Can Ted Cruz run for president?
By Z. Byron Wolf, CNN
updated 9:56 AM EDT, Wed August 14, 2013
Washington (CNN) — While the issue of President Barack Obama’s birth has long been settled, and it’s a moot point anyway since he’s in his second term in office, there remain some people who won’t be convinced.
Just ask members of Congress, who even this summer are encountering so-called “birthers” at town hall meetings.
With Ted Cruz, there is no conspiracy. He wasn’t born in the United States. But that hasn’t stopped the junior Texas senator from courting a possible presidential bid.
The dynamic young senator has traveled to Iowa and other early primary states. If his moves toward a candidacy become more serious, they’re sure to spark first a debate about his conservative politics, but also that recurring debate about whether a “natural-born citizen” can be born outside the United States.
https://www.cnn.com/2013/08/13/politics/natural-born-president/index.html
The definition of the Constitutional term Natural-Born Citizen was set forth by the U.S. Supreme Court in its decision in Minor v. Happersett in 1875 as follows: NBC=Born in the Country to Parents who were its Citizens. Cruz is therefore POTUS-ineligible for two reasons. First, he was not born in the Country (Born in Calgary, Alberta Canada). Second, he was not born of Parents (plural) who were U.S. Citizens (father was Cuban). This man needed to come forward personally, as soon as talk of him becoming president began to circulate, to admit his ineligibility to that office. Because he did not, and is instead actively promoting himself as POTUS-eligible, his self-professed fidelity to the U.S. Constitution must now be questioned carefully.
Cruz’s supposed POTUS aspirations have spawned ridiculous definitions of Natural-Born Citizen, including this doozy: Everybody other than someone born in a foreign country to two foreign citizen parents is eligible to run for and hold the office of President of the United States.
Accomplished attorney and popular talk show host Mark Levin, author of the Liberty Amendments, is coming to Bookends in Ridgewood on Sunday at 11:00 to meet fans and sign copies of his book. He needs to explain why he has not taken an intelligible position on the definition of the constitutional term natural-born Citizen (NBC). Is it because he did not want to complicate the presidential aspirations of his good friend Ted Cruz. He of anybody should be prepared to accept the fact that the SCOTUS decision in Minor v. Happersett in 1875 included a definition of NBC that was necessary to the holding (and therefore was not “obiter dicta”) and remains good law for purposes of construing the U.S. Constitution. The term natural-born Citizen does not exist in nature solely to establish a qualification for the U.S. presidency. It actually describes the vast majority of the individuals living in the United States who can claim citizenship status. For that reason, the term natural-born citizen is part of our political and cultural heritage and is not to be trifled with.
Some believe the term natural-born Citizen was invented by John Jay who gave the following advice in his 1787 letter to George Washington during the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia: “Permit me to hint, whether it would be wise and seasonable to provide a strong check to the admission of Foreigners into the administration of our national Government; and to declare expressly that the Commander in Chief of the American Army shall not be given to nor devolve on, any but a natural born Citizen.”
But no, this is not the case. The earliest known uses of the term appear to be by John Adams.
John Adams was appointed American minister to the court of Saint James in 1785. On August 25, 1798 from Grosvenor Square, Westminster, he penned a letter to U.S. Foreign Secretary John Jay (remember him?) in which he used the term natural-born citizen, the relevant passage being as follows:
“Yesterday, I had a long conference with Mr. Pitt for the first time. …
I shall not attempt to give you the conversation in detail, yet it is necessary to give some particulars, from which you may judge how much or how little may result from the whole. …
He then asked me, if we could grant to England, by a treaty, any advantages which would not immediately become the right of France. I answered, we could not. If the advantage was stipulated to England, without a compensation, France would be entitled to it without a compensation; but, if it was stipulated for an equivalent or reciprocal privilege, France must allow us the same equivalent or reciprocal privilege. But, I added, France would not be a very successful rival to Great Britain in the American commerce, upon so free a footing as that of the mutual liberty of natural-born subjects and citizens; upon the footing of the most favored nation, France would stand a good chance in many things. In case of mutual navigation acts between Britain and America, France would have more of our commerce than Britain. In short, Britain would lose and France gain, not only in our commerce, but our affections, in proportion as Britain departed from the most liberal system.”
We now know that the historical record as is now stands is insufficient to bestow on John Jay the honor of inventing the term “natural-born Citizen.” So was this a one-time fluke, or was John Adams in the habit of using the term earlier than August 1785?
On July 24, 1785, John Adams wrote Thomas Jefferson from London in response to a letter from Jefferson on July 7, 1785 including a draft of a treaty:
“Dear Sir,—
I have a letter from the Baron de Thulemeier of the 19th, and a copy of his letter to you of the same date. I hope now, in a few days, to take Mr. Short by the hand in Grosvenor Square, and to put my hand to the treaty. I think no time should be lost. We will join Mr. Dumas with Mr. Short in the exchange, if you please.
(In Cipher.)
The Briton’s alien’s duty is a very burdensome thing, and they may carry it hereafter as far upon tobacco, rice, indigo, and twenty other things, as they now do upon oil. To obviate this, I think of substituting the words “natural born citizens of the United States,” and “natural born subjects of Great Britain,” instead of “the most favored nation.””
It turns out, John Adams used the term “natural-born Citizen” as early as 1783. (See “The Adams Papers: Papers of John Adams,” volume 14, October 1782 – May 1783, copyright 2008 by the Massachusetts Historical Society, published by the Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Editors: Gregg L. Lint, C. James Taylor, Hobson Woodward, Margaret A. Hogan, Mary T. Claffey, Sara B. Sikes, and Judith S. Graham, ISBN 0674026071, 9780674026070, length 582 pages.)
The passage of interest of this volume of John Adams’ writings begins on page 449, and I quote (bracketed passages added by me):
“Draft Articles to Supplement the Preliminary Anglo-American Peace Treaty [ca. 27 April 1783] agreed upon by and between David Hartley Esquire, Minister Plenipotentiary of his Britannic Majesty
“for & in behalf of his Said Majesty on the one Part, and J.A. [John Adams], B.F. [Benjamin Franklin], J.J. [John Jay] and H.L. [Henry Laurens], Ministers Plenipotentiary of the United States of America for treating of Peace with the Minister Plenipotentiary of his Said Majesty, on their behalf, on the other Part,
“in Addition to those Articles agreed upon, on the 30th day of November 1782 by and between Richard Oswald Esq. the Commissioner of his Britannic Majesty for treating of peace with the Commissioners of the United States of America, in behalf of his said Majesty, on the one Part, and the said J.A., B.F., J.J. and H.L., four of the Commissioners of the Said States for treating of Peace, with the Commissioner of his Said Majesty, on their Behalf, on the other Part.
“1. The Subjects of the Crown of Great Britain Shall enjoy in all and every of the United States, all of the Rights Liberties Priviledges and Immunities and be Subject to the Duties and Allegience of natural born Citizens of the Said States – and on the other Hand, all Citizens of the Said United States shall enjoy in all and every of the Dominions of the Crown of Great Britain, all the Rights, Liberties Privileges, and Immunities and be subject to the Duties and Allegience of natural born Subjects of that Crown, excepting Such Individuals of either Nation as the legislature of the other shall judge fit to except.”
Judging solely from the grave language used by John Jay in his letter to George Washington 1787 with respect to excluding foreign influence from the highest office in our government, it is plain to see that the Constitutional term “natural-born Citizen” cannot be accorded a definition loose enough to include Ted Cruz. One thing I can say, though–at least his mother was old enough, according to the applicable U.S. statutory provisions at the time, to pass U.S. citizenship on to Ted, despite his foreign birth and foreign father.
A correction (inside the asterisks) of post #5:
John Adams was appointed American minister to the court of Saint James in 1785. On August 25, **1785** from Grosvenor Square, Westminster, he penned a letter to U.S. Foreign Secretary John Jay (remember him?) in which he used the term natural-born citizen, the relevant passage being as follows: