“The bosom of America is open to receive not only the Opulent and respectable Stranger, but the oppressed and persecuted of all Nations and Religions; whom we shall welcome to a participation of all our rights and privileges, if by decency and propriety of conduct they appear to merit the enjoyment.” —George Washington (1783)

Not since President Dwight Eisenhower’s “Operation Wetback” (yes, that was the name of Ike’s program to deport millions of illegal aliens) has any administration seriously dealt with illegal immigrants — until Donald Trump arrived in 2017. He made stopping illegal immigration a centerpiece of his administrative objectives.

Trump made progress against almost insurmountable odds. But Joe Biden and his Democrat Party hacks orchestrated their bulk-mail ballot fraud in 2020 to dispose of Trump. They opened our southern border in order to rig national elections. And not only is the flood of illegal immigrants now breaking the bank of the Demos’ so-called sanctuary cities and states but the flood of bloodshed by violent immigrants is on the Biden/Harris regime and will take years to clean up.

Fortunately, Trump is back, and one of his first actions as president in the wake of the Biden/Harris disaster was to issue an executive order to end so-called birthright citizenship. The anchor baby myth, as I have argued for decades, is an abject violation of our Constitution and Rule of Law.

This was a setup for a Supreme Court review, and, as expected, a federal judge temporarily blocked Trump’s executive order denying American citizenship to children born in the U.S. to illegal aliens.

Ironically assailing Trump’s order as “blatantly unconstitutional,” U.S. District Judge John Coughenour scoffed: “Where were the lawyers when this decision was being made? … I have difficulty understanding how a member of the bar would state unequivocally that this is a constitutional order.” And as a testament to how determined leftists are to protect so-called birthright citizenship, 22 attorneys general and immigration organizations, led by the American Civil Liberties Union, have filed lawsuits challenging Trump’s executive order.

However, the notion that the progeny of those who blatantly broke our nation’s laws to enter our country would be rewarded with citizenship was clearly not the original intent of the 14th Amendment.

In fact, as argued by Hans von Spakovsky, senior legal fellow in The Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Center, “For the first century following the 14th Amendment’s ratification, few legal scholars would have batted an eye at a directive like Trump’s.”

This is far from the open-and-shut case that Coughenour suggests.

Two esteemed law professors recently argued in The New York Times that the 14th Amendment does not guarantee citizenship to the children of illegal aliens. Georgetown’s Randy Barnett and the University of Minnesota’s Ilan Wurman note, “When they finally consider this question, the justices will find that the case for Mr. Trump’s order is stronger than his critics realize.”

Constitutional analyst Betsy McCaughey concludes, “Birthright citizenship excluded illegals from day one.” She notes: “There’s only one Supreme Court ruling on birthright citizenship in the last 160 years. Defenders cite the [United States v. Wong Kim Ark] decision, but in fact, it actually undercuts their argument by specifying that 14th Amendment protections extend to all people who ‘are permitted by the United States to reside here.’”

Josh Hammer, senior editor-at-large at Newsweek, insists, “Trump is emphatically correct about birthright citizenship,” adding, “Birthright citizenship for children of illegal aliens is, at best, a live and unsettled legal debate. But the original meaning is quite clear.”

So, now that the Supreme Court will consider the nature and scope of the temporary injunctions against Trump’s EO, what exactly was the “original intent” of the 14th Amendment?

The most succinct answer to that question can be found in the words of the 14th Amendment’s sponsor, Michigan Republican Sen. Jacob Howard. He declared at the time of the amendment’s consideration, “This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, [or] who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers…”

In context, then, does the 14th Amendment mean what its framers intended and the states ratified, or does it mean whatever the courts and Congress have construed it to mean today? This is the perennial contest between Rule of Law and rule of men, between Liberty and tyranny.

As Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1823, “On every question of construction carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed.”

Section 1 of the 14th Amendment, which pertains to immigration and naturalization, reads, “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.”

To discern the authentic meaning of this amendment as originally intended by its framers, we must first start with its plain language and then further examine the context under which it was proposed and passed. Any debate about the authority of our Constitution must begin with First Principles, or original intent.

“All persons born or naturalized in the United States…”

This language is plain and easily understood.

“…and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

This language, too, is plain and easily understood — unless there is a contemporary Democrat political agenda that does not comport with the original understanding, in which case benefactors and beneficiaries of that agenda will interpret (read: misconstrue) it to fit their purposes.

So, what does “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” actually mean? Beyond the apparent plain language definition, a factual interpretation is supported by the context in which this amendment was framed and ratified.

After the War Between the States, freedmen (former slaves) may have been liberated by Abraham Lincoln’s 1863 Emancipation Proclamation, but they didn’t enjoy the same rights as those who freed them. Although slaves were in the United States legally, and thus “subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” they had no assurance of equal rights.

The Civil Rights Act of 1866 was designed to rectify this injustice. “All persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States,” it noted. “All persons within the jurisdiction of the United States shall have the same right in every State and Territory to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, give evidence, and to the full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of persons and property as is enjoyed by white citizens, and shall be subject to like punishment, pains, penalties, taxes, licenses, and exactions of every kind, and to no other.”

The first definition of “citizenship” in legal references is “nationality or legal status of citizenship.”

The 1866 Act defined “persons within the jurisdiction of the United States” as all persons at the time of its passage, born in the United States, including all slaves and their offspring. However, concern that the legislation might be overturned by a future Congress motivated its sponsors to make it more resistant to the arbitrary rule of men, so they proposed the 14th Amendment to our Constitution. Upon ratification, it would protect the provision of the 1866 Act from legislatures and the courts.

The aforementioned Sen. Howard, who sponsored Section 1 of the 14th Amendment (the Citizenship Clause), noted that “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” was “simply declaratory of what I regard as the law of the land already.” Remember: He also made clear, as noted previously, “This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, [or] who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers…”

Asked for his understanding of “subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” Illinois Sen. Lyman Trumbull, chairman of the Judiciary Committee and one of the keys to the amendment’s passage, responded, “That means ‘subject to the complete jurisdiction thereof.’ What do we mean by ‘complete jurisdiction thereof’? Not owing allegiance to anyone else. That is what it means.”

Sen. Howard followed, “I concur entirely with the honorable Senator from Illinois [Trumbull], in holding that the word ‘jurisdiction,’ as here employed, ought to be construed so as to imply a full and complete jurisdiction on the part of the United States … that is to say, the same jurisdiction in extent and quality as applies to every citizen of the United States now.”

There can be no doubt about the law’s original meaning and its authors’ original intent. Now, we wait for the Supreme Court’s decision on the injunctions.

While we wait, let’s take a brief walk down memory lane and revisit some prominent Democrat positions on illegal immigration and border security.

Bill Clinton, in his 1995 State of the Union speech, had this to say about illegal immigration:

“All Americans, not only in the states most heavily affected, but in every place in this country, are rightly disturbed by the large numbers of illegal aliens entering our country. The jobs they hold might otherwise be held by citizens or legal immigrants. The public services they use impose burdens on our taxpayers. That’s why our administration has moved aggressively to secure our borders more, by hiring a record number of new border guards, by deporting twice as many criminal aliens as ever before, by cracking down on illegal hiring, by barring welfare benefits to illegal aliens. In the budget I will present to you, we will try to do more to speed the deportation of illegal aliens who are arrested for crimes, to better identify illegal aliens in the workplace, as recommended by the commission headed by former Congresswoman Barbara Jordan. We are a nation of immigrants. But we are also a nation of laws. It is wrong and ultimately self-defeating for a nation of immigrants to permit the kind of abuse of our immigration laws we have seen in recent years, and we must do more to stop it.”

Clinton reiterated these positions in the years that followed, justifying his position by insisting, “We are a nation of laws.” (Laughable, I know, given that the Democrats have a long history of preferring the rule of men over Rule of Law.)

One of Trump’s most vociferous opponents of immigration reform and border security, the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), who described the Republicans’ immigration reform measures as “cruel and arbitrary,” had this to say when Clinton was president:

“Border control is a federal responsibility. We simply don’t enforce our borders adequately. In my state, we have about 2,000 people a day who illegally cross the border. Now this adds up to about two million people who compete for housing, who compete for classroom space. And we have a Medicaid situation. … There are well over 300,000 people [on Medicaid] who are illegal aliens. That presents obvious problems. … I think we can enforce our borders — I think we should enforce our borders. To have a situation where 40% of babies born on Medicaid … are born of illegal immigrants creates a very real problem for the state, which is in deficit. To have 17% of our prison population … be illegal immigrants who come here and commit felonies — that is not what this nation is all about.”

When asked why so little had been done on immigration over the previous 40 years, Feinstein declared:

“The numbers have escalated tremendously. … In Mexico, there is no welfare, there is no AFDC [food stamps], there is no Medicaid, there is no Social Security. … Mexico does nothing to enforce its border. In my view … Mexico must do its share. The day when America can be the welfare system for Mexico is gone. We simply can’t afford it. You’ve seen the costs to state and local governments. … It’s a competition for space, whether the space is a job, the space is a home, or the space is a seat in a classroom. … The people who should be here are those who come legally.”

A year later, Feinstein was joined at a press conference by then-fellow California Sen. Barbara Boxer and Clinton Attorney General Janet Reno. According to Boxer:

“You see before you three women who are very determined to solve the problem. … I look forward to working with [Reno] and my colleague to resolve this, to slow this illegal immigration to a trickle. … This [Clinton] administration is the first one to come up with many points on how to resolve this.”

Twelve years after Clinton’s 1995 State of the Union address, then-Sen. Barack Obama echoed his remarks, declaring:

“We agree on the need to better secure our border, and to punish employers who choose to hire illegal immigrants. We are a generous and welcoming people here in the United States, but those who enter our country illegally, and those who employ them, disrespect the rule of law, and they are showing disregard for those who are following the law. We simply cannot allow people to pour into the United States undetected, undocumented, unchecked, circumventing the line of people who are waiting patiently, diligently, and lawfully to become immigrants.”

Then, as president, Obama insisted:

“We are a nation of laws. Undocumented workers broke our immigration laws, and I believe that they must be held accountable. When I took office, I committed to fixing this broken immigration system and began to do what I could to secure our borders. Today, our immigration system is broken and everybody knows it. … We will [add] additional [border] resources for our law enforcement personnel, so that they can stem the tide of illegal crossing and to speed the return of those who do cross over. If you are a criminal, you will be deported. … We expect people who live in this country to play by the rules.”

Obama added, “To those members of Congress who question my authority … or question my wisdom to act where Congress has failed, I have one answer: Pass a bill.” (For the record, Obama deported more than three million illegal immigrants, and he did so without any of the legal challenges now being leveled against Donald Trump.)

What about Hillary Clinton? She has had a lot to say — on the record — about illegal immigrants.

At the time of Bill Clinton’s 1995 SOTU remarks, his co-president declared, “We do not think comprehensive healthcare benefits should be extended to … illegal aliens. We do not want to do anything to encourage more illegal immigration.”

In 2003, then-Sen. Hillary Clinton declared, “I am adamantly against illegal immigrants. Certainly, we have to do more at our borders.” In 2006, she reiterated, “What we need is to secure our borders.”

In 2008, then-presidential candidate Clinton insisted, “I do not think it is appropriate to give a driver’s license to someone who is here undocumented.”

In 2014, again-presidential candidate Clinton said regarding Barack Obama’s unconstitutional DACA decree, “We have to send a clear message — just because your child gets across the border, that doesn’t mean your child gets to stay. We don’t want to send a message that is contrary to our laws.”

In 2015, she said, “I voted numerous times when I was a senator to spend money to build a barrier to try to prevent illegal immigrants from coming in.”

In 2016, she said, “In my first 100 days, I will introduce legislation for comprehensive immigration reform.”

So, what’s changed in the last two decades? Illegal immigration has now become a more significant burden on federal and state budgets, a greater threat to undermining wages and job opportunities for U.S. workers, and a national security threat — but the Democrats are hell-bent on opening that Latino pipeline to their most promising future constituency.

It is long past time to restore and protect the value of American citizenship.

(For additional case law, see The Claremont Institute’s analysis, “The Case Against Birthright Citizenship.”)

Footnote: The Patriot Post has been repeatedly challenged by so-called “fact-checkers” who repeatedly suppress conservative views — in this case, our assertion that the law on so-called “birthright citizenship” is not settled.

Semper Vigilans Fortis Paratus et Fidelis
Pro Deo et Libertate — 1776

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