“Section 1. 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.”
Birthright citizenship or anchor babies have been in the news for many years now, causing a multitude of controversy because we know that there are pregnant women crossing the border to have their children in the United States and therefore claim residency. This has been fueled by a lack of enforcement of our immigration laws and by the Democrat Party who are courting voters to turn our constitutional republic into a pure democracy.
The use of the 14th amendment to establish birthright citizenship for the babies of illegal immigrants is a misuse of an amendment that was passed as part of the Reconstruction Amendments that directly affected Black Americans after the end of the Civil War. Historically speaking the Reconstruction Amendments consist of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The 13th amendment ended slavery in the US but was riddled with problems such as enabling criminal punishments of involuntary servitude and the establishment of black codes because of its ambiguous wording.[1] Thus the 14th amendment was introduced to counter the problems arising from the 13th amendment.
In its entirety, the 14th amendment compromises five sections and more words than any other amendment. It was conceived by John Bingham of Ohio who believed that Reconstruction should place “limitations upon the States in favor of the personal liberty of all citizens of the Republic.”[2] His initial proposals in February of 1866 were considered to be too sweeping and would not be implemented. This would result in the first Civil Rights Act dubbed the Civil Rights Act of 1866. Later, they returned to the idea of a constitutional amendment when President Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Act. The Congressional record at the time showed the first section caused rigorous debate much like today and the other sections of the amendment are direct answers to confederacy issues such as repayment of debt, eliminating the 3/5th clause, leadership until the 5th section which deals with the assertion of congressional enforcement power.
Our concern in this paper is Section One and whether or not it grants automatic citizenship to children born to illegal aliens. First, we need to look at the original intention of the amendment writers. Their intention was to ensure that black citizens who were born in this country prior to its enactment were citizens now rather than slaves. The intent of the first sentence is to overturn the horrendous Dred Scott Decision of 1857 which stated that Black slaves were not eligible for citizenship even though they were born in the several states. The amendment continues on to say “and are subject to the jurisdiction there of” would also be citizens of the United States. Prior to the implementation of the Constitution citizens of one state were aliens in another state as each state (colony) at the time had a sovereign right to establish their own laws. Upon the ratification of the Constitution, this changed and “the citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states.” Thereby making each citizen of a state also a citizen of the United States at large and naturalization in each state unnecessary.
This intent of creating citizenship for former black slaves is further stated by Senator Howard in his speech introducing the 14th amendment to the 39th Congress. He specifically states “This abolishes all class legislation in the states and does away with the injustice of subjecting one caste of persons to a code not applicable to another. It prohibits the hanging of a black man for a crime which the white man is not to be hanged. It protects the black man in his fundamental right as a citizen with the same shield which it throws over the white man.”[3] He and others who were proponents of the amendment were specifically talking about the injustices that had been faced by the black man (peoples) since the end of the Civil War. Therefore, it ended the practice of denying citizenship, as laid out by the Dred Scott Decision of 1857, on ethnicity. As such it had nothing to do with immigration and conferring citizenship upon the offspring of those who illegally entered this country. But instead, it was intended to grant citizenship to Black Americans who had been born in this country prior to 1866.
Now there will be people who argue against this and will use other sections of Senator Howard’s speech to prove they meant to apply it to everyone under every circumstance. Such as when he states, “It will, if adopted by the states, forever disable every one of them from passing laws trenching upon those fundamental rights and privileges which pertain to citizens of the United States, and to all persons who may happen to be within their jurisdiction.”[4] Again we are injecting modern beliefs rather than looking at what they meant and the circumstances at the time of the amendment’s introduction. But more specifically the writers of the amendment use the word “citizen” to describe who is protected under our laws and Constitution. So, the question becomes can a child born of illegal aliens be a citizen when the parents are not subject to the jurisdiction of the country? The 14th amendment doesn’t address that, and it was never intended to address that issue so it should not be used as justification for granting citizenship to children born in this country to illegal aliens who have broken our laws to live here. Let me make this clear least someone accuse this writer of racism due to the large influx of illegals and anchor babies who are Hispanic – this opinion is colorblind. The use of the 14th amendment to justify granting citizenship to the children of any illegal alien regardless of race, creed, color, religion, or ethnicity is wrong and counter to the intent of the 14th amendment.
The debate over the 14th amendment is a prime example of why Civics and historically accurate history should be taught in schools across this nation.
[1] Constitutional Amendments – Amendment 14 – “Citizenship, Equal Protection, Apportionment, and War Debts” | Ronald Reagan
[2] The 14th Amendment: A “Mini-Constitution” | Teaching American History
[3] Speech Introducing the Fourteenth Amendment | Teaching American History
[4] Speech Introducing the Fourteenth Amendment | Teaching American History
