DEFENDING THE CONSTITUTION FROM USURPATION
A recent investigation into the official Congressional records for Sen. Lowell P. Weicker, Jr. [1] who was born May 16, 1931 in Paris, France to American citizen parents; reveals that birth to American parents alone were not sufficient for Weicker to comply with the eligibility requirements in Article 2 of the Constitution; consequently, impeding his Presidential aspirations. With current challenges to both Sen. Ted Cruz born in Calgary, Alberta, Canada [2] [3] and Sen. Marco Rubio whose parents were not American citizens at the time of his birth [4] [5], the historical relevance to Sen. Weicker’s aspirations for the Office of the U.S. Presidency are profound.
A chronological timeline compiled from the letters between Sen. Weicker and his constituents detailing his interest in running for the Presidency brings to light a startling sequence of events. Weicker had declared his readiness to “legally” run for the Presidency as early as May of 1978, yet repeatedly conceded that his run for the Presidency was conditional. And the conditions weren’t just limited to whether he could raise enough money or support, Weicker’s communications reveal there were technical and legal hurdles that must be overcome for him to be eligible.
It is May 2nd, 1978 and Sen. Weicker declares in Congressional correspondence “I have cleared the decks legally in the event I do decide to go for it.” His assertion written in the past tense would indicate Weicker believed at that time he was legally eligible to run for the Office of the Presidency.
Then on June 13th he refers to his efforts in the present tense. “Right now, I’m simply concentrating on taking the technical and legal steps to be ready to go.”
So did something occur between May 2nd and June 13th causing Sen. Weicker to reassess whether he had as of yet met the requirements? The tone of his correspondence markedly changed, and as we shall see; his uncertainty is professed publicly at a crisis point in American history.
Also among the archives comprising the “Papers of Lowell Weicker, Jr.” in the Special Collections at the University of Virginia include press clippings from the Presidential campaign of 1980. These news reports in the context of the times they were written shed light on the challenges Weicker faced. When cumulatively compared with the subversive tactics of today’s media and complete absence of vetting for prospective Presidential candidates; it is clear the Republic of the United States of America as it stands is in a Constitutional crisis of epic proportion.
In this news report, Weicker makes an extremely astounding observation: “It would be rather embarrassing to go through this whole process, be elected President of the United States and then find you’re ineligible.”
On the other hand, it is incredulous to believe Weicker having graduated from the University of Virginia Law School, founded by Thomas Jefferson; would need his staff to research his eligibility. The following letter written by Thomas Jefferson on August 30, 1814 from Monticello lays out his recommended course for legal study. [6] The manuscript in Jefferson's own hand writing, includes Vattel's treatise "The Law of Nations" (in the original French translation). Jefferson doesn't just gloss over Natural Law either. That would be studied every morning before 8am! Therefore, it would be impossible for Weicker to graduate with a law degree from the University of Virginia School of Law and not know what a "Natural Born Citizen" is.
Next from the Weicker archives is a news report by Knight Kiplinger which is egregiously inaccurate and an epic fail in regards to the ideals of professional journalism which avow to seek truth and report it so as to accurately inform the public. [7]
“Weicker readily admits he doesn’t know for sure whether he is technically qualified, according to the Constitution, to be President.”
Kiplinger claims Congress and the courts have never really defined the phrase “Natural Born Citizen” which someone must be to become President.
In the defense of truth, here are four historical references he failed to mention:
1. Emer de Vattel, the Swiss philosopher, diplomat and jurist from his preeminent masterpiece The Law of Nations or the Principles of Natural Law Applied to the Conduct and to the Affairs of Nations and of Sovereigns (1758):
Book 1, Chapter XIX
§ 212. Citizens and natives.
"The citizens are the members of the civil society; bound to this society by certain duties, and subject to its authority, they equally participate in its advantages. The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens. As the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights. The society is supposed to desire this, in consequence of what it owes to its own preservation; and it is presumed, as matter of course, that each citizen, on entering into society, reserves to his children the right of becoming members of it. The country of the fathers is therefore that of the children; and these become true citizens merely by their tacit consent. We shall soon see whether, on their coming to the years of discretion, they may renounce their right, and what they owe to the society in which they were born. I say, that, in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is a citizen; for, if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country." [8]
2. In 1866, Rep. John Bingham, the principal framer of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution stated on the House floor:
3. The U.S. Supreme Court in Minor v. Happersett, 88 U.S. 162 (1875) defined “Natural Born Citizen” as children born of two parents who are United States citizens:
"The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common-law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives, or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners." [11]
4. In 1917 the World War I Selective Service Draft Registration Card [12] delineated between a “natural born Citizen”, a naturalized citizen and an alien. This was after both the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868 and the Wong Kim Ark case was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1898. The Selective Service Act of 1917 was upheld by the United States Supreme Court in the Selective Draft Law Cases in which the Solicitor General's argument, and the high court’s unanimous opinion written by Chief Justice White citing Vattel's “The Law of Nations” (1758).
As the report continues, Kiplinger says there are conflicting laws and court decisions; however, the only conflicting law that really matters is Article 2 of the Constitution which trumps any statute and implicitly requires a “Natural Born Citizen” for the Office of the Presidency.
Guidance for interpreting the Constitution is provided by Thomas Jefferson in a letter to William Johnson, Associate Justice to the U.S. Supreme Court on June 12, 1823:
"On every question of construction [of the Constitution], let us 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." [13]
Kiplinger also puts forth another legal falsehood for a provision in the Naturalization Act of 1790: “the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond Sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born Citizens”. The claim here being, that because the statute was unchallenged; it therefore clears the deck for someone with dual-allegiance to be President. He cites the historian Edwin S. Corwin, yet fails to include the exact source for Corwin’s claim with historical facts to support it.
The truth is, the Third Congress as assembled in Pennsylvania in 1795 included George Washington and other Founding Fathers who knew precisely what a “Natural Born Citizen” was as defined in the Law of Nations. And when they convened on January 29th they passed the Naturalization Act of 1795 explicitly removing with surgical precision the language of the Naturalization ACT of 1790 containing the provision “shall be considered as natural born citizens” and replacing it in the 1795 statue with “shall be considered as citizens of the United States.” [14]
The entire statute of 1790 was repealed from U.S. Code. It only took Congress 5 years, or 1 election cycle to realize the need to clarify the delineation between a “citizen” and a “Natural Born Citizen” in order to retain the exclusive class of citizen required by Article 2, Section 1, Clause 5 of the Constitution to be President. Congress is empowered to enact legislation for the purpose of establishing a uniform rule of naturalization pursuant to Article I, Section 8, Clause 4 of the Constitution enumerating Congressional authority. However, Article 2 of the Constitution is shielded by Article 5 preventing Congress from altering the requirements of the Office of the President by a statute alone. Only an Amendment to the Constitution ratified by three fourths of the states can do so.
The following year in 1796, George Washington delivered his farewell address to Congress [15] in Philadelphia in the very same place the Naturalization Act of 1795 was adopted with a warning:
“If in the opinion of the People the distribution or modification of the Constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit which the use can at any time yield.”
It is abundantly clear from the historical evidence that the Founders and Framers never intended for the Constitution to evolve apart from the Amendment process.
If the errors in Kiplinger’s report weren’t bad enough, he then advocates subverting the rule of law and the Constitutional Amendment process in favor of a loosely interpreted evolving Constitution. Such contemptible intent by a reporter and any news organization that publishes or broadcasts it must be repudiated.
When Ted Cruz in the same breath says that he is a Constitutional attorney and also relies on the Naturalization Act of 1790 to derive citizenship rights which would make him a “Natural Born Citizen”, he is being deceitful so as to mislead the American public from the truth about his Constitutional ineligibility.
History is replete with accounts of corrupt usurpations and our Republic has not been spared such violations. Chester Arthur was a dual citizen and British subject at birth because his father was not a citizen at the time of his birth, circumstances similar to those of Sen. Marco Rubio. Arthur was 14 years old when his dad was naturalized and reportedly lied to conceal his Constitutional ineligibility. [16] [17] The Barack Obama saga is still unfolding. [18] Article 2 of the Constitution has 3 eligibility requirements for the Office of President and Vice-President of the United States including age, residency and that one must be a “Natural Born Citizen”. This was the Founders way of ensuring sole allegiance to the Republic and providing a strong check against foreign entanglements and influence. Having just fought a bloody war for their independence from the tyrannies of the King of England, they codified this single class of citizen for the President who would not only be sworn to uphold, support and defend the Constitution as its Chief Executive, but simultaneously lead the nation’s Armed Forces as Commander-in-Chief.
The Constitution is the law of the land, and though there have been several attempts in recent years to change the requirements for the Presidency, no sitting Congress has succeeded in getting the requisite votes to pass such an Amendment. Because the Founders recognized they could not foresee every controversy subsequent generations would encounter, they wisely established the Amendment process so the Republic could legally modify a law through its representatives and thereby evolve or adapt as society sees fit.
Defending truth, faithfully upholding the original intent of the Constitution and demanding enforcement of the Rule of Law without prejudice are all honorable goals, however these ideals are impossible to transcend beyond hope today without a legally binding vetting apparatus.
14. http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.rbc/rbpe.2220020e pp. 166-167
Defender of the Truth
© Pixel Patriot 2016
(All rights reserved.)
© Pixel Patriot 2016
(All rights reserved.)
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