![]() From historical material and case law, it appears that the common understanding of the term “natural born” in England and in the American colonies in the 1700s included both the strict common law meaning as born in the territory (jus soli), as well as the statutory laws adopted in England since at least 1350, which included children born abroad to British fathers (jus sanguinis, the law of descent). ![]() born citizens has been settled law for more than a century, there have been legitimate legal issues raised concerning those born outside of the country to U.S. citizens born within the United States to be President.Īlthough the eligibility of U.S. ![]() There is no provision in the Constitution and no controlling American case law to support a contention that the citizenship of one’s parents governs the eligibility of U.S. In addition to historical and textual analysis, numerous holdings and references in federal (and state) cases for more than a century have clearly indicated that those born in the United States and subject to its jurisdiction (i.e., not born to foreign diplomats or occupying military forces), even to alien parents, are citizens “at birth” or “by birth,” and are therefore “natural born”-as opposed to “naturalized”-U.S. In textual constitutional analysis, it is understood that terms used but not defined in the document must, as explained by the Supreme Court, “be read in light of British common law” since the Constitution is “framed in the language of the English common law.” Under the common law principle of jus soli (law of the soil), persons born on English soil, even of two alien parents, were “natural born” subjects and, as noted by the Supreme Court, this “same rule” was applicable in the American colonies and “in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution. At the time of independence, and at the time of the framing of the Constitution, however, the term “natural born” with respect to citizenship was in use for many years in the American colonies, and then in the states, from British common law and legal usage. ![]() The term “natural born” citizen is not defined in the Constitution, and there is no discussion of the term evident in the notes of the Federal Convention of 1787. ![]() The Constitution sets out three eligibility requirements to be President: one must be 35 years of age, a resident “within the United States” for 14 years, and a “natural born Citizen.” There is no Supreme Court case which has ruled specifically on a challenge to one’s eligibility to be President (although several cases have addressed the term “natural born” citizen), and this clause has been the subject of several legal and historical treatises over the years, as well as more recent litigation. ![]()
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