Birthright Citizenship Debate in US Election 2016

RichardGarfinkle

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A couple of interesting blogposts this morning about Republican candidates and immigration policies.

Ezra Klein is focusing on Trump. His thesis that Trump is trying to use collective punishment that largely focuses on legal immigrants is worth examining.
http://www.vox.com/2015/8/18/9171919/donald-trump-immigration-plan

Paul Waldman is being a bit broader.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blog...6-election-by-raising-birthright-citizenship/

But both are discussing the topic of Birthright Citizenship which is guaranteed under section 1 of the 14th Amendment:
Section 1.
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. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Several of the Republican candidates are suggesting that this needs to be changed.

This is one of the scariest ideas currently running around immigration politics.

Currently, immigrant status and the weaker legal protections that go with it exists only in the people who have immigrated but not been naturalized (resident aliens). The children of immigrants are citizens if born in the US.

While it has been argued that this motivates people to come here and have children, I would argue that more than that it motivates immigrants to treat this as their country, that it makes it easier for those born here to identify as Americans even if they are children of immigrants. Creating an inherited resident alien (and therefore subject to deportation on government whim) status will reduce national identification. This, in turn, will increase disaffection and disloyalty.

Cynicism can be further increased if we consider that laws need not be written to treat resident aliens in the same way that citizens are treated. This would allow for labor laws that have less protection for such people. Thus businesses could hire resident aliens for lower wages with fewer benefits, etc.

Far be it from me to not suggest that such policies would benefit the short term interests of the upper class at the expense of the lower and middle classes.

I'm also willing to suggest that such policies would be sold to the lower and middle classes as protection of their status as citizens while actually undermining their position in society.

This kind of thing might work because immigration policies have historically played on racism and fear of the alien.
http://academic.udayton.edu/race/02rights/immigr09.htm
http://www.umass.edu/complit/aclanet/USMigrat.html
 

Michael Wolfe

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This is one of the scariest ideas currently running around immigration politics.

It's scary, but amending the consitution is hard, as we know.

What's scarier is those who don't think amending the constitution would be necessary at all. Richard Posner, for example, thinks Congress could simply amend the Immigration and Nationality Act and leave the constitution alone.

Personally, I hope we keep our practice of Jus Soli intact. Globally speaking, it's simply not a common practice these days. In that regard, it's one of our country's real bright spots, imo.
 

raburrell

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Just adding one article to Richard's:
Jamie Bouie

And it continues. To pay for all of this—including a wall across the southern border of the United States—Trump would seize all remittance payments to Mexico (from both legal and unauthorized immigrants), increase fees on all temporary visas, border crossing cards, and NAFTA worker’s visas, and raise tariffs on goods from Mexico. In addition, Trump would limit visas to high-skilled workers, and limit the number of refugees and asylum seekers who come to American shores. The overriding goal, again, is to keep new immigrants out of the country—regardless of status—and punish the ones that are already here.

I'm pretty disgusted with this country at the moment, so I really have nothing else to say on Trump and his merry band of mean-spirited and dim-witted acolytes.
 

juniper

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I hope we keep our practice of Jus Soli intact. Globally speaking, it's simply not a common practice these days. In that regard, it's one of our country's real bright spots, imo.

From NPR yesterday: http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-...-you-should-know-about-birthright-citizenship

"In 2012, the Law Library of Congress took a comprehensive look at France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain and the U.K. and found that none of those countries automatically give citizenship to children born to undocumented immigrant parents.


The Center for Immigration Studies, which tends to favor more restrictive immigration policies in the U.S., took a worldwide look at the issue in 2010 and found that "only 30 of the world's 194 countries grant automatic citizenship to children born to illegal aliens."​
 

ErezMA

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I tend to have a position on most things political, but I actually don't have a position either way on this one. I can get how taking away birthright citizenship can end the whole conundrum of immigration where a pregnant woman comes to America illegally, gives birth and she's facing deportion with her child still here. At the same time, how do we decide who would become a citizen? If my fiancee gives birth tomorrow, will our child have to wait in line, get a green card, go through all the steps of becoming a citizen?
 

BoF

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Personally, I hope we keep our practice of Jus Soli intact. Globally speaking, it's simply not a common practice these days. In that regard, it's one of our country's real bright spots, imo.
I remember George Washington University Professor Jonathan Turley as Keith Olbermann’s go to guy on constitutional issues. In this article from 2011 Turley traces the time of the controversy to 1866—a time when the ink was barely dry on the 14[SUP]th[/SUP] Amendment. Turley has harsh words for those who would deny children of undocumented workers birthright citizenship.

In 1866, the anchor babies of concern were Chinese. Senator Edgar Cowan (R-PA), who later voted against the amendment, was worried about Gypsies in Pennsylvania and Chinese in California overrunning the country if their children were granted citizenship.

Senator John Conness (R-CA) understood the amendment’s meaning to extend birthright citizenship to the children of Chinese immigrants…


When politicians lie and distort history to this extent, they conceal the true motivation behind their desire to deny birthright citizenship to children of illegal immigrants. If their intentions are honorable, why lie about the original intent of the 14th Amendment?
http://jonathanturley.org/2011/02/26/birthright-citizenship-was-the-original-intent/

Turley would probably say Trump is lying. Isn’t it amazing how the same shit just keeps getting recycled ad nauseam.
 

raburrell

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@BoF: Agreed - if you look at the history of the 1922 Johnson-Reed act, and the 1948 debate over modifying quotas (couldn't let too many Jews in, apparently, despite that whole Holocaust thing), it's just one long repeat of the same ugliness. Anti Asian, Anti Jew, Anti Mexican, whatever. (Things cracked slightly in '53, when there were somewhere around 3 million orphans left by the war in Korea, but even then, it only applied to children under 10 years of age).

Shorter post: Nativism drives me batty.
 

RichardGarfinkle

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Yes - oh, is the idea requiring parents to be citizens for you to be citizens?

If you remove that clause of the 14th Amendment, then the legal definition of citizenship will be up to Congress and/or The States. It will change easily based on political convenience.
 

Expat-hack

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Where does dual citizenship fall into all of this? I understand (perhaps incorrectly) that many of these children will be entitled to the passport their parents carry plus a U.S. Passport. True? False?
 

RichardGarfinkle

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Where does dual citizenship fall into all of this? I understand (perhaps incorrectly) that many of these children will be entitled to the passport their parents carry plus a U.S. Passport. True? False?

Depends on the laws of their parents' nation of origin.
 

BoF

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So, if you are one of the Donald’s competitors, how do you find a card to trump Trump. Here’s how Ben Carson does it.

FLORENCE, AZ - Republican presidential hopeful Dr. Ben Carson focused on border and immigration issues as he continued his Arizona campaign trip on Wednesday, and he was in no mood to be politically correct.


"For a woman to be pregnant and say, 'I'm going to go to the United States and have my baby there so that I can have an anchor' is stupid," said Carson. "We can keep families together. If they came here and did that, we can still keep them together by packaging them up and sending them back."


Carson proposed the idea of using drones for possible air strikes.

"If that requires getting rid of some of their hideouts, I'll get rid of some of their hideouts," Carson said.


"We're not going to use drones here at the Sheriffs office," Babeu said.



"Well here's the bottom line," Carson said. "You guys don't seem to understand this. I suggest we use all the things that are available to us, but we use the military expertise."
http://www.abc15.com/news/region-ce...h-sheriff-babeu-to-discuss-border-immigration
 
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Gregg

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From what I've read, the original intent of the 14th Amendment wasn't to give automatic citizenship to foreigners born here. (At the time there was no such thing as an "illegal alien").
It was intended to give citizenship to former slaves.
This is what Senator Howard, an author of the Amendment, said in 1866:
"Every person born within the limits of the United States, and subject to their jurisdiction, is by virtue of natural law and national law a citizen of the United States. This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons. It settles the great question of citizenship and removes all doubt as to what persons are or are not citizens of the United States. This has long been a great desideratum in the jurisprudence and legislation of this country."
One of the questions is whether a foreigner visiting our country is subject to US jurisdiction or the jurisdiction of their native country.
 

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From what I've read, the original intent of the 14th Amendment wasn't to give automatic citizenship to foreigners born here. (At the time there was no such thing as an "illegal alien").
It was intended to give citizenship to former slaves.
This is what Senator Howard, an author of the Amendment, said in 1866:
"Every person born within the limits of the United States, and subject to their jurisdiction, is by virtue of natural law and national law a citizen of the United States. This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons. It settles the great question of citizenship and removes all doubt as to what persons are or are not citizens of the United States. This has long been a great desideratum in the jurisprudence and legislation of this country."
One of the questions is whether a foreigner visiting our country is subject to US jurisdiction or the jurisdiction of their native country.

If the intent wasn't to give citizenship to people born in the states, then it was really poorly worded...
 

Gregg

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If the intent wasn't to give citizenship to people born in the states, then it was really poorly worded...

Here's the wording:
"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."
I'm not a lawyer - so I ask these questions not from a legal position.
The question is of "jurisdiction". Certainly anyone, citizen or not, can be arrested for breaking the law - speeding, theft, murder - but what about other legal matters: probate, divorce, child custody, etc. Do we have jurisdiction over a tourist from Europe, for example, in these matters?
And what about the clause "and of the State wherein they reside?". Does someone who is visiting our country reside here or in a State? If they don't reside in a State, perhaps they can't be citizens.

I realize there have been several Supreme Court cases which have affirmed that anyone born here is a citizen according to the 14th Amendment.
But I'm just wondering.....................
 

raburrell

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Cyia

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Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door...

... just don't expect them to become citizens or dream of having their kids do so because I can slam that golden door if I want to and ship them all straight back to you.

(Kind of loses something in the modern translation, don't you think?)
 

Diana Hignutt

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Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door...

... just don't expect them to become citizens or dream of having their kids do so because I can slam that golden door if I want to and ship them all straight back to you.

(Kind of loses something in the modern translation, don't you think?)

Maybe, we should just hang a "Closed for Remodeling" sign on the Statue of Liberty?