Natural born citizens "are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens." Vattell, "The Law of Nations", 1753.

Vattell was talking about that concept in general terms. Even though there is no evidence that Vattell's concept of natural born influenced the founders, it is moot. Why you ask? English common law (which Vattell talks about in that book).

Is this what you do, mine quotes to support your argument?

I posted this as rebuttal to you on another article about letting naturalized citizen become president. I am going to post it here has well.

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Your statements are incorrect.

You fail to understand the concept and history of common law in the United States. During the founding of the country, the law was based on the common law of England. The United States and its States (except Louisiana) inherited English common law. This is why courts sometimes talk about cases that predate the founding. Habeas corpus comes from English common law. The same is true for natural born citizen, which English law defined as a citizen at birth.

Of course, you know this, because you have brought up United States v. Wong Kim Ark. The meaning of natural born is talked about in that decision.

And how.

Just yesterday my 67-year-old husband and I (age 62) received the following news from his Religious-Right cousin. We literally fainted from the screaming terror this engendered in our hearts:

(If this doesn't make your blood boil...... Nothing will......Watch out Baby Boomers!!!) Page 425 of Health Care Bill - Listen to this interview Fred Thompson's Radio Show interviewing Betsy McCaughey (pronounced Mc Coy). Or look it up on http://www.fredthompsonshow.com/, under interviews. On page 425 it says in black and white that EVERYONE on Social Security, (will include all Senior Citizens and SSI people) will go to MANDATORY counseling every 5 years to learn and to choose from ways to end your suffering (and your life). Health care will be denied based on age. 500 Billion will be cut from Seniors healthcare. The only way for that to happen is to drastically cut health care, the oldest and the sickest will be cut first. Paying for your own care will not be an option. Now, CALL YOUR PEOPLE IN WASHINGTON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Tell them to read page 425 if they don't read anything else. Surely some of them have parents. P.H. "ON PAGE 425 OF OBAMA’S HEALTH CARE BILL, the Federal Government will require EVERYONE who is on Social Security to undergo a counseling session every 5 years with the objective being that they will explain to them just how to end their own life earlier.

Yes...They are going to push SUICIDE to cut medicare spending!

They're done with the birther thing. Now it's all about Obama's evil plans for mass euthanasia.

"Will the Birthers Doom the GOP?"; The Daily Beast; Batchelor, John; July 29, 2009.

Final paragraph:

The party has wasted away to the point where opportunistic eruptions like the birthers and much worse are natural sorrows. Republican incoherence didn’t begin with Mombasa. There is logic to the closing down of a great political party that has abandoned its own greatness to cheer on churls. Perhaps what appears terminal cowardice is only venality; perhaps what sounds like a death rattle is only the wrinkled ranting of crones in the Senate; perhaps the polls showing the Republican brand not as well regarded as Drano are just outliers. Perhaps, too, like miscreant HAL 9000, the GOP is warming up to sing, “Daisy, Daisy.”

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-07-28/paranoids-ate-my-party/?cid=hp:featureline

you're right about the Supremes. and also, it's not clear to legal scholars as to just who might be qualified to raise such a case anyway. Pryor seems to think the Congress has the power and responsibilty to get this resolved; maybe after all the hullabaloo some Congress in the near future will do so.

Good talking to ya. Now, let's get back to laughing at those crazy zany birthers!

Thanks for the info and link. Yes, I do have the original paper, but the version I have cannot be posted on the web. Thus, this link should be useful for others.

I read somewhere that the Supreme Court may be reluctant to make a ruling on this issue (if it is challenged for a presidential matter, which is probably the only circumstance that it would be challenged), given the fact that by the time the judges make a ruling, the President may already be in office, which would create a lot of significant (and complex) legal problems if it turns out that the President cannot held office. Like you indicated, this should perhaps be handled by one of the other two branches of the federal government.

Thanks for referening Ms. Pryor's essay. Here's a link to the actual essay in full, for those interested in her views of a very complex issue.

http://yalelawjournal.org/images/pdfs/pryor_note.pdf

It's interesting to note that a year ago, when the NY Times wrote an article regarding McCain't elibility for the job, they mentioned Jill Pryor's earlier commentary:

In a paper written 20 years ago for the Yale Law Journal on the natural-born enigma, Jill Pryor, now a lawyer in Atlanta, said that any legal challenge to a presidential candidate born outside national boundaries would be “unpredictable and unsatisfactory.”

“If I were on the Supreme Court, I would decide for John McCain,” Ms. Pryor said in a recent interview. “But it is certainly not a frivolous issue.”

In her article in 1988, Pryor actually sets out the very same THREE categories at issue that I earlier commented on:

"Despite its. apparent simplicity, the natural-born citizen clause of the Constitution" has never been,completely understood. It is well settled that "native-born" citizens, those born in the United States, qualify as natural born." It is also clear that persons born abroad of alien parents, who later become citizens by naturalization," do not." But whether a person born abroad of American parents, or of one American and one alien parent," qualifies/as natural born has never been resolved."

Once again--the issue is not one which has ever been settled, since 1787, and remains in need either of a clear Congressional diktat, or a Supreme Court decision, or if necessary, a constitutional amendment, making clear once and for all that citizenship bestowed on an individual at birth, regardless of location, qualifies as being "natural born."