Birthright Citizenship Comes From Article 2, Section 1
of the Constitution, not the Fourteenth Amendment
In
the current debate over birthright citizenship, the opponents want to amend the
Fourteenth Amendment.
Unfortunately
for them, birthright citizenship is not conferred by the Fourteenth Amendment, it is conferred by Article 2, Section 1, the qualifications
for President.
Article
2, Section 1 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.”
Natural
born citizen, what does that mean? That means that there must be some way of
becoming an American citizen naturally. Naturally means, something occurring at
random in nature without the intercession of humans.
This
is where natural born citizenship comes from, from the qualifications for
President. All the Fourteenth Amendment does is extend
the birthright citizenship of Article 2, Section 1 to blacks who, because of
the Dred Scott decision, were considered property,
not people.
The
only way to be naturally born is to be born in the United States. If
citizenship becomes dependent on the nationality of the parents, if some people
born in the United States are citizens and others born identically in the
United States are not, then that is not natural born citizenship.
That
is why it is called naturalization when foreign born people become American
citizens. That is why the INS stands for Immigration and Naturalization
Service. For the foreign born, becoming an American is the process of
making something natural out of something artificial.
Now,
it is ok, in a sense, if people want to turn the United States into an
apartheid state like the old South Africa or a racist state like Israel where
only certain ethnic groups are accorded citizenship and where everyone else is
a guest worker.
But
at least proponents of this position should be competent and honest enough to
correctly identify the source of birthright citizenship in the United States
Constitution.
The
fourteenth amendment is a straw man. It sounds a lot less drastic to say, “Let’s
change the fourteenth amendment,” which is, after all, just an amendment, than
it does to say, “Let’s change the qualifications for president.”
The
assault on birthright citizenship is a dangerous throwback to tribalism. If nationality is synonymous with ethnicity,
does that mean that all American Jews will lose their citizenship and be
required to live in Israel? Ironically,
the people who are most hot under the collar to deny citizenship to the
children of illegal aliens are biggest boosters of the idea that American Jews
have a “right” to live in Israel while the Palestinians who live there may
not.
These
ideas are contrary to the revolutionary ethos that made the United States the
greatest nation in human history. These
are the ideas led the world into two mass slaughters, World War I and World War
II. On the basis of past history, if the
ethnicity is nationality idea prevails, it will definitely lead to World War
III and probably the end of the human race.
Return to Institute of Election Analysis Home
Page