Obviously you do not understand that the sole and specific job of EVERY one of the republican congresscritters is to stroke the infinite ego the Dear Leader.
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The argument that I have heard is that the amendment doesn’t refer to “legal” jurisdiction, but “political” jurisdiction. Meaning, you are in this country, but a different country has political authority over you (you are a citizen of the other country).
Wrong Sparky.
“Subject to the jurisdiction thereof” means compelled to follow he laws of. As in people who are compelled to follow our laws. ie do not have diplomatic immunity.
It is meant to exclude the children of diplomats. Children whose parents would want them to be declared the citizens of the country they are from.
BTW the issue of birthright citizenship came up in debate of the 14th Amendment citizenship clause when drafting it. They were unambiguously meaning any child born on US soil to those not diplomats or Indians (who were subject to tribal jursidiction and technically immune from prosecution).
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Thank you for taking the time to explain. And assist in cracking open a can of worms!
And thanks all for the further explains. This is why I come to the BBS. Lots of smarties here.
Does anyone else think the US voting system is overly complicated? Registering, levers, punches, chads, non-taxed Indians, slaves counted as 3/5s a person, the Electoral College, and so on. Is this good old American Exceptionalism at work?
As a Canadian, voting is one of the easiest things I do… about as difficult as filling my car with gas. The concept of registering to vote is foreign to me… I just check a box on my yearly tax return and ta-da, I’m registered. And I have never once waited more than 5 minutes to vote.
Anyhow, please vote next Tuesday. And please get the 800lb gorilla back to kinder, gentler place.
Edit: typos, and I sure hope the BBS software uses more than a single unsigned 8-bit for the message counter. I’ve never seen a thread over 255 posts…
more details:
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Would you like to play a game?
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Oh lordy yes. The Electoral College is a bizarre, archaic institution designed to balance plantation states with ones where most of the population lived in a few big cities. It truly makes no sense in 2018, especially with a president whose team figured out the best ways to game an ancient system.
Registration isn’t much of an issue these days after the ‘motor voter’ law; states are required to either automatically register you when you get a drivers’ license or to let you register at the polling place when you vote. Now, keeping your name on the polls is seemingly tricky if you’re Black, but that’s a different issue…
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I wasn’t claiming it is a good argument, just that it is my understanding that this is the argument they are planning to make.
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i’m not so quick to give alito a pass on this, he doesn’t wear his originalism on his sleeve in quite the same way scalia did, but he has definitely had his moments.
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In the (increasingly unlikely) case of a blue wave, the balance of power is going to be held by Manchin-style DINOs. And it’s a safe bet that their primary concern will be punching left and maintaining the empire, as usual.
I don’t think that clause was ever enforced, certainly not after Reconstruction was aborted.
Funny how we all forgot about it though. The Jim Crow states sure wouldn’t control the House if we hadn’t.
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They altered the wording while retaining the intent, and achieved what they’d been after. Fascist base fired up, entry of most poor/brown Muslims banned, exemption maintained for their rich Saudi mates.
It followed the usual pattern of recent USSC cases regarding GOP abuses. The court takes the case and says “we know what you’re up to, but the language is a bit too obvious; re-word it this way and you’ll be fine”. The voter suppression cases tend to follow a similar theme.
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Maybe why he’s so cranky all the time is that, his ego being infinite, even hundreds of rich and powerful people cannot begin to assuage it?
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Sort of like the evil universe version of Mr Incredible at the insurance company. “I like to help you, but I can’t… (hands GOP pencil and paper)”
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Typically one doesn’t just get to invent and advance a whole new definition of a term of legal art as a way of circumventing the law. That theory, if that’s indeed what they’re plotting, is right up there with “gold fringe means maritime court” nonsense.
The reason the amendment does not specify “legal jurisdiction” is it would be redundant. That’s what “jurisdiction” means all by itself. An entirely new legal concept (“political jurisdiction”) just invented by the current administration last week cannot, by definition, be what the authors of a hundred and fifty year old amendment were referring to.
If they meant something like “political allegiance” instead, there are other terms that would have been in common use at the time that could’ve expressed that clearly. Like, for instance, “political allegiance.” The alternative amendment being suggested might’ve been worded like so:
“All persons born or naturalized in the United States and owing allegiance to the government thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
That would have included freed slaves, excluded children of diplomats and foreign-born visitors and residents. If this was a distinction the authors of the amendment cared to make, it could’ve been made easily, which makes that argument a claim that the authors of the amendment made a colossal mistake. So much for originalism.
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…unless one is a USSC Justice.
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Gotcha, that makes sense. You paint an extremely scary picture… some real 3rd Reich stuff.
Reminds me of the situation in Guantanamo… basically these assholes want a situation where there’s two classes of residents, one for whom constitutional protections do not apply.
Even if this is just being floated to rile up the base for the election, it’s very depressing how blatant the march toward fascism has become.
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Apart from else, what makes you say the blue wave is “increasingly unlikely”? What I’ve seen suggests that the Democrats still have a very high chance of taking the House, a low but genuine chance of taking the Senate (which is amazing with this year’s map), and a bit better chance of deadlocking it 50-50.
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