Trump Plans to Challenge the Constitutional Definition of Birthright Citizenship

[Machiavellian]

coolbeans said:

Machiavellian said:

I thought this topic was interesting.  So President Trump has been making the news as we head into the mid-terms by stating he has the executive power to remove Birthright Citizenship using his pen.  Birthright Citizenship is part of the 14th Amendment to the constitution.  For people who are not part of the US, in order to make a change to the Constitution, you have to have 2/3rds of the house and Senate approval of the proposal and then it has to be sent to the states for a vote.  75 present of the states would need to vote yes for the amendment to be ratified.  The other way for a constitution change is to have a constitutional convention and 2/3rds of the states has to be present.  From there 3/4ths of the states would have to agree for any amendments.

My question, what are people thoughts on this current move by President Trump.

Well...the utilization of executive order has caused me to ask they same thing for virtually each president since the 2000's: how are EO's so liberally used?  Then again, considering that--like virtually all current immigration arguments--other branches of gov't have been kicking the can down the road since the 90's I understand the political effectiveness of kickstarting this topic.  

I'm also not really buying this false premise as though a new amendment has to be ratified to end Birthright Citizenship, especially when the language of key figures whom originally ratified it (EDIT: the 14th) have clarified on it:

"This will not, of course, include persons born in the US who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the gov't of US, but will include every other class of persons." (Sen. Jacob Howard)

From the context surrounding this Amendment (Dred Scott decision in particular) to "...and subject to the jurisdiction thereof..." part, it seems insane to think such a decision would also allow the newborns of pregnant illegal aliens playing Red Rover with a host country's Border Patrol to immediately be granted citizenship.  US reached this point from a few special cases touching on the subject and disingenuous stretches of its intentions, NOT on some highly-upheld principles that Beloved Leader is looking to sully with his fascism and such.

The argument in question saying is that one clause  "and subject to the jurisdiction thereof".  Not sure why this seems to be the one clause that people use because if that is the case how is it that the US government can prosecute illegal immigrants in the US.  As the other side has argued, you cannot use the intent of the person who wrote the amendment, only the words and their meaning.  If we go down that route then the 2nd amendment goes into play as well.  At the end of the day, it has already been argued who is and isn't subject to the jurisdiction of the US and that are diplomats and Indians on reservations.  You cannot prosecute them on US soil but instead send them back to their country or reservation.

If people actually want the words of the 14th to be more clear then should it not go through the same process we have used for years.