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OCTOBER 31, 2018
Ending Birthright Citizenship
By
Daniel John Sobieski
History, as the saying goes, is a lie agreed upon, and there has perhaps been no bigger lie detrimental to the future national security and economic well-being of the United States that the 14th Amendment, clearly written to protect the rights of African-American slaves liberated by the first Republican President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, somehow confers citizenship on the offspring of anybody whose pregnant and can sneak past the U.S. Border Patrol.
U.S. citizenship is rendered meaningless if it is defined as an accident of geography and it is the clear that this was not the intention authors of those who wrote the 14th Amendment and shepherded it into the Constitution. President Trump has rightly targeted birthright citizenship as
an historical error that needs to be corrected:
President Trump said in a newly released interview he plans to sign an executive order ending so-called "birthright citizenship" for babies of non-citizens born on U.S. soil -- a move that would mark a major overhaul of immigration policy and trigger an almost-certain legal battle…
Michael Anton, a former national security adviser for Trump, pointed out in July that "there’s a clause in the middle of the amendment that people ignore or they misinterpret – subject to the jurisdiction thereof.”
"What they are saying is, if you are born on U.S. soil subject to the jurisdiction of the United States – meaning you’re the child of citizens or the child of legal immigrants, then you are entitled to citizenship,” Anton told Fox News’ Tucker Carlson in July. “If you are here illegally, if you owe allegiance to a foreign nation, if you’re the citizen of a foreign country, that clause does not apply to you.”
Anton is stunningly correct and clearly echoes the sentiments and legislative intent of the authors of the 14th Amendment. The only question is whether this historical error is better corrected though a clarifying amendment, legislation, or through a Trump executive order. GOP Rep. Steve King, R-IA, has proposed legislation:
In January of this year, Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) proposed the Birthright Citizenship Act of 2015 (
HR 140) that seeks to amend current law by making requirements for citizenship more narrow, and, in King’s opinion, more constitutional…
“A Century ago it didn’t matter very much that a practice began that has now grown into a birthright citizenship, an anchor baby agenda,” King said. “When they started granting automatic citizenship on all babies born in the United States they missed the clause in the 14th Amendment that says, ‘And subject to the jurisdiction thereof.’ So once the practice began, it grew out of proportion and today between 340,000 and 750,000 babies are born in America each year that get automatic citizenship even though both parents are illegal immigrants. That has got to stop.”…
King’s bill seeks to amend section 301 of the Immigration and Nationality Act to clarify those classes of individuals born in the United States who are nationals and citizens of the United States at birth. The bill states that a person born in the United States is a citizen if one parent is “(1) a citizen or national of the United States, (2) an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence in the United States whose residence is in the United States; or (3) an alien performing active service in the armed forces.”
But some would argue that no clarifying legislation is necessary and that as a result of President Trump’s appointment of originalist interpreters of the Constitution to the Supreme Court, the original intent of the 14th Amendment can be restored.
The Supreme Court has never said birthright citizenship is constitutional and legal scholars have noted that supporters of birthright citizenship, a gross misinterpretation of the 14th Amendment,
ignore the intentions of those who wrote it.
Peter H. Schuck, Yale University’s Simeon E. Baldwin Professor of Law Emeritus and self-described “militant moderate,” reiterated his opinion Monday that birthright citizenship is not required by the U.S. Constitution. Though opposed to many of the president’s positions, he was surprised the administration has not made opposition to citizenship for the children of illegal aliens more central to its immigration policy…
On at least one key immigration stance, however, Schuck appears to be in agreement with President Trump. In the 1990s, along with Yale Political Scientist Rogers Smith, he determined, in a book called
Citizenship Without Consent, that the policy of granting citizenship to everyone born on American soil, including so-called “anchor-babies” -- those born to illegal aliens -- was not mandated by the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as is popularly trumpeted by open-borders supporters. Trump came to the same conclusion on the campaign trail, once stating,
“We’re the only ones dumb enough, stupid enough to have it.”