I’ve been having an argument with a very good friend of mine for a few weeks now on whether or not our President is indeed a United States citizen and eligible to be President of the United States. He like many others is convinced that our President is not eligible to be a citizen (and therefore not eligible to be President) and I, while it would tickle me to no end if it turned out that we elected a person who is Constitutionally ineligible to be president, am thus far unconvinced that he isn’t a citizen. I am more than willing to listen to both sides and help either in their quest for factual evidence.
Wikipedia states this of Barack Hussein Obama II:
” Barack Obama, … was born on August 4, 1961 in Honolulu, in the state of Hawaii[1] to Barack Hussein Obama, Sr. (1936–1982) (born in Kanyadhiang, Rachuonyo District, Nyanza Province,[2] Kenya Colony, British Empire) and Stanley Ann Dunham, known informally as Ann (1942–1995) (born in Wichita, Kansas) “
and cites these for credibility:
- ^ “Statement by Dr. Chiyome Fukino” (PDF). hawaii.gov. Retrieved 2008-12-05. Joe Miller, “Does Obama have Kenyan Citizenship?”, Fact Check, 2008-08-29, quoted in part on FightTheSmears
- ^ “Partial Ancestor Table: President Barack Hussein Obama, Jr.“. New England Historic Genealogical Society. Retrieved 2009-07-21.
- ^ http://www.kake.com/home/misc/38157259.html
For the sake of this article this will establish these facts:
1 . President Obama was born on August 4th 1961
2. President Obama was born to 1 parent of alien citizenship and 1 parent of United States citizenship
What still up in the air is whether or not he was (A) Born in the United States and (B) a United States “natural born” citizen as defined by U.S. law. My friend has given me this web link to establish his side of the argument:
http://silverstockreport.com/2009/obama-citizen.html
To summarize the article for you it states these points:
1. The burden of proof of citizenship is on the person requesting citizenship.
2. Citizenship status given by statue may not be good enough to establish Constitutional “natural born” citizenship status.
3. Though the Constitution clearly does not define “natural born” citizenship it does clearly state there is a difference between “natural born” U.S. citizens and naturalized U.S. citizens. Amendment 14 Section 1
4. Only a “natural born” citizen of age 35 or older and a U.S. resident of 14 years may be President. Article 2 Section 1; United States Constitution
5. The founders of the U.S. clearly felt that detailed governing information would be for Congress to decide by passing laws though they meant to protect specific ideas.
6. President Obama was born overseas.
7. Ann Dunham was too young to confer citizenship to a child born of her if that child was born abroad.
To save time I agree with points 1 through 5. I may choose to address them at a later time.
Based on my research I have come up with the following:
1. There is currently no clear evidence to establish where President Obama was born.
2. Stanley Ann Dunham was a citizen of United States at the time of President Obama’s birth.
3. Title 8, Section 1401 of the U.S. Code (aka the Immigration and Naturalization Act, Title 3, Section 301) states that:
a. a person born in the united states is a citizen
g. a person born outside of the U.S. to at least 1 citizen parent satisfying these requirements:
I. the citizen conferring citizenship must have been in the U.S. for at least 5 years
II. 2 of the 5 years must be after the age of 14
4. The lowest possible age for a parent to confer citizenship is 16 years of age.
5. Stanley Ann Dunham was at least 17 years old when President Obama was born.
Taking all this into account the only conclusion I can make is that Barack Hussein Obama II was a citizen of the United States of America when he was born. I’m going to follow this article with some further research to see if there are any other events that would affect the Presidents citizenship during the years before he was President because during the course of writing this article I have come across some interesting assertions like his adoption by his step father and association with William Charles (Bill) Ayers.
3. Title 8, Section 1401 of the U.S. Code (aka the Immigration and Naturalization Act, Title 3, Section 301) states that:
a. a person born in the united states is a citizen
g. a person born outside of the U.S. to at least 1 citizen parent satisfying these requirements:
I. the citizen conferring citizenship must have been in the U.S. for at least 5 years
II. 2 of the 5 years must be after the age of 14
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No, Page 236, Paragraph (7) says:
“a person born outside the geographical limits of the United States and its outlying possessions of parents one of whom is an alien, and the other a citizen of the United States who, prior to the birth of such person, was phuysically present in the United States or its outlying possessions for a period or periods totaling not less than ten years, at least five of which were after attaining the age of fourteen years. . .”
Fourteen plus five is 19 – Stanley was only 17.
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You still haven’t addressed the ‘natural born citizen’ issue?
First, thank you for reading prsmith.
You’re going to have to help me understand your comment. You say that Page 236, Paragraph 7 says: “…” but U.S. law isn’t written like that. U.S. law is written in Title’s, Chapters, Sub-Chapters, Section, etc… like I stated above. The law above, as quoted by you, clearly states in section 1401,g,II that 2 of the 5 years must be after the age of 14 making 16 the lowest age not 19.
I’m using Cornell Law school as my reference to this @ http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode08/usc_sec_08_00001401—-000-.html Now if you would prefer that the reference come from the U.S. Government you can follow the instruction below to see from there.
Visit: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/uscode/
In the main search box on the front page type “8USC1401″ and press enter.
Select “TEXT” from the corresponding link.
Now I have stumbled upon an amendment made to the law that I will be researching and posting about soon. Public law 99-653 amended 8|1401|G|II to the current 2 of 5 in 1986. Before that the law read 5 of 10. I will doing research to find out if 99-653 is applicable to persons born before 1986 or not.
Edit:
A link to 99-653: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d099:hr4444:
Also I forgot to address your second comment. The law above reads in its title “Nationality at Birth and Collective Naturalization”. I believe it is the intent of Congress that this law determines “natural born” status.
Thanks for the clarification and for doing the legwork. It is dismaying to see the negative direction our laws are taking relative to citizenship. Why don’t they just do away with the Constitution and national borders and declare us all “citizens of the world” and let it go at that?
Again, none of this addresses the ‘natural born citizen’ clause. Assuming Obama is a citizen, there are still hurdles to overcome in my mind based on founding fathers’ notes, letters, etc., the Law of Nations which clearly directed their thoughts as proved by the wording in Article I, Section 8, Paragraph 10 and the purpose for adding a, to us, undefined three word clause.