Is 2010 shaping up to be the year of the 14th Amendment?
It could be argued that the 14th Amendment, along the free expression Amendments within the Bill of Rights, serves as the aorta through which our constitutional values flow.
Adopted July 9, 1868, the 14th Amendment's three most widely known clauses are citizenship, due process, and equal protection.
Section one 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. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
Earlier this year we were privy to the 14th Amendment's importance ignored as right-wing candidates ran on an interposition and nullification platform.
Basing their position on the 10th Amendment, 
interposition refers to the right of the states to protect their interests from federal violation deemed by those states to be dangerous or unconstitutional. Nullification is the theory that states can invalidate federal law it considers unconstitutional.
Besides the fact this argument was settled at Appomattox, it is the 14th Amendment that renders the interposition and nullification argument archaic.
When the 10th Amendment was originally proposed, the Bill of Rights did not apply to the states; it applied only to federal law. States had their own constitutions and their own bills of rights.
Some states also had slavery, which was protected under the 10th Amendment. After the Civil War, the 14thAmendment extended the Bill of Rights and made it applicable to both state and federal law, diminishing much of the 10th Amendment's power.
The 14th Amendment was recently affirmed as U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker ruled that California's Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage, was unconstitutional.
Citing the due process and equal protection clauses, Judge Walker wrote: "Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite-sex couples are superior to same-sex couples."
Unacquainted with the application of De Toqueville's "tyranny of the majority" in our democracy, social conservatives reduced upholding equal protection and due process to overruling the "will of the people."
The citizenship aspect of the14th Amendment has recently come under scrutiny for political purposes by several Republican candidates and as well as members of Congress.
Republican Senate candidate Rand Paul was the first I heard publicly oppose citizenship for children born to illegal immigrants.
"Did he just advocate revising the 14th Amendment?" I thought to myself. I dismissed it as poppycock from someone not ready for primetime.
But recently members of the Republican Senate have echoed similar charges, in particular South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham and Arizona Senator John McCain, who have been two of the more rational voices on immigration reform on the GOP side.
The citizenship clause essentially overruled Dred Scott v. Sanford (1857), which held blacks could not be citizens.
So far, we've witnessed this year segments of the Republican Party reach for a pre-Civil War Constitution, offer that the majority will trump equal protection and due process, and propose that birthright no longer be a determining factor in order to receive the benefits provided by the 14th Amendment.
How can anyone take Republican cries of the adherence to the Constitution seriously if it includes revising the 14th Amendment? Moreover, how can individuals claim to uphold American values void of any reverence for the 14th Amendment?
Without the 14th Amendment, what is the effectiveness of the suffrage and civil rights movements? Clearly there is no Brown v. Board of Education decision.
The 14th Amendment opened the door to what the American experiment could be in ways unimagined by the Founders. Though originally intended to address the status of former slaves, the 14th Amendment made America better for everyone.
There is an irony to this unfortunate yarn in that the Radical Republicans, comprised of individuals such as Sen. Charles Sumner and Rep. Thaddeus Stevens, were key to the ratification of the 14th Amendment. Today, it's another group of "radical" Republicans, who have opted for a different path, vacuous of substantive ideas going forward they propose instead to turn back the clock on American democracy.
Byron Williams is an Oakland pastor and syndicated columnist. He is the author of Strip Mall Patriotism: Moral Reflections of the Iraq War. E-mail him at byron@byronspeaks.com or visit his Web site byronspeaks.com.
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You can find the approximate numbr of ER Births for illegal women, but that is about it. Do you honestely believe that automatic citizenship for their children and all of the benefits that come with it are not an incentive for illegals to come here and give birth? They are, through the child, provided housing, food etc.
For the few dozen of these children born here, who will grow up to be full US citizens, it's certainly not worth undermining the basic grounds for citizenship in the US. Already, Joe Lieberman has proposed stripping citizenship for people accused (not convicted) of terrorism simply to subvert our legal system and impose martial law. The 14th Amendment is the only thing that stops that protects you from the government stripping your citizenship at will, leaving you stateless and without due process.
Even after ratification of the 14th Amendment in 1868, women were still denied the right to vote ("nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."??) for another 52 years!
In 1920, the 19th Amendment voided a portion of Section 2 of the 14th Amendment so that women were finally (and explicitly) allowed the right to vote.
Are you suggesting that we should return to the days when women were implicitly denied the right to vote by Section 2 of the 14th Amendment?
Because denying automatic citizenship to children born here while their parents were here illegally is not a revision of the 14th amendment. It's clear that the authors of the 14th never intended it to apply to those who are "subject to the jurisdiction"(citizens of) other nations.
Excuse me but that is utter nonsense. Once someone is on U.S. soil they are SUBJECT TO THE JURISDICTION OF the United States - not foreign countries. If someone commits a crime while on U.S. soil they are automatically subject to the jurisdiction of U.S. law - not Mexican law, French law or any other law that might or might not be in effect in whatever country the person came from.
Denying automatic citizenship to children born here while their parents were here illegally absolutely is a revision of the 14th amendment. Actually, it is more correct to say that it is a blatant VIOLATION of the 14th Amendment, because the 14th Amendment states quite unequivocally that "ANYONE BORN ON U.S. soil is a citizen of the United States". Nothing unclear or confusing about that, is there?
If you were not even born yet when the 14th Amendment was written, then it is clear that you have no idea whom the authors of the 14th Amendment "intended" to apply or not apply it to. That is why we have courts, which interpret the laws and decide what the intent of the law was when written. There is already well over 100 years of settled case law with regard to what the 14th Amendment says, does not say, means and does not mean. It's settled
We know what the writers of any part of the Constitution intended because of what they wrote and said about their intentions. This is not only true of the 14th but of every other part of the Constitution.
Here's what Sen. Jacob Howard, the author of the 14th, had to say:
[The 14th amendment] will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the government of the United States, but will include every other class of person.[1]
"There is already well over 100 years of settled case law with regard to what the 14th Amendment says, does not say, means and does not mean. It's settled"
If you look at that case law, you will realize that every case had to do with someone who was in this country legally. The courts have never ruled on the citizenship of those born to parents not here legally.
Someone from a foreign country who is on U.S. soil is subject to the LAWS of the U.S.....while they are here. "Subject to the jurisdiction" means something entirely different. It means having allegiance to the U.S. and not having allegiance to any other nation. A foreign national who comes here illegally is still a citizen of that nation, owing allegiance to that nation, and subject to the jurisdiction of that nation.
You cannot compare today with how the country was over 200 years ago.
http://www.eturbonews.com/15529/us-birth-tourism-becoming-flourishing-business
http://www.amren.com/mtnews/archives/2010/03/birth_tourism_i.php
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=130549
Incidentally, your claims of "illegals getting on welfare" are absolute lies and B.S. Illegal aliens are not eligible for welfare, food stamps, AFDC or any other social programs. The only one who might be eligible for assistance is the U.S.-born child because HELLO, they're an AMERICAN CITIZEN. And the kid doesn't receive "welfare", they might receive AFDC but the amount they receive is a pittance, barely a couple of hundred bucks per month. Big freakin' deal. It probably takes a whole 15 cents out of your pocket. You want I should fling the 15 cents in your face? Will that make you happy? I don't suppoose YOU'VE ever tried to raise and feed and clothe and shelter a child on 200 bucks a month, have you? I didn't think so.
Kindly PROVE that illegal aliens "can have FREE healthcare" (an utter lie) or "get into public housing" (another outright lie). Otherwise, kindly withdraw your lying claims for the lies that they are.