Another Obama Isn't Eligible To Be President Suit Dies At The Supreme Court

This time it's the Wrotnowski suit which had nothing to do with the birth certificate matter. This guy claimed that because Obama's father wasn't a US citizen, no matter where or when Obama was born he can't be considered a 'natural born citizen'. The court did not decide the case on the merits but simply refused to hear it without offering any reasons.

That said, Wrotnowski's argument is more breathtakingly stupid than a lot of the other stuff that's out there.

"The law has always been understood to be, if you are born here, you're a natural born citizen," said Thomas Goldstein, founder of the Scotusblog.com Web site and a lawyer who has argued numerous cases before the high court. "And that is particularly true in this case, when you have a U.S. citizen parent like Barack Obama's mother."

For those of you scoring at home, this line of reasoning goes back to 1898 and a case called United States v. Wong Kim Ark which among other things holds.

The Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, in the declaration that

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,

contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two only: birth and naturalization. Citizenship by naturalization can only be acquired by naturalization under the authority and in the forms of law. But citizenship by birth is established by the mere fact of birth under the circumstances defined in the Constitution. Every person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, becomes at once a citizen of the United States, and needs no naturalization.

See? Two types of citizenship only...birth and naturalization, there's no third choice according the Supreme Court. If you accept that Obama was born in the US, then he's eligible.

Now there are some who don't accept the 'short form Certificate of Live Birth' that Obama has offered up and want to see his original 'vault' version. Well, at the moment there may not be a way for him to do that according to Bob Owens.

Some will argue — as I did earlier in the week — that Obama should, of his own volition, ask the state of Hawaii to release his long-form vault copy birth certificate to settle this matter once and for all. While the state doesn’t presently have a procedural mechanism in place to make the long-form copy available, it is merely a procedure, not a law, and the proper officials could waive procedural norms for this specific issue of national importance. Once produced, the singular, above-and-beyond release of Obama’s original birth certificate would eliminate all doubt of his citizenship from rational minds.

So unless they change the rule or Alan Keyes wins his lawsuit, it looks like it's going to have to suffice.

Now, I'm not trying to argue every point of this case here. You may not like that the media is incurious about this whole matter or that his letting Factcheck.org see the COLB is enough but those are different issues.

According to Owens, it appears that as of now it appears Obama has offered up what he can get. And who exactly is he supposed to show it to at this point? No court has asked to see it and as far as know neither has any state Secretary of State, elector or member of Congress.

I haven't seen anything on lately on the Keye's case, which Ace has argued is the case that should succeed at least in meeting the standing requirement. Short of something developing there, it looks like the this is a dead issue in the courts.

There's no doubt however it will live a good long time on the intertubes.

(Thanks to Slublog for the tip on the Owens piece)

posted by DrewM. at 01:05 PM

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