/2009/01/the-great-mother-of-all-natural-born-citizen-quotation-pages/