Bombshell: Second CRS Memo Covering for Obama’s Ineligibility Not Released to the Public…Until Now
PRESIDENTIAL ELIGIBILITY, PART 1
by Joseph DeMaio
What
else is the Congressional Research Service advising congressmen and
senators to tell their constituents about Obama's "eligibility?"
(May 30, 2011) — Sherlock Holmes once
noted that the perfect crime is the one that is never detected. Those
who are now finally discovering the unsolved mystery of Barack Obama’s
eligibility under the Constitution as a “natural born Citizen” should
read more Sherlock Holmes.
In reality, there is no mystery.
Day-by-day, week-by-week and revelation by revelation, the empirical
evidence accumulates that the man now occupying the White House may very
well be plainly ineligible to do so. It only remains for the truth to
finally catch up to him, as the truth always does. And yet legions of
his supporters and sycophants are doing all they can to delay and
postpone that day of reckoning.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
1. In order for a person to be born
a “natural born Citizen” under Art. 2, Sec. 1, Cl. 5 – the “eligibility
clause” of the Constitution as it was understood by the Founders under The Law of Nations by E. de Vattel, a legal scholar during the years the Constitution was conceived, drafted and executed – both such person’s parents must be, at that time, United States citizens and no U.S. Supreme Court case has held otherwise;
2. An April 3, 2009 Congressional Research Service (“CRS”) Memorandum
authored by one Jack Maskell, a Legislative Attorney in the CRS
American Law Division and entitled “Qualifications for the Office of
President of the United States and Legal Challenges to the Eligibility
of a Candidate” and intended for distribution to members of Congress
either (a) innocently, but substantively, misreads, misconstrues and/or
misapplies federal appellate and U.S. Supreme Court precedent, or (b)
intentionally, and thus improperly (and possibly illegally), alters the
meaning of precedent through substantive editing by grammatical ellipsis
omission of material words, and thus facts, in two federal documents,
to arrive at its conclusion that Barack H. Obama is, purportedly,
eligible to be president as a “natural born citizen;”
3. A June 5, 2009 Congressional
Research Service “Transmittal” message to a member of Congress from one
Jerry Mansfield, an “Information Research Specialist” in the CRS
“Knowledge Services Group,” misinforms the congressman by stating that
questions about Mr. Obama’s birth certificate have been “ultimately
resolved” in favor of his eligibility based on a series of biased and
badly-skewed Internet postings;
4. A second
Congressional Research Service memorandum, dated March 18, 2010 and
authored, again, by Mr. Jack Maskell, and entitled “Birth Certificates
of Presidential Candidates and Standing to Challenge Eligibility,” but
without mentioning or referencing the April 3, 2009 memo, commits the
same conceptual errors of the prior April 3, 2009 memo and thus merely
compounds and perpetuates the problem;
5. The issue of Barack H. Obama’s
eligibility to serve as president under the “natural born citizen”
clause of the Constitution thus far remains unaddressed on the merits by
the U.S. Supreme Court and, accordingly, remains unresolved as well.
BACKGROUND
As frequently noted in postings at
various Internet websites, including, notably, The Post & Email –
most recently in the posts appearing here (http://www.thepostemail.com/2011/05/08/too-hot-to-handle/),
by one by one Tracey M. Grissom and which includes a link to an
extensive work on presidential eligibility by one Stephen Tonchen first
appearing in 2009 (http://people.mags.net/tonchen/birthers.htm), as well as in a post by one Antoine Francisque appearing here (http://www.thepostemail.com/2011/04/14/how-could-obama-not-be-a-u-s-citizen-if-his-mother-was-an-american/)
– the core issue regarding Mr. Obama’s eligibility is not properly
confined to his actual birthplace, be it Honolulu, Mombasa or elsewhere,
although that is a related issue. Rather, the central focus in
addition must be on the citizenship status of his mother and, in
particular, his father.
The Tonchen “Eligibility Primer” is
particularly comprehensive and easy to read. While it does acknowledge
the existence of the April 3, 2009 CRS Memo, it does not address the
various unexplained anomalies examined in the following memorandum.
In addition, the recent publication by Dr. Jerome Corsi of a new book on these issues, “Where’s the Birth Certificate? The Case That Barack Obama is Not Eligible to be President,” touches
upon, but does not directly address or analyze, the noted anomalies in
the CRS Memo. Thus, while the Corsi book reaches the correct conclusion
– that Barack Obama is very likely ineligible to the presidency under
the “natural born Citizen” clause of the Constitution – it does so
without addressing the more serious problems with the CRS Memo.
Accordingly, Dr. Corsi’s book, if anything, understates the severity of
the problem. And, to be clear, Dr. Corsi and/or his researchers cannot
be faulted for the oversight, because the anomaly in the CRS Memo is
extremely difficult to discern, at best, unless one is specifically
looking for it.
Although the Constitution itself does
not define the term “natural born Citizen,” these exists a wealth of
information and authority (for those willing to review and consider it)
bearing upon what the Founding Fathers understood the meaning of the
term to be and what their intent was through its incorporation into the
Constitution between 1776 and 1789, the years leading up to the
drafting, signing and ratification of the Constitution.
Specifically, the writings of the Swiss-German legal philosopher, Emmerich de Vattel in his 1758 tome on international law – The Law of Nations – in particular bear heavily on the issue. In the preface to the 1999 digital edition of The Law of Nations, and commenting on the 1883 edition by Joseph Chitty, Esq. (http://www.constitution.org/vattel/vattel.htm), is found the following:
“This 1758 work by Swiss legal
philosopher Emmerich de Vattel is of special importance to scholars of
constitutional history and law, for it was read by many of the
Founders of the United States of America, and informed their
understanding of the principles of law which became established in the
Constitution of 1787. Chitty’s notes and the appended
commentaries by Edward D. Ingraham, used in lectures at William and Mary
College, provide a valuable perspective on Vattel’s exposition from the
viewpoint of American jurists who had adapted those principles to the
American legal experience.” (Emphasis added)
In Book I, Chapter XIX, § 212 of The Law of Nations, addressing the issue of what constitutes the citizens and natives of a country, de Vattel notes as follows:
“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.” (Bold/emphasis added)
It is thus clear that the proper
analysis in the determination as to whether one is (or even can be) a
“natural born citizen” – at least under de Vattel’s articulation of the
principles of law distinguishing “natural born citizens” from “native
born citizens” – is immutably fixed in time as of the moment of birth,
and not at some subsequent time.
Indeed, as noted here (http://www.thepostemail.com/2010/05/03/jefferson-used-vattels-the-law-of-nations-to-write-our-founding-documents/),
the Founding Fathers, including Thomas Jefferson, relied upon de Vattel
in drafting both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
And since Jefferson as well as many other Founding Fathers were
conversant, if not fluent, in French – including Benjamin Franklin, who
served as our Ambassador to France from 1776 to 1785 – it is generally
acknowledged that they knew exactly what was being stated by de Vattel
in The Law of Nations.
Moreover, even the U.S. Supreme Court
has recognized that de Vattel’s tome was of critical influence on the
Founding Fathers, stating, for example, that “[t]he international jurist
most widely cited in the first 50 years after the Revolution was Emmerich de Vattel. 1 J. Kent, Commentaries on American Law 18 (1826). In 1775, Benjamin
Franklin acknowledged receipt of three copies of a new edition, in
French, of Vattel’s Law of Nations and remarked that the book ‘has been
continually in the hands of the members of our Congress now sitting…. ‘” 2 F. Wharton, United States Revolutionary Diplomatic Correspondence 64 (1889)…” (emphasis added) See U.S. Steel Corp. v. Multistate Tax Commission, 434 U.S. 452, 462, n. 12 (1978).
And one of the Founding Fathers, John
Jay – a contributing author, along with Alexander Hamilton and James
Madison, to The Federalist Papers and serving as the first Chief Justice
of the U.S. Supreme Court – suggested in a July 25, 1787 letter to
then-serving Presiding Officer of the Continental Convention of 1787,
George Washington that it would be prudent to include, in the nation’s
new Constitution, a specific restriction on who might be eligible to the
national presidency. (http://www.familytales.org/dbDisplay.php?id=ltr_joj4101&person=joj). He advised Washington:
“Permit me to hint whether it would not be wise and seasonable to provide a strong check to the admission of foreigners into the administration of our national government; and to declare expressly that the command in chief of the American army shall not be given to, nor devolve on any but a natural born citizen.” (Emphasis added)
Thus, while a child born of alien
parents in this country may be deemed under the Fourteenth Amendment to
the Constitution to be a “native born citizen” – as the Supreme Court
has frequently noted (see, e.g., United States v. Wong Kim Ark,
169 U.S. 649 (1897)) – the child cannot, by definition, be at that time
or at any other time a “natural born citizen” unless its parents are,
at the time of the birth, also citizens. While the child may later
voluntary renounce his or her citizenship upon reaching majority status,
it cannot be involuntarily taken away.
Stated otherwise, consistent with Jay’s
advice to Washington, and under de Vattel’s analysis, with which the
Founders were familiar and which “… informed their understanding of the
principles of law which became established in the Constitution…,” unless
at the time of birth, a child’s parents both
were citizens, although the child would be a “native born citizen,” the
child could by definition not be a “natural born citizen.”
Against this backdrop, the putative
current President of the United States (a) confirms in his
autobiography, corroborated as well through the newly-released Internet
“picture” of what is claimed to be his original birth certificate, that
his father, Barack Obama, Sr., was a Kenyan and not a U.S. citizen; (b)
refuses to release or allow the release of the “hard copy” his original
Hawaiian “long form” birth certificate (assuming one exists) while
contending that the image of a “certification of live birth” posted on
the internet in 2009 and now, on April 27,
2011, proves he was born there, an issue only indirectly related to the
legal question of whether he is a “natural born Citizen” under the
Constitution; (c) ignores as irrelevant the many reports in newspapers,
both here and abroad, that he was born in Kenya or even Indonesia; and
(d) dismisses all questions on the point of his constitutional
eligibility as “distractions.”
THE CRS AND THE BEGINNING OF THE PROBLEM
Equally troubling, however, is how the
issue has been managed and manipulated by Obama’s supporters and
defenders, from the mainstream media to left-wing Hollywood sycophants.
The entire issue has been morphed by the left (and even by many on the
not-left) into a conspiracy theory on a par with Roswell UFO’s. By
metastasizing legitimate questions over his eligibility into Saturday
Night Live skits, the machine thus far has succeeded in trivializing,
marginalizing and, in many cases, demonizing those having the audacity
to even think of asking the question. In true Orwellian form, the Thought Police are alive and well in America.
Even more disturbing, though, is the way
the specific issue of the putative president’s eligibility has been
addressed and seemingly – unless otherwise plausibly explained –
manipulated and misrepresented by what should otherwise be an unbiased
and objective arm of the United States Congress, the Congressional
Research Service (“CRS”). The Congressional Research Service is a
legislative agency within the Library of Congress. Its website (http://www.loc.gov/crsinfo/) asserts that it
“…works exclusively for the United
States Congress, providing policy and legal analysis to committees and
Members of both the House and Senate, regardless of party affiliation.
As a legislative branch agency within the Library of Congress, CRS has
been a valued and respected resource on Capitol Hill for nearly a
century. CRS is well-known for analysis that is authoritative,
confidential, objective and nonpartisan. Its highest priority is to
ensure that Congress has 24/7 access to the nation’s best thinking.”
Let us test those assertions.
First, what follows is a brief analysis
of a “memorandum” prepared by the CRS and issued April 3, 2009 intended,
according to the memorandum’s introductory statements, to address
questions “… from congressional offices…” which had been posed to the
agency regarding the issue of Mr. Obama’s constitutional eligibility.
The memorandum is not an indexed “report” which might otherwise be
located at the CRS website (http://www.loc.gov/crsinfo/) or a parallel repository maintained by the State Department (http://fpc.state.gov/c18185.htm).
On the other hand, the full text of the CRS Memorandum has been posted on the internet and can be found here: (http://www.scribd.com/doc/41197555/41131059-MoC-Memo-What-to-Tell-Your-Constituents-in-Answer-to-Obama-Eligibility).
Whether the title in the website address originated with the CRS or
somewhere else is unknown, but it should give some hint of the purpose
underlying the memo. It will be hereafter referenced as the “CRS Memo.”
The CRS Memo begins by stating that,
without regard to its distribution to the specific but unidentified
“congressional offices” requesting guidance, it was “… prepared to
enable distribution to more than one congressional office,” presumably
in anticipation that more than one or two members of Congress might want
to become enlightened on the topic. This is a prophetic observation,
given the fact that the putative president’s intransigence in refusing
to put the controversy to rest by simply releasing a “hard copy” – as
opposed to another image of a hard copy posted April 27, 2011 to the
Internet – of his original birth certificate, assuming, again, that an
original Hawaiian long-form certificate exists, has served only to
attract more and more attention to the issue, and, lately, from persons
of higher and higher profile.
Moreover, given the “release” by the
White House on April 27, 2011 of an Internet “image” of a document now
purporting to be the “original long form birth certificate,” and the
contents of a second CRS memo, discussed herein later, the controversy
is only exacerbated.
Second, after a brief introductory
discussion about the “vetting” of candidates for the office and the
purported impropriety of lawsuits seeking to challenge the eligibility
of presidential candidates as lacking “standing” and being premised on
“non-justiciable political questions,” the CRS Memo delves into what it
terms a “Legal Analysis of [the] Natural Born Citizenship Requirement.”
It is this section of the CRS Memo
dealing with the “vetting” issue which Dr. Corsi’s book seizes upon.
While the issue is significant, as Dr. Corsi points out, because it
confirms that candidate (and now president) Obama was, in effect, “given
a pass” by the system and those charged with operating it because no
federal law required the “vetting” of a presidential candidate’s
eligibility under the “natural born Citizen” clause of the Constitution,
it is not the end of the inquiry.
To state the obvious: just because
something is not “required” does not mean that it would be unwise or
imprudent to do it anyway. Dr. Corsi characterizes (at p. 295) the
paragraph on the first page of the CRS Memo containing the statement
that no “vetting” of presidential candidates is “required” (and which
first page is included as Exhibit 124 at p. 234 of the book) as “… the
most important paragraph in the document.” Respectfully, there may be
an even more important paragraph farther into the document, as discussed
hereafter.
The “analysis” portion of the CRS Memo
is thereafter subdivided into sections addressing “Background/Summary,”
“Constitutional History,” “Common Understanding of the Legal Term
‘Natural Born’ in [the] 1700’s” and “Legal Challenges Brought in 2008,”
with subsections addressing challenges involving the presidential
eligibility of both Senator John McCain and then-Senator Barack H.
Obama.
Indeed, while the CRS Memo goes to great
lengths to expound upon the fact that, for example, a well-known legal
treatise popular in England in colonial times, Blackstone’s Commentaries,
was “… widely known in the Colonies…” and that certain commentators
believed that the “… Framers had a broad view of the term ‘natural born’
and considered all foreign-born children of American citizen parents
eligible for the Office of the Presidency…,” (see CRS Memo at
fn. 44 and accompanying text), the CRS Memo is devoid of any reference
at all to the teachings of de Vattel, even in a dismissive way. Unlike
the CRS Memo, even Blackstone’s Commentaries and the United States Supreme Court recognize de Vattel and the impact and influence of his writings on the Founding Fathers.
Moreover, the citation by the CRS Memo
(fn. 44) to a law review article for the broad statement regarding the
purported ambivalence of the Founders to foreign-born persons being
eligible to the presidency is plainly inconsistent with the advice John
Jay – clearly, a Founder – to George Washington in 1787.
On the other hand, the CRS Memo does
mention and discuss Jay’s letter to Washington, but ultimately concludes
that the concern over the “natural born citizen” and “eligibility”
issues related to a desire to ensure the requisite chief executive
fealty and allegiance to the nation and “… to prevent wealthy foreign
citizens, and particularly wealthy foreign royalty and their progeny or
relations, from scheming and buying their way into the presidency, or
creating an American monarchy.” See CRS Memo at 6-7.
This conclusion, of course, seems to be
inconsistent with the “broad view of the term ‘natural born citizen’…”
espoused elsewhere in the CRS Memo. In any event, since The Law of Nations was
plainly available to the Founders and “… informed their understanding
of the principles of law which became established in the Constitution of
1787…,” (see U.S. Steel v. Multistate Tax Commission, ante, and Preface Comments, 1999 digital edition, The Law of Nations, ante), this omission from the CRS Memo’s “analysis” of any reference to de Vattel’s tome, substituting primary reliance on Blackstone’s Commentaries,
is one that stands out like the proverbial “empty room… except for that
elephant in the corner,” or, to quote Sherlock Holmes, “the dog that
didn’t bark.”
At minimum, one would expect a thorough
evaluation of the issues from as “…authoritative, confidential,
objective and nonpartisan…” an entity as the CRS to include at least a
passing reference to § 212 of The Law of Nations, with whatever
explanatory, distinguishing or dismissive comments might in the
author’s mind be appropriate. But the complete omission of any
reference whatsoever to de Vattel is not only problematic from
an objective, intellectual perspective, but could also presage a less
benign motivation underlying the ultimate conclusions of the CRS Memo
itself.
It would take far more time and energy
than this writer presently possesses to dissect all of the components of
the CRS Memo and explain why, at the end of the day, its ultimate
conclusions are highly questionable and suspect, thus demanding far more
examination than has thus far been expended on the issues. Suffice it
to say, however, that there are certain aspects of the memo which are
extremely problematic and troubling and which thus both invite and
necessitate more scrutiny. Whether that scrutiny should come from
official or unofficial sources or whether it should be addressed through
legal action is a matter left for others to decide.
THE CORE OF THE CRS MEMO ATTACK
Specifically, in the first subsection of
the “Legal Analysis” portion of the CRS Memo, it is contended that,
based on the common law principle of “jus soli” or the “law of
the soil” which existed in England and the Original Colonies in 1776, as
well as under statutes and constitutional amendments coming into effect
thereafter:
“… all persons born ‘in’ the United
States and subject to its jurisdiction are citizens of the United States
‘at birth.’ As such, any person physically born ‘in’ the United
States, regardless of the citizenship status of one’s parents (unless
such parents are foreign diplomatic personnel not subject
to the jurisdiction of the United States) would appear to be a ‘natural
born’ citizen eligible to be President of the United States [fn. 25].”
(Emphasis in original)
Footnote 25 of the memorandum cites
“specifically” – meaning as a primary source for the assertion being
made – as the authority for that contention the 1939 U.S. Supreme Court
decision in a case called Perkins v. Elg, 307 U.S. 325 (1939)
and its reliance on an 1875 “letter of advice” by U.S. Attorney General
Edwards Pierrepont in a matter called Steinkauler’s Case. As will be seen shortly, not only is that reference misleading – the original statement of law coming from a different case involving a different fact situation – even if not misleading, it arrives at exactly the wrong legal conclusion.
Even before going through its
“analysis,” the CRS Memo thus gives one a preview of the ultimate
conclusion that, without regard to the citizenship status of one’s
parents, if a person is born here, that person is a “natural born”
citizen eligible to be President of the United States.
Stated otherwise, the CRS Memo posits
for example, that if an illegal alien (some might prefer the term
“undocumented immigrant”) pregnant woman, with or without an
accompanying father, lawfully or unlawfully crosses the border – whether
from Canada into North Dakota, Mexico into Texas, the Pacific Ocean
into San Francisco, the Atlantic Ocean into New York City or the Gulf of
Mexico into New Orleans – and gives live birth here, the child will,
without more, meet the “natural born Citizen” criterion of the
Constitution. In effect, the CRS Memo thus eradicates any distinction
between a “native born citizen” and a “natural born citizen,” conflating
the two into a single, “one-size-fits-all” principle.
This point is recognized by Dr. Corsi at
pp. 203-204 of his book, but without the additional analysis of why the
eradication of the two concepts by their conflation into a single one
is not only exactly what the Founders did not intend, but why it is something that cannot be supported under Perkins v. Elg as
originally issued by the Supreme Court…, as opposed to how the Court’s
opinion is paraphrased through ellipsis, yet offered up as a quote, in
the CRS Memo and as discussed hereafter.
Indeed, that the “eligibility”
distinction still exists between, on the one hand, a “native-born
citizen” or a “naturalized citizen,” and on the other hand, a “natural
born citizen” is confirmed by the Supreme Court decision in Schneider v. Rusk, 377 U.S. 163 (1964). There, Justice Douglas opined for the majority (yes, there was a dissent), 377 U.S. at 165:
“We start that the rights of citizenship
of the native born and of the naturalized person are of the same
dignity and are coextensive. The only difference drawn by the
Constitution is that only the ‘natural born’ citizen is eligible to be President. Art, II, s [§] 1.” (Emphasis added).
Although the CRS Memo includes – oddly – several references to Schneider v. Rusk in support of its conclusions (see, e.g., CRS Memo fns. 24, 49 and its quote from Hollander v. McCain, 566 F. Supp. 2d 63, 66 (D. N.H. 2008), and fns. 51 and 66, referencing Rusk),
nowhere in the CRS Memo is there an attempt to distinguish or explain
away the statement (albeit denoted dictum) that “… only the ‘natural
born’ citizen is eligible to be President.”
A cynic might be thus tempted to
conclude that the only way of accomplishing the predetermined objective
sought would be to turn to Perkins v. Elg, with its discussion
of U.S. Attorney General Edwards Pierrepont’s “letter advice,” and
“reverse engineer” a concocted result re-characterizing Marie Elg – who
from birth was a natural born citizen – as being merely a ‘native born’
citizen, and then conflate that misleading and restrictive conclusion
into what she actually was all along: a natural born citizen eligible to
the presidency.
The principle to be kept in mind is
simply this: all natural born citizens are also native born citizens,
but not all native born citizens are natural born citizens. Stated
otherwise, since Rusk notes that only a natural born citizen is eligible to serve as president, if Barack H. Obama is not a “natural born citizen,” the only
way for the CRS Memo to otherwise “fudge” or “concoct” his eligibility
is to morph his status as a “native born citizen” (which, if in fact he
was born in Hawaii would be the case under the Wong Kim Ark decision) into a “natural born citizen” through the conflation of the two concepts. This, as the opinion in Rusk confirms, cannot be done, at least with any intellectual propriety.
Moreover, does anyone believe that the
CRS Memo’s main conclusion – that a child of foreign-born, non-U.S.
citizens would be eligible to the presidency – is what Alexander
Hamilton, James Madison or, in particular, John Jay had in mind when
writing The Federalist? Go back in this memo and read Jay’s advice to
George Washington in 1787. Does anyone really believe that the Founding
Fathers who signed the Constitution would have agreed that, despite the
teachings of de Vattel in § 212 of The Law of Nations with
which they were familiar, this was what was intended through their
careful selection of the words used in Art. 2, Section 1, Cl. 5 of their
newly-minted Constitution?
Does anyone who reads the unanimous decision in Perkins v. Elg as
originally written – as contrasted with how it is altered and
paraphrased in the CRS Memo – really believe that the Founders intended
that a child born here of a mother impregnated by an al Qaeda Pakistani
father would, could or should be eligible to become president? Yet
that is the result posited by the CRS Memo.
Some who read the words of the CRS Memo –
again, to be distinguished from the actual words of the Supreme Court
decisions upon which it purports to rely for its conclusions, a matter
addressed, post – might conclude in the affirmative. On the
other hand, a growing segment of the population might conclude that such
a result is decidedly not what the Founders of this nation intended. And
yet, this clearly appears to be the logical import of the product of a
federal agency touting itself as Congress’ repository of “… the nation’s
best thinking.”
Really?
Stated otherwise, since the teachings of de Vattel articulated in § 212 of The Law of Nations stand in such stark contrast to the conclusion of the CRS Memo – i.e.,
that the “natural born citizen” status of a person may exist regardless
of the citizenship status of both parents, and in particular that of
the father – it is at best inaccurate to contend that only the common
law principles found in Blackstone’s Commentaries should inform the debate. At worst, it is intentionally misleading.
And yet, the foregoing is not the worst problem with the CRS Memo.
The core problem with the CRS Memo takes
the form of what seemingly is a conscious effort on the part of the
memorandum drafters to “adjust” or “tweak” the actual language of two
critical federal documents in order to arrive at a predetermined,
targeted result. The documents thus victimized in the CRS Memo are (1)
the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Perkins v. Elg, 307 U.S. 325 (1939) and (2) the U.S. Attorney General’s “opinion” in Steinkauler’s Case, 15 Op. Atty. Gen. 15 (1875), accurately quoted in Elg,
but altered and thus misquoted in the CRS Memo. Let us hope this is an
innocent mistake, for if it is not, it is a matter which should concern
everyone, and in particular, 535 members of Congress.
———————————-
Editor’s Note: The second CRS memo,
dated March 18, 2010, is entitled “Birth Certificates of Presidential
Candidates and Standing to Challenge Eligibility” does not appear to be available
to the public at the Open CRS website. The Post & Email was made
aware of it by a citizen researcher. Why has the public not been
informed of this additional memo which seeks to provide further cover
for Obama to occupy the Oval Office?
The Constitution – Stronger than Dirt!
Here is a question for the obots. If, back when the Founders were
laying their quills to the final draft of our awesome Constitution, jus soli (birth on U.S. soil) were considered enough to qualify one as a natural born Citizen, then what would have been the need for the Fourteenth Amendment[1]?
Of course, the Fourteenth Amendment was written many decades after the Constitution and it did not address natural born Citizenship at all, so how could it inform us as to the Founders thoughts onjus soli, you may reasonably wonder? Well, let’s follow the logic:
One certainly cannot be a natural born Citizen without at least being born a citizen, right? Okay, now note that all former slaves were born jus soli
totally within the jurisdiction and boundaries of the USA, yet a
Constitutional amendment was required to just make some of these, our
fellow countrymen, citizens. That right (and plain as can be). Many former slaves who were born on U.S. soil were being denied citizenship by certain States because they were born to non-citizen parents!
Clearly, jus soli was not enough to make them citizens (let alone natural born Citizens). That the Fourteenth Amendment exists at all is proof positive that the Founders did not consider jus soli sufficient by and of itself to confer natural born Citizenship status – blood and dirt were both required.
The above train of thought is perfectly consistent with the Founders’
expressed intent to prevent our Commander-in-Chief from having any
foreign affinities, loyalties or allegiances. The natural born Citizen clause was to ensure that the facts of one’s birth would provide no natural
claim by any foreign power that one be a direct subject or citizen of
that power. That means that one must not be born on the soil of a
foreign power (i.e., within its jurisdiction) and that the USA must not
recognize either of one’s parents as being legitimately, legally claimed
as subjects or citizens of a foreign power.
Blood and dirt – perhaps not perfect, but the Founders
recognized it as doing the best job of protecting sovereign Citizens of
our great nation from the danger of a usurper gaining the Presidency
(and sadly, the danger that comes from defying their wisdom we are
experiencing first hand, today).
That is a powerful article.
The conclusions of the CRS memos were pre-ordained. The people who
requested the memos were members of Congress, congressional leaders…and
Democrats because both houses were controlled by the Democrats at the
time the memos were requested. IMO neither memo was released to the
public because those involved in preparing them, and the members of
Congress who received the memo, all knew the memos were highly
questionable and were created to support only one ultimate conclusion,
which was of course that Obama was eligible, no other conclusion could
have ever occurred considering the involvement of Congress on both sides
of the isle in getting an unqualified person on the presidential ballot
and ultimately elected. Nancy Pelosi was especially involved with the
two different certification letters for Obama/Biden, signed and
notarized on the same day. One letter, sent to Hawaii mentioned
eligibility, “as required by the Constitution”, the other letter, with
no mention of the Constitution, was sent to the other 49 states. I know
of no explanation from the DNC for this action, they simply ignore any
questions that are ask as to why the wording was changed for
Obama/Biden.
Indications are that many involved in the election process in 2008,
both in the Hawaii Democrat Party and in the DNC, were aware of Obama’s
ineligibility but determined to press on regardless. The Democrat Party
of Hawaii resisted certifying Obama/Biden to be on the ballot in Hawaii
and ultimately changed the wording of their candidate certification to
leave out all mention of qualifications, “per the Constitution” on the
2008 Hawaii certification letter for Obama/Biden. The 2000 and 2004
Hawaii certification letters for Gore, (2000) and Kerry, (2004)
contained the words, to paraphrase, “eligible per the Constitution”. The
Hawaii Democrat Party has also to my knowledge refused to answer any
questions about why they changed their certification form wording for
Obama/Biden.
It is dismaying and almost unbelievable that almost three years later
we still have a putative president who has never proven his eligibility
to hold the office. That a person who is still largely unknown in so
many ways is allowed to hold the office of president without ever being
vetted in any meaningful way, and to be commander-in-chief of America’s
military, is clearly placing our nation in great danger.
That we are supposedly on the verge of allowing an apparent illegal
usurper of the presidency who is yet to prove he is an American citizen
at all, and cannot prove he is a natural born Citizen as required by the
Constitution, to run for the same office a second time is unbelievable
and must not be allowed to happen if America is to recover from the
massive damage already done.
Please pray, again, for our nation…
Excellent work in uncovering this 2nd CRS Memo.
The first CRS memo was first made public by my attorney getting a
copy of it sent to him by express mail. I picked up a copy at his
office in NJ. I uploaded it and named it at that time with the name now
associated with it and then uploading it to my attorney Mario Apuzzo’s
SCRIBD.com account. Since I also assisted with Atty Apuzzo’s blog, I
posted it in his blog upon my return from Atty Mario Apuzzo’s office in
NJ on the morning of 5 Nov 2010 at 2:33 a.m. announcing the find. As I
said, I am the one who gave the uploaded document the descriptive name
mentioned in your piece. This secret CRS Memo document was leaked to us
in paper form. It was sent to us since my lawsuit, , i.e., Kerchner et
al v Obama & Congress et al, was also suing Congress for their part
in confirming and allowing the swearing in of a constitutionally
ineligible person as the President and Commander in Chief of our
military Here are the links to the first public disclosure of the first
CRS Memo document at SCRIBD.com and at Atty Mario Apuzzo’s blog.
Someone stripped off the source credit line for the scanned in copy in
other copies out there in the wild. You can see the source credit line
at this link where I first uploaded the original leaked copy of the
first CRS Memo.
The document obtained by volunteers with connections inside a
Senators office trying to help my lawsuit and given to us in an effort
to try to help our lawsuit. The first CRS Memo was also covered 3 days
later by Dr. Jerome Corsi in his article about it in WorldNetDaily. Dr.
Corsi did not mention in his book how this first CRS Memo came to be
made public, i.e., through the efforts and work of volunteers helping
the prosecution of the Kerchner v Obama & Congress lawsuit which
went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Dr. Corsi also forgot to
mention said lawsuit in Chapter 12 of his book.
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.printable&pageId=225561
CDR Kerchner (Ret)http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.printable&pageId=225561
