U.S. Citizenship
One of the ironic things about our Constitution is that the original Constitution and Bill of Rights (first 10 Amendments) never defined what made someone a citizen. In reality, everyone that was a citizen of a state in the Union was a citizen of the Union. This comes about from Article IV Section 2 of the Constitution:
The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States.
The words citizen or citizens were used nine other times in the Constitution in defining who could be President, a member of Congress, and the powers of the Judicial Branch, but never to define who could be a citizen of the United States. The designation citizen is not used at all in the Bill of Rights with the intention that these rights were afforded to everyone within the borders of the United States, not just citizens and whether here legally or illegally.
It was not until the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868 that we had a national definition of citizenship:
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.
The key phrase here is "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof". Under today's definition of jurisdiction, this could be read as "subject to the laws thereof". However this was not the intent. The actual intent of this phrase can be found in Section 1992 of the U.S. Revised Statutes which uses the phrase "and not subject to any foreign power".
Not being "subject to any foreign power" means they have allegiance only to the United States. Obviously this would rule out children born to the parents of diplomats from foreign countries that are here working in the interest of another country. But, when children are born there national loyalty is that of their parents, therefore children born in the U.S. to foreign parents visiting the U.S. are not U.S. citizens either because the national loyalty of the baby's parents is not to the United States. There is no citizenship birthright in the United States, unless the parents have complete allegiance to the United States.
It was surprising to me that something as important as citizenship of a country was more or less overlooked in the writing of the U.S. Constitution. Making this even more surprising is that in the early days of the United States non-citizens had limitations about owning property or engaging in business transactions. It just seems like citizenship would have gotten more attention in the early days of the country.
New citizenship was originally limited for "immigrants who were free White persons of good character" as per the Naturalization Act of 1790.
It wasn't until the Naturalization Act of 1870 that "aliens of African nativity and to persons of African descent" were (rightly) given citizenship.
There is a book authored by Mark Stein, American Panic: A History of Who Scares Us and Why, that details the various injustices imposed on numerous minorities by American citizens and the American government throughout our history. I would highly recommend this book to everyone.
Yes, I hope because the people protected by this Naturalization Act were not here by choice. I hope it was recognized this left them without choices and therefore this adjustment was made.
Today, many of those here do have a home country to which they have allegiance to.
I believe that was the reasoning behind it.
Another glaring issue with the Constitution is its anemic provision for Presidential qualifications.
When the Constitution was written, the possibility of any American some day becoming President was a dream. Now, it's a nightmare.
I think an amendment is in order.
I can see how some would think that. Trump wasn't my favorite, but the alternative would be to have Hillary elected so she could pardon herself.
Being President is the only right we still enjoy as an American citizen. All others these days are being shared and given to whomever, whenever indiscriminately.
And some are Ok with this?
So, if children born to people visiting here aren't citizens, which obviously makes sense, I feel that defines the current issues. Children born to people living here, not visiting for sure, should not naturally be given citizenship. There is no allegiance to the US., just the intent to benefit from being here.
I do wonder if citizenship was overlooked in the Bill of Rights or if they felt it was addressed somewhere else, or, presumed it was clear and further definition was unnecessary? Those poor gentlemen had no clue how we could turn their honest, heartfelt work into such a mess. That we would continue to 'interpret' twist, turn and adjust the words, fight over them and use them against ourselves.
What a shame. I can interpret this to mean we need a wall, we need to send illegals home and have no cause to give illegals anything. But someone else, maybe a Democrat, would find a way to interpret this that everyone is welcome and should have free healthcare.
Again, what a shame. Our founders did a hell of a job and we walk all over it. Regardless of majority rules, the abbreviated definition of democracy.
I'm OK with most of the Bill of Rights being applied to everyone in the U.S. Freedom of speech and assurances that you can't be unlawfully detained are good for everyone. But I think the right to bears arms should be extremely limited to non-citizens. There are people from other countries that are here working and have been for years that I understand may have a desire to have a handgun for protection, just as I do, and that would be OK. But to allow handguns to anyone in the country that doesn't have an arrest record? Not a good idea.
There are a lot of 'not a good idea' subjects out there. Seems Democrats are short sighted. The irrational, popularity decisions have short term, if any, positive affects on our country. Seems they get caught up in the moment and forget what their real job is. Represent constituents (voters, elector). Guess that is why they want anyone and everyone to vote.
Think about it. If there is someone new in the country they probably don't speak good english. They fall for the party that claim they will give you anything you want. For the life of me I can not understand why groups like Hispanics, Jews, and Catholics would ever consider voting for the Democratic Party. The belief systems are so at odds with each other.
For the Hispanics, many of them want to work in the US to send money back to the family to help them survive. If when we go down for vacation, people from the US would get away from the tourists areas they would see that many people in Mexico just want to survive. None of the policies of the Democratic party produce jobs and the encouragement of illegal immigration only works to hold wages down, hurting all of us, not just the immigrants wanting to help their families.
For the Jewish community, look no further than how the Democratic Party treats Israel. Obama and the Democratic Party are antisemits. Obama, with the approval of the Democratic Party (since they defended the action) spent US taxpayer money and labor to try to defeat Netanyahu in the last election. Why would anyone support a political organization that is against the very basis of your existence.
Catholics. John F. Kennedy was the last great Democratic president we had, and he would not be welcome in his own party today. JFK was the President that invented Reaganomics, not Reagan. When tax rates for the wealthiest in the country were at 90+%, Kennedy recognized that these were the people that were generating jobs in the country. The more money these wealthy get to reinvest the better it is for the rest of us. If you disagree my feelings about Kennedy, look at abortion. If your are voting based on the Catholic religion, how can you support the stance of the Democratic Party on abortion. It's just freaking unbelievable!
Oops, sorry about the late night rant. What you said just hit a nerve, well, maybe three nerves and I am not getting started on African-Americans tonight. The leadership of the Democratic Party, and I want to make it clear that I mean the leadership and not the average Democrat on the streets, has become deranged enough to the point they will not support any idea out of the Trump administration or the Republican Party in general. They are currently working against OUR country to further their own interest, and those interest are not in the average American's favor.
Hope I struck a nerve and didn't get on your nerves.
I have a tendancy to get on peoples's nerves when I don't let a subject go. Personality flaw? Lol
As I have no solutions I can only support our party to the fullest. If Republicans can prevail and when Trump gets his second term I am hoping the Democratic Party, such as it is today, is basically a thing of the past.
In the meantime awareness, practicality, success, consistency, education (it would help if they taught the Constitution in schools), and Republican turn out to vote will have to carry us through.
Your late night rant should be taught in schools as well. We've wiped out, ignored, twisted and changed history to suit ourselves. Taints decision making of our young.
Sorry for the early morning rant. 😊
You just struck a nerve. I just can't understand why people don't examine their own values when deciding how to vote. The press doesn't help. They should go back to reporting the news and stop telling people what they should think about the news, or at least present both sides of an argument versus just brainwashing people into liberal attitudes.
Oh boy. I will study this. Seems like our current government needs to fully understand this as well. Or at least one side of our current leaders.
Thanks so much for checking out if the Constitution referenced 'citizen' and 'citizenship'!
Off to work but will read this again tonight.