Proposed law to eliminate US citizenship by birthright

This is about HR 698, a bill remove “citizenship by birthright” from children born within the US to foreign parents.

The proponents of the bill seek to avoid conflict with the 14th Amendment of the US Constitution, which states, in part:

One of the claims of the bill’s sponsors is that there is no need to amend the Constitution to eliminate citizen by birthright. They claim they can define who is “subject to the jurisdiction [of the United States]” by the normal legislative process. And HR 698, simply specifies that which infants are so subject. Those infants include ones born of US citizens and permant residents (the text is below). Presumably, infants who fall outside of the definition are not subject to the jurisdication of the United States, and hence not citizens.

This raises all kinds of questions for me. How can it be that people within the borders of the country are not subject to its jurisdiction? Are there any such people now? I think foreign diplomats, heads of state, and their families have this status to a limited degree, but maybe I’m mixing my metaphorical statuses. What exactly would that mean in practice? Can they grow up and kill with impunity? Can they be arrested and deported?

I think it’s interesting that for a child born “out of wedlock”, the nationality of the father is irrelevant.

Finally, Section C of the bill, appears to be an attempt to make the law retroactive, possibly back to the beginning of the republic. :stuck_out_tongue: Aliens born before the bill is enacted will also not be subject to the jurisdiction of the US. But if they are born before the bill is enacted, they are citizens and hence not aliens. Or possibly the US will have tens or hundreds of thousands of people wandering around within its borders not subject to its jurisdiction.

It seems to me this law would make a total hash how the government interacts with non-citizens, all in an effort to avoid amending the constitution, something the sponsors know would be virtually impossible for a reason like this.

Anyway, I’d like to hear more informed opinions than my own.

Here is the text of HR 698:

Even if it passes, which it won’t, it will be overturned in a fast five seconds. There’s absolutely no way SCOTUS allows such a sweeping change to Constitutional interpretation to be made by simple legislative action.

Section (2) is quite interesting, as you note. I would guess that the basic intent is to prevent pregnant women with no other means of support from crossing the border in order to give birth.

What a mean-spirited proposal. Man…people sure do suck sometimes.

Yea fuck those guys.

Yeah, it looks like the writer chickened out and couldn’t say such people are not citizens, preferring instead to use the “jurisdiction” clause in the hopes that a gentleman’s agreement will make the intent obvious.

A straight reading looks to me like a person born to an unmarried illegal immigrant is immune to the law and can thus kill, rape and park in fire lanes at will.

I don’t think it’s mean-spirited, necessarily. I take the proponents at their word when they say the move is intended to curb illegal immigration (which at face value it seems it might).

I mean, unless you’re going to call for right of abode for all, it’s a bit unfair to call an anti-immigration policy mean-spirited.

Out of line with the ideals of the framers, and all that? Quite possibly.

The US has a legitimate claim to jurisdiction over a person who commits a crime against a US national outside the US (that is, once they’ve committed the crime), so the killing and raping part doesn’t apply. I’m not sure that the same claim can be made for, say, property law violations, though.

So let’s say I have a Canadian girlfriend and we have a baby in the U.S. My child is not a citizen, even though I’ve been all my life? :dubious:

SEXUAL DISCRIMINATION!!! :mad:

WTF does “wedlock” have to do with anything?

You know what another problem is with proposals like this? They usually completely ignore people legally present in the U.S., sometimes for quite protracted periods, in statuses such as on H-1B or L-1 work visas (and their dependents), or even people who have been granted asylum (but who are not eligible even to apply for green cards until they have been in the U.S. for a year after they are granted asylum).

And yes, people do suck. But that’s a much longer rant than I have time for right now.

Unfortunately, that’s already how it works if a child is born to a US national father and a non-national mother outside the US. See here..

Don’t have time to find it again right now (I had provided a link a while back), but this just seems to have the law do what it was intended to do when it was crafted back in 1865. Maybe 1866. The birthright citizenship notion was added then, after the Dred Scott decision, in order to secure full citizenship for blacks being born in new states and territories. I think Calhoun might have been the sponsor.

This is a good idea, though I’m not sure of the specifics.

Which would presume “means of support” = “husband”. Very enlightened POV on the author’s part, indeed :stuck_out_tongue: It seems to try to make it so that the US-citizen nonhusband father has to go through the rigmarole of filing a claim of jus sanguinis citizenship for the child, by the extant process of going through a consular office while the child is abroad. That part is just mean (and are they going to also exempt the US citizen “baby daddy” from having to support his deported child?)

No: if you are in the US, you are subject to federal, state and local laws, including criminal laws and parking laws. There are two major exceptions:

(1) Diplomatic and consular personnel and their immediate families.

(2) Members of an invading military force.

So, if you are the ambassador from Freedonia, and park your limousine in a fire lane, or you are the driver of a Freedonian tank invading the US, and park the tank in a fire lane, you can’t be required to pay a parking fine. (However, if the ambassador made a habit of it, he could have his credentials withdrawn and be required to leave the country; and the tank driver could be taken and held as a prisoner of war until the end of hostilities).

Jacob Howard of Michigan..

I think you might have to offer something more than “this is a good idea”.

What Mr. Howard failed to understand was that most of these children are not subject in any way to the jurisdiction of other states (and are therefore wholly subject to US jurisdiction), since although they may possess the right of citizenship in their parents’ country of origin at birth, they do not possess citizenship itself. Thus, his original intent when proposing the Citizenship Clause (of the 14th Amendment) is immaterial.

If the US citizen baby daddy does provide support for the deported child, it would actually provide the child with part of a claim to citizenship in and of itself. He’d have to formally acknowledge paternity somehow too, though.

Yes, I realize that’s how it is supposed to work, but this proposed legislation tries to define exactly who is “subject to the jurisdiction of the United States” while leaving others out. Sure, the excluded aren’t citizens (what a relief!) but if they’re not “subject to jurisdiction”, then what do you do with them? Kill them with impunity? Deport them with impunity? Shrug and let them do what they want?

Actually, since this bill simply amends “Section 101 of the Immigration and Nationality Act”, it would probably be best to view the original text.

But I guess the question becomes, is there no difference between inside the US and outside the US? If we’re all** in**the US, I’m a citizen, the child is born **in **the US, she IS my child, why should my civil relationship to her mother count for anything vis-a-vis the rights emanating from the father-child relationship(*)? The proposal as stands seems to need some serious tweaking to be workable (e.g., as mentioned this does not only affect ilegal aliens but also anyone legally admitted to the US but not with a permanent resident status)
(*OK, so I’m on record as supporting the complete abolition of the concept of “illegitimacy” – so a parent is a parent and a child is a child and all rights and duties are equal regardless of marital status – and that may color my position)

Here you go.

I think the purpose of it is to stop people claiming a citizen as the father to get the child citizenship. It’s a bloody stupid part of a bloody stupid law, and would get it struck immediately, but the idea behind it is that you can be sure who the mother is.

That hypothetical situation probably won’t occur, since as I noted above this legislation is never going to pass.

I only brought up the foreign-birth procedure because Johnny L.A. complained that this “only the mother counts for out of wedlock babies” stuff is unfair (which it is).

FTR, I wholly agree with your position vis-a-vis “legitimacy”.

However, to answer your question, the child should in theory be able to claim citizenship in the same way as if he/she was born outside the country; ie., through formal acknowledgment of paternity by the father, and support of the child.

Because you are evil, fornicating out of wedlock, and with a FOREIGNER!