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130-815: The Citizenship Clause is the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution , which was adopted on July 9, 1868, which states: 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. This clause reversed a portion of the Dred Scott v. Sandford decision, which had declared that African Americans were not and could not become citizens of
260-633: A Constitutional amendment could protect black people's rights and welfare within those states. The U.S. Supreme Court stated in Shelley v. Kraemer (1948) that the historical context leading to the Fourteenth Amendment's adoption must be taken into account, that this historical context reveals the Amendment's fundamental purpose and that the provisions of the Amendment are to be construed in light of this fundamental purpose. In its decision
390-601: A candidate for President of the United States be a "natural-born citizen." According to a former edition of the US Department of State Foreign Affairs Manual : The majority opinion by Justice Horace Gray in United States v. Wong Kim Ark observed that: This observation by Gray about the term "natural-born citizen" was obiter dicta , since the case did not involve any controversy about presidential eligibility. Mr. Cowan: I will ask whether it will not have
520-631: A century. In Saenz v. Roe (1999), the Court ruled that a component of the " right to travel " is protected by the Privileges or Immunities Clause: Despite fundamentally differing views concerning the coverage of the Privileges or Immunities Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, most notably expressed in the majority and dissenting opinions in the Slaughter-House Cases (1873), it has always been common ground that this Clause protects
650-693: A citizen either by the United States or by the state, is not a citizen of the United States within the meaning of the first section of the Fourteenth Article of Amendment of the Constitution". In 1870, the Senate Judiciary Committee also had expressed the proposition, saying: "the 14th amendment to the Constitution has no effect whatever upon the status of the Indian tribes within the limits of the United States". About 8% of
780-488: A fair procedure. The Supreme Court has ruled that this clause makes most of the Bill of Rights as applicable to the states as it is to the federal government, as well as to recognize substantive and procedural requirements that state laws must satisfy. The Equal Protection Clause requires each state to provide equal protection under the law to all people, including non-citizens, within its jurisdiction . This clause has been
910-666: A foreign citizenship was considered sufficient cause for revocation of national citizenship. This concept was enshrined in a series of treaties between the United States and other countries (the Bancroft Treaties ). However, the Supreme Court repudiated this concept in Afroyim v. Rusk (1967), as well as Vance v. Terrazas (1980), holding that the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment barred
1040-514: A foreign country, the right to travel to the seat of government, the right to peaceably assemble and petition the government, the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus, and the right to participate in the government's administration. This decision has not been overruled and has been specifically reaffirmed several times. Largely as a result of the narrowness of the Slaughter-House opinion, this clause subsequently lay dormant for well over
1170-630: A foreign power, and this clause of the Fourteenth Amendment constitutionalized this rule. According to Garrett Epps , professor of constitutional law at the University of Baltimore, "Only one group is not 'subject to the jurisdiction' [of the United States] – accredited foreign diplomats and their families, who can be expelled by the federal government but not arrested or tried." The U.S. Supreme Court stated in Elk v. Wilkins (1884), with respect to
1300-574: A member of the Porcellian Club . He graduated in 1829, and was a member of Phi Beta Kappa . He graduated from Harvard Law School in 1832. Admitted to the Massachusetts bar later that year, Curtis began his legal career. In 1834, he moved to Boston and joined the law firm of Charles P. Curtis, where he developed expertise in admiralty law and also became known for his familiarity with patent law . In 1836, Curtis participated in
1430-546: A railroad strike ( Wilson v. New , 1917), as well as federal laws regulating narcotics ( United States v. Doremus , 1919). The Court repudiated, but did not explicitly overrule, the "freedom of contract" line of cases in West Coast Hotel v. Parrish (1937). In its decision the Court stated: The Constitution does not speak of freedom of contract. It speaks of liberty and prohibits the deprivation of liberty without due process of law. In prohibiting that deprivation,
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#17327655957941560-482: A single qualification, that they be "subject to the jurisdiction" of the United States, and while Howard and others, such as Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lyman Trumbull of Illinois, the author of the Civil Rights Act, believed that the formulations were equivalent, others, such as Senator James R. Doolittle from Wisconsin, disagreed, and pushed for an alternative wording. Howard, when introducing
1690-661: A successful conclusion the purposes above mentioned. Relying on the principle of "freedom of contract" the Court struck down a law decreeing maximum hours for workers in a bakery in Lochner v. New York (1905) and struck down a minimum wage law in Adkins v. Children's Hospital (1923). In Meyer v. Nebraska (1923), the Court stated that the "liberty" protected by the Due Process Clause [w]ithout doubt ... denotes not merely freedom from bodily restraint but also
1820-596: A ward of the court. The Massachusetts decision was considered revolutionary at the time. Previous decisions elsewhere had ruled that slaves voluntarily brought into a free state, and who resided there many years, became free. Commonwealth v. Aves was the first decision to hold that a slave voluntarily brought into a free state became free the moment he or she arrived. The decision in this freedom suit proved especially controversial in slaveholding southern states. As with his fellow Massachusettsan and Harvard graduate John Adams , Curtis's willingness to serve as defense attorney for
1950-405: A writ of habeas corpus against Aves, contending that Med became free by virtue of her mistress's having brought her voluntarily into Massachusetts. Aves responded to the writ, answering that Med was his daughter's slave, and that he was holding Med as his daughter's agent. The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, through its Chief Justice, Lemuel Shaw , ruled that Med was free, and made her
2080-466: Is a citizen in their state through tax policy. The Citizenship Clause has been interpreted to the effect that children born on United States soil, with very few exceptions, are U.S. citizens. This type of guarantee—legally termed jus soli , or "right of the territory"—does not exist in most of Europe, Asia or the Middle East, although it is part of English common law and is common in
2210-454: Is a citizen of the United States of America or not, "for the Due Process Clause applies to all "persons" within the United States, including aliens, whether their presence here is lawful, unlawful, temporary, or permanent." The Supreme Court of the United States interprets the clauses broadly, concluding that these clauses provide three protections: procedural due process (in civil and criminal proceedings); substantive due process ; and as
2340-696: Is equally clear that the Clause does not tolerate a hierarchy of 45 subclasses of similarly situated citizens based on the location of their prior residence. … [T]he protection afforded to the citizen by the Citizenship Clause of that Amendment is a limitation on the powers of the National Government as well as the States. The Saenz Court also mentioned the majority opinion in the Slaughterhouse Cases , which had stated that "a citizen of
2470-603: Is not addressed by this amendment. The Supreme Court held in Civil Rights Cases (1883) that the amendment was limited to "state action" and, therefore, did not authorize the Congress to outlaw racial discrimination by private individuals or organizations. However, Congress can sometimes reach such discrimination via other parts of the Constitution such as the Commerce Clause which Congress used to enact
2600-687: Is not confined to mere freedom from bodily restraint. Liberty under law extends to the full range of conduct which the individual is free to pursue, and it cannot be restricted except for a proper governmental objective. In Poe v. Ullman (1961), dissenting Justice John Marshall Harlan II adopted a broad view of the "liberty" protected by the Fourteenth Amendment Due Process clause: Benjamin Robbins Curtis Benjamin Robbins Curtis (November 4, 1809 – September 15, 1874)
2730-444: Is possible only under the following circumstances: For jus sanguinis U.S. citizenship, i.e., citizenship for the children born abroad of U.S. citizen parents, which is established only by congressional statute and not the U.S. Constitution (including its amendments), these restrictions do not apply (e.g., cf. Rogers v. Bellei , 401 U.S. 815 (1971)). In Saenz v. Roe , the Supreme Court held that this clause protects an aspect of
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#17327655957942860-620: Is reasonable in relation to its subject and is adopted in the interests of the community is due process. This essential limitation of liberty in general governs freedom of contract in particular. The Court has interpreted the term "liberty" in the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments in Bolling v. Sharpe (1954) broadly: Although the Court has not assumed to define "liberty" with any great precision, that term
2990-406: Is required. Otherwise, states may regulate commerce. Curtis was one of the two dissenters in the Dred Scott case, in which he disagreed with essentially every holding of the court. He argued against the majority's denial of the bid for emancipation by the slave Dred Scott. Curtis stated that, because there were black citizens in both Southern and Northern states at the time of the drafting of
3120-464: Is silent on the matter. That resolved a historic controversy over federal interstate commerce powers. To this day, it is an important precedent in Commerce Clause cases. The issue was whether states can regulate aspects of commerce or whether that power is exclusive to Congress. Curtis concluded that the federal government has exclusive power to regulate commerce only when national uniformity
3250-481: Is that, through the course of this Court's decisions, it has represented the balance which our Nation, built upon postulates of respect for the liberty of the individual, has struck between that liberty and the demands of organized society. If the supplying of content to this constitutional concept has of necessity been a rational process, it certainly has not been one where judges have felt free to roam where unguided speculation might take them. The balance of which I speak
3380-742: Is the balance struck by this country, having regard to what history teaches are the traditions from which it developed as well as the traditions from which it broke. That tradition is a living thing. A decision of this Court which radically departs from it could not long survive, while a decision which builds on what has survived is likely to be sound. No formula could serve as a substitute, in this area, for judgment and restraint. — Justice John M. Harlan II in his dissenting opinion in Poe v. Ullman (1961). The Due Process Clause has been used to strike down legislation . The Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments for example do not prohibit governmental regulation for
3510-823: Is the guarantee of a fair legal process when the government tries to interfere with a person's protected interests in life, liberty, or property, and substantive due process is the guarantee that the fundamental rights of citizens will not be encroached on by government. Furthermore, as observed by Justice John M. Harlan II in his dissenting opinion in Poe v. Ullman , 367 U.S. 497, 541 (1961), quoting Hurtado v. California , 110 U.S. 516, 532 (1884), "the guaranties of due process, though having their roots in Magna Carta 's 'per legem terrae' and considered as procedural safeguards 'against executive usurpation and tyranny', have in this country 'become bulwarks also against arbitrary legislation'." In Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992) it
3640-473: Is the law, as I understand it, at the present time. Is not the child born in this country of German parents a citizen? I am afraid we have got very few citizens in some of the counties of good old Pennsylvania if the children born of German parents are not citizens. Mr. Cowan: The honorable Senator assumes that which is not the fact. The children of German parents are citizens; but Germans are not Chinese; Germans are not Australians, nor Hottentots, nor anything of
3770-584: The Foreign Affairs Manual , which is published by the State Department , "Despite widespread popular belief , U.S. military installations abroad and U.S. diplomatic or consular facilities abroad are not part of the United States within the meaning of the [Fourteenth] Amendment." Loss of national citizenship is possible only under the following circumstances: For much of the country's history, voluntary acquisition or exercise of
3900-597: The 2000 presidential election , Obergefell v. Hodges (2015) regarding same-sex marriage, and Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard (2023) regarding race-based college admissions. The amendment limits the actions of all state and local officials, and also those acting on behalf of such officials. The amendment's first section includes the Citizenship Clause , Privileges or Immunities Clause , Due Process Clause , and Equal Protection Clause . The Citizenship Clause broadly defines citizenship, superseding
4030-668: The American Civil War . The amendment was bitterly contested, particularly by the states of the defeated Confederacy , which were forced to ratify it in order to regain representation in Congress. The amendment, particularly its first section, is one of the most litigated parts of the Constitution, forming the basis for landmark Supreme Court decisions such as Brown v. Board of Education (1954) regarding racial segregation, Loving v. Virginia (1967) regarding interracial marriage , Roe v. Wade (1973) regarding abortion ( overturned in 2022 ), Bush v. Gore (2000) regarding
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4160-556: The Civil Rights Act , which had been debated and passed in the same session of Congress only several months earlier, the clause's author, Senator Jacob M. Howard of Michigan, phrased it a little differently. In particular, the two exceptions to citizenship by birth for everyone born in the United States mentioned in the Act, namely, that they had to be "not subject to any foreign power" and not "Indians not taxed", were combined into
4290-565: The Civil Rights Act of 1964 —the Supreme Court upheld this approach in Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States (1964). U.S. Supreme Court Justice Joseph P. Bradley commented in the Civil Rights Cases that "individual invasion of individual rights is not the subject-matter of the [Fourteenth] Amendment. It has a deeper and broader scope. It nullifies and makes void all state legislation, and state action of every kind, which impairs
4420-494: The Dred Scott decision had blossomed into mutual distrust. He did not want to live on $ 6,500 per year, much less than his earnings in private practice. Upon his resignation, Curtis returned to his Boston law practice, becoming a "leading lawyer" in the nation. During the ensuing decade and a half, he argued several cases before the Supreme Court. Although Curtis initially supported Abraham Lincoln as president, by 1863 he
4550-525: The Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 . On the other hand, in United States v. Wong Kim Ark , the Supreme Court held that, under the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, any child born in the United States is a US citizen from birth, with the sole exception of children born to a parent or parents with diplomatic immunity, since such parent is not a "subject to the US law". More broadly,
4680-625: The Massachusetts Practice Act of 1851 . "It was considered a model of judicial reform and was approved by the legislature without amendment." At the time, Curtis was viewed as a rival to Rufus Choate and was thought to be the preeminent leader of the New England bar. Curtis came from a politically connected family, and had studied under Joseph Story and John Hooker Ashmun at Harvard Law School. His legal arguments were thought to be well-reasoned and persuasive. Curtis
4810-501: The Slaughter-House Cases that the right to become a citizen of a state (by residing in that state) "is conferred by the very article under consideration" (emphasis added), rather than by the "clause" under consideration. In McDonald v. Chicago (2010), Justice Clarence Thomas , while concurring with the majority in incorporating the Second Amendment against the states, declared that he reached this conclusion through
4940-410: The federal government nor any state can revoke at will; even undocumented immigrants—"persons", in the language of the amendment—have rights to due process and equal protection of the law. During the original congressional debate over the amendment Senator Jacob M. Howard of Michigan—the author of the Citizenship Clause —described the clause as having the same content, despite different wording, as
5070-474: The right to travel . Specifically, the Saenz Court said that the Citizenship Clause protects a citizen's right to resettle in other states and then be treated equally: [T]he Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment expressly equates citizenship with residence: "That Clause does not provide for, and does not allow for, degrees of citizenship based on length of residence." Zobel , 457 U. S., at 69. It
5200-409: The "accident of birth"-the fact that we happened to be born in the United States. And our Constitution, in speaking of natural-born citizens, uses no affirmative language to make them such, but only recognizes and reaffirms the universal principle, common to all nations, and as old as political society, that the people born in a country do constitute the nation, and, as individuals, are natural members of
5330-484: The Amendment are to be construed with this fundamental purpose in mind. Section 1 has been the most frequently litigated part of the amendment, and this amendment in turn has been the most frequently litigated part of the Constitution. The primary author of the Fourteenth Amendment's first section was John Bingham . The Citizenship Clause overruled the Supreme Court's Dred Scott decision that black people were not citizens and could not become citizens, nor enjoy
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5460-458: The Americas. Birthright citizenship for children born abroad to US citizen parents ( jus sanguinis or "right of blood") is defined separately in federal law . The “jurisdiction” requirement was considered in two Supreme Court cases. In Elk v. Wilkins , 112 U.S. 94 (1884), the Court held that Native American tribes represented independent political powers with no allegiance to
5590-672: The Aves family did not necessarily reflect his personal or legal views, as shown by his later dissent in the 1857 Dred Scott decision . Curtis became a member of the Harvard Corporation , one of the two governing boards of Harvard University, in February 1846. In 1849, he was elected to the Massachusetts House of Representatives . Appointed chairman of a committee to reform state judicial procedures, they presented
5720-422: The Civil Rights Act and the Citizenship Clause could confer citizenship on them at birth, and Trumbull stated that "What do we [the committee reporting the clause] mean by 'subject to the jurisdiction of the United States'? Not owing allegiance to anybody else. That is what it means." Senator Reverdy Johnson of Maryland commented that subject to the jurisdiction thereof in the proposed amendment undoubtedly meant
5850-486: The Civil War, the U.S. Congress moved to grant citizenship to freed slaves , and to overrule the Dred Scott decision. Their first action was the Civil Rights Act of 1866 , which declared: "... all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States." Representative James F. Wilson of Iowa, upon introducing
5980-467: The Congress from revoking citizenship. However, it has been argued that Congress can revoke citizenship that it has previously granted to a person not born in the United States. The Privileges or Immunities Clause, which protects the privileges and immunities of national citizenship from interference by the states, was patterned after the Privileges and Immunities Clause of Article IV, which protects
6110-438: The Constitution does not recognize an absolute and uncontrollable liberty. Liberty in each of its phases has its history and connotation. But the liberty safeguarded is liberty in a social organization which requires the protection of law against the evils which menace the health, safety, morals and welfare of the people. Liberty under the Constitution is thus necessarily subject to the restraints of due process, and regulation which
6240-513: The Constitution. The text of the Citizenship Clause was first offered in the Senate as an amendment to Section 1 of the joint resolution as passed by the House . There are varying interpretations of the original intent of Congress, based on statements made during the congressional debate over the amendment. While the Citizenship Clause was intended to define as citizens exactly those so defined in
6370-474: The Court said: The historical context in which the Fourteenth Amendment became a part of the Constitution should not be forgotten. Whatever else the framers sought to achieve, it is clear that the matter of primary concern was the establishment of equality in the enjoyment of basic civil and political rights and the preservation of those rights from discriminatory action on the part of the States based on considerations of race or color. [...] [T]he provisions of
6500-593: The Fourteenth Amendment also incorporates most of the provisions in the Bill of Rights , which were originally applied against only the federal government, and applies them against the states. The Supreme Court stated in Zadvydas v. Davis (2001) freedom from imprisonment-from government custody, detention, or other forms of physical restraint-lies at the heart of the liberty that the Due Process clause protects. The Due Process clause applies regardless whether one
6630-521: The Fourteenth Amendment sought to entrench the principle in the Constitution in order to prevent its being struck down by the Supreme Court or repealed by a future Congress. Before the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, the antebellum United States generally embraced the common-law doctrine of citizenship by birth within the country. Justice Joseph Story described the rule in Inglis v. Trustees of Sailor's Snug Harbor : The rule commonly laid down in
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#17327655957946760-471: The Fourteenth Amendment wanted these principles enshrined in the Constitution to protect the new Civil Rights Act from being declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court and also to prevent a future Congress from altering it by a mere majority vote. This section was also in response to violence against black people within the Southern States . The Joint Committee on Reconstruction found that only
6890-672: The Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause: The 'liberty' mentioned in [the Fourteenth] amendment means not only the right of the citizen to be free from the mere physical restraint of his person, as by incarceration, but the term is deemed to embrace the right of the citizen to be free in the enjoyment of all his faculties, to be free to use them in all lawful ways, to live and work where he will, to earn his livelihood by any lawful calling, to pursue any livelihood or avocation , and for that purpose to enter into all contracts which may be proper, necessary, and essential to his carrying out to
7020-516: The Fourteenth Amendment, a man born within the United States to Chinese citizens who have a permanent domicile and residence in the United States and are carrying out business in the United States—and whose parents were not employed in a diplomatic or other official capacity by a foreign power—was a citizen of the United States. Subsequent decisions have applied the principle to the children of foreign nationals of non-Chinese descent. According to
7150-591: The Fourteenth Amendment, 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. The reference to naturalization in the Citizenship Clause is to the process by which immigrants are granted United States citizenship . Congress has power in relation to naturalization under the Naturalization Clause in Article I, Section 8, Clause 4 of
7280-518: The Massachusetts " freedom suit " of Commonwealth v. Aves as one of the attorneys who unsuccessfully defended a slaveholding father. When New Orleans resident Mary Slater went to Boston to visit her father, Thomas Aves, she brought with her a young slave girl about six years of age, named Med. While Slater fell ill in Boston, she asked her father to take care of Med until she (Slater) recovered. The Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society and others sought
7410-711: The Native population at the time qualified for U.S. citizenship because they were "taxed", while others obtained citizenship by serving in the military, marrying whites or accepting land allotments, such as those granted under the Dawes Act . Children born to these Native American tribes therefore did not automatically receive citizenship under the Fourteenth Amendment if they voluntarily left their tribe. Native tribes that paid taxes were exempt from this ruling; their peoples were already citizens by an earlier act of Congress, and all non-citizen Natives were subsequently made citizens by
7540-545: The Privileges or Immunities Clause instead of the Due Process Clause. Randy Barnett has referred to Justice Thomas's concurring opinion as a "complete restoration" of the Privileges or Immunities Clause. In Timbs v. Indiana (2019), Justice Thomas and Justice Neil Gorsuch , in separate concurring opinions, declared the Excessive Fines Clause of the Eighth Amendment was incorporated against
7670-484: The Service of His Majesty." It also quotes Thomas Jefferson 1776 (in T. Jefferson Public Papers 344): Blacks Law Dictionary defines natural born citizen as "A person born within the jurisdiction of a national government". Webster's International Dictionary defines natural-born as "especially: having the legal status of citizen or subject". Section 1 of Article Two of the United States Constitution requires that
7800-404: The Supreme Court explained that, to ascertain whether a process is due process, the first step is to "examine the constitution itself, to see whether this process be in conflict with any of its provisions." In Hurtado v. California (1884), the U.S. Supreme Court said: Due process of law in the [Fourteenth Amendment] refers to that law of the land in each state which derives its authority from
7930-721: The Supreme Court in 1857 to return to private legal practice in Boston, Massachusetts . In 1868, Curtis was President Andrew Johnson 's defense lawyer during Johnson's impeachment trial . Curtis was born November 4, 1809, in Watertown, Massachusetts , the son of Lois Robbins and Benjamin Curtis, the captain of a merchant vessel . Young Curtis attended common school in Newton and beginning in 1825 Harvard College , where he won an essay writing contest in his junior year. At Harvard, he became
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#17327655957948060-485: The Supreme Court's decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857), which had held that Americans descended from African slaves could not be citizens of the United States. Since the Slaughter-House Cases (1873), the Privileges or Immunities Clause has been interpreted to do very little. The Due Process Clause prohibits state and local governments from depriving persons of life, liberty, or property without
8190-531: The U.S. government did not have full jurisdiction over Indian tribes, which governed themselves and made treaties with the United States. On the subject of citizenship for Indians, Trumbull said that "It is only those persons who come completely within our jurisdiction, who are subject to our laws, that we think of making citizens." Moreover, they objected to the phrase "Indians not taxed" on the basis that it could be construed as making citizenship dependent on wealth and also that it would allow states to manipulate who
8320-676: The United States Constitution The Fourteenth Amendment ( Amendment XIV ) to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868, as one of the Reconstruction Amendments . Usually considered one of the most consequential amendments, it addresses citizenship rights and equal protection under the law and was proposed in response to issues related to formerly enslaved Americans following
8450-460: The United States and subject to its jurisdiction become American citizens at birth. The principal framer John Armor Bingham said during the 39th United States Congress two years before its passing: I find no fault with the introductory clause, which is simply declaratory of what is written in the Constitution, that every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in
8580-607: The United States can, of his own volition, become a citizen of any State of the Union by a bona fide residence therein, with the same rights as other citizens of that State." The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) at "natural-born" defines it as a person who becomes a citizen at birth (as opposed to becoming one later). It lists this definition as going back to the 16th century. OED cites a law of 1695 (Act 7 & 8 Will. III (1696) 478) that states, "A Natural born Subject of this Realm ... Who shall be willing to Enter and Register himself for
8710-399: The United States or enjoy any of the privileges and immunities of citizenship. The concepts of state and national citizenship were already mentioned in the original U.S. Constitution adopted in 1789, but the details were unclear. Prior to the Civil War, only some persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, were citizens of the United States and of
8840-464: The United States to any parentage (including Chinese noncitizen residents who do not intend to reside permanently in the United States), even though he (and others) thought it had already been guaranteed by the Act, whereas Cowan opposed the Amendment (and Act), arguing that it would have the undesirable outcome of extending citizenship to the children of Chinese and Romani immigrants. Most of
8970-432: The United States, and owing no allegiance to any alien power, should be citizens of the United States and of the state in which they reside. Slaughterhouse Cases , 16 Wall. 36, 83 U. S. 73; Strauder v. West Virginia , 100 U. S. 303, 100 U. S. 306. This section contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two sources only: birth and naturalization. The persons declared to be citizens are "all persons born or naturalized in
9100-435: The United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof". The evident meaning of these last words is not merely subject in some respect or degree to the jurisdiction of the United States, but completely subject to their political jurisdiction and owing them direct and immediate allegiance. And the words relate to the time of birth in the one case, as they do to the time of naturalization in the other. Persons not thus subject to
9230-414: The United States, and that their peoples were under a special jurisdiction of the United States. It held that a Native person born a citizen of a recognized tribal nation was not born an American citizen and did not become one simply by voluntarily leaving his tribe and settling among whites. The syllabus of the decision explained that a Native person "who has not been naturalized, or taxed, or recognized as
9360-418: The United States, its territories or districts, whether the parents are citizens or aliens, is a natural born citizen in the sense of the Constitution, and entitled to all the rights and privileges appertaining to that capacity." In the 1844 New York case of Lynch v. Clarke , the court held that the common law doctrine applied in the United States, and ruled that a child born in the country of a temporary visitor
9490-501: The United States. In Elk v. Wilkins (1884), the clause's meaning was tested regarding whether birth in the United States automatically extended national citizenship. The Supreme Court held that Native Americans who voluntarily quit their tribes did not automatically gain national citizenship. The issue was resolved with the passage of the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 , which granted full U.S. citizenship to indigenous peoples. The Fourteenth Amendment provides that children born in
9620-547: The addition to the Amendment, stated that it was "the law of the land already" and that it excluded only "persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers". Others also agreed that the children of ambassadors and foreign ministers were to be excluded. Concerning the children born in the United States to parents who are not U.S. citizens (and not foreign diplomats), however, three senators, including Trumbull, as well as President Andrew Johnson , debated how both
9750-461: The amendment. The Reconstruction Amendments and thus the Fourteenth Amendment "were specifically designed as an expansion of federal power and an intrusion on state sovereignty." The Reconstruction Amendments affected the constitutional division of power between U.S. state governments and the federal government of the United States , for "The Fourteenth Amendment 'expand[ed] federal power at the expense of state autonomy' and thus 'fundamentally altered
9880-462: The answer to the articles of impeachment , which was "largely his work". His opening statement lasted two days, and was commended for legal prescience and clarity. He successfully persuaded the Senate that an impeachment was a judicial act, not a political act, so that it required a full hearing of evidence. This precedent "influenced every subsequent impeachment". After the impeachment trial, Curtis declined President Andrew Johnson's offer of
10010-431: The author of the Civil Rights Act, asserted that both the Civil Rights Act and the Fourteenth Amendment would confer citizenship to children born to foreign nationals in the United States. Senator Edgar Cowan of Pennsylvania had a decidedly different opinion. Some scholars dispute whether the Citizenship Clause should apply to the children of unauthorized immigrants today, as "the problem ... did not exist at
10140-435: The balance of state and federal power struck by the Constitution ' " ( Seminole Tribe of Fla. v. Florida , 517 U. S. 44, 59 (1996); see also Ex parte Virginia , 100 U. S. 339, 345 (1880). ). 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
10270-441: The basis for many decisions rejecting discrimination against people belonging to various groups. The second, third, and fourth sections of the amendment are seldom litigated. However, the second section's reference to "rebellion, or other crime" has been invoked as a constitutional ground for felony disenfranchisement . It was held, under Trump v. Anderson (2024), that only the federal government can enforce section three and not
10400-410: The benefits of citizenship. Some members of Congress voted for the Fourteenth Amendment in order to eliminate doubts about the constitutionality of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 , or to ensure that no subsequent Congress could later repeal or alter the main provisions of that Act. The Civil Rights Act of 1866 had granted citizenship to all people born in the United States if they were not subject to
10530-485: The body politic. If this be a true principle, and I do not doubt it, it follows that every person born in the country is, at the moment of birth, prima facie a citizen; and he who would deny it must take upon himself the burden of proving some great disfranchisement strong enough to override the "natural-born" right as recognized by the Constitution in terms the most simple and comprehensive, and without any reference to race or color, or any other accidental circumstance. After
10660-408: The books is, that every person who is born within the ligeance of a sovereign is a subject; and, e converso, that every person born without such allegiance is an alien. . . . Two things usually concur to create citizenship; first, birth locally within the dominions of the sovereign; and secondly, birth within the protection and obedience, or in other words, within the ligenance of the sovereign. That is,
10790-450: The case. As one source puts it, "a bitter disagreement and coercion by Roger Taney prompted Benjamin Curtis's departure from the Court in 1857." However, others view the cause of his resignation as having been both temperamental and financial. He did not like " riding the circuit ," as Supreme Court Justices were then required to do. He was temperamentally estranged from the court and was not inclined to work with others. The acrimony over
10920-486: The children of ambassadors and foreign ministers were to be excluded. Senator James Rood Doolittle of Wisconsin asserted that all Native Americans were subject to United States jurisdiction, so that the phrase "Indians not taxed" would be preferable, but Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lyman Trumbull and Howard disputed this, arguing that the federal government did not have full jurisdiction over Native American tribes, which govern themselves and make treaties with
11050-441: The citizenship clause of the Act, stated that it was "merely declaratory of what the law now is," and recounted at length the common law history of birthright citizenship. Representative John Bingham of Ohio affirmed that the clause was "simply declaratory of what is written in the Constitution," with specific reference to the "natural-born citizen" qualification for presidential office. The Fourteenth Amendment's citizenship clause
11180-489: The common law rule of birthright citizenship before the Civil War came from attacks on the rights of African-Americans, most famously in the United States Supreme Court's 1857 decision of Dred Scott v. Sandford , in which the court held that free African-Americans, though born in the United States, could not be citizens. The dissenting justices relied on the common law rule of citizenship to challenge
11310-475: The congressional debate over the amendment, as well as the customs and understandings prevalent at that time. Some of the major issues that have arisen about this clause are the extent to which it included Native Americans , its coverage of non-citizens legally present in the United States when they have a child, whether the clause allows revocation of citizenship, and whether the clause applies to illegal immigrants . The historian Eric Foner , who has explored
11440-483: The court characterized the statement, All persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States as "the broad and clear words of the Constitution," ruling that Wong's U.S. citizenship had been acquired by birth and had not been lost or taken away by anything happening since his birth. A 2010 Congressional Research Service report observed that, though it could be argued that Congress has no power to define "subject to
11570-497: The debate on this section of the Amendment centered on whether the wording in the Civil Rights Act or Howard's proposal more effectively excluded Indians on reservations and in U.S. territories from citizenship. Doolittle asserted, and Senators Johnson of Maryland and Thomas A. Hendricks of Indiana concurred, that all Indians were subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, so that the phrase "Indians not taxed" would be preferable, but Trumbull and Howard disputed this, arguing that
11700-564: The due process clause has been held by the Court applicable to matters of substantive law as well as to matters of procedure." Justice Louis Brandeis observed in his concurrence opinion in Whitney v. California , 274 U.S. 357, 373 (1927), that "[d]espite arguments to the contrary which had seemed to me persuasive, it is settled that the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment applies to matters of substantive law as well as to matters of procedure. Thus all fundamental rights comprised within
11830-432: The earlier Civil Rights Act of 1866, namely, that it excludes Native Americans who maintain their tribal ties and "persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers". According to historian Glenn W. LaFantasie of Western Kentucky University , "A good number of his fellow senators supported his view of the citizenship clause." Others also agreed that
11960-443: The effect of naturalizing the children of Chinese and Gypsies born in this country? Mr. Trumbull: Undoubtedly. ... Mr. Trumbull: I should like to inquire of my friend from Pennsylvania, if the children of Chinese now born in this country are not citizens? Mr. Cowan: I think not. Mr. Trumbull: I understand that under the naturalization laws the children who are born here of parents who have not been naturalized are citizens. This
12090-689: The expansion of national consciousness that marked Reconstruction . ... Birthright citizenship is one legacy of the titanic struggle of the Reconstruction era to create a genuine democracy grounded in the principle of equality. Garrett Epps also stresses, like Eric Foner, the equality aspect of the Fourteenth Amendment: Its centerpiece is the idea that citizenship in the United States is universal —that we are one nation, with one class of citizens, and that citizenship extends to everyone born here. Citizens have rights that neither
12220-422: The federal Constitution, black people thus were clearly among the "people of the United States" contemplated thereunder. Curtis also opined that because the majority had found that Scott lacked standing, the Court could not go further and rule on the merits of Scott's case. Curtis resigned from the court on September 30, 1857, in part because he was exasperated with the fraught atmosphere in the court engendered by
12350-458: The inherent and reserved powers of the state, exerted within the limits of those fundamental principles of liberty and justice which lie at the base of all our civil and political institutions, and the greatest security for which resides in the right of the people to make their own laws, and alter them at their pleasure. Due process has not been reduced to any formula; its content cannot be determined by reference to any code. The best that can be said
12480-405: The jurisdiction of the United States at the time of birth cannot become so afterward except by being naturalized, either individually, as by proceedings under the naturalization acts , or collectively, as by the force of a treaty by which foreign territory is acquired. There are varying interpretations of the original intent of Congress and of the ratifying states, based on statements made during
12610-607: The jurisdiction thereof" for the purpose of regulating immigration. Historian Eric Foner has explored the question of birthright citizenship and argues that "birthright citizenship stands as an example of the much-abused idea of American exceptionalism...birthright citizenship does make the United States (along with Canada) unique in the developed world. No European nation recognizes the principle." The Fourteenth Amendment does not provide any procedure for revocation of United States citizenship. The Supreme Court in Afroyim v. Rusk held that loss of 14th-Amendment-based U.S. citizenship
12740-466: The jurisdiction" and the terms of citizenship in a manner contrary to the Supreme Court's understanding of the Fourteenth Amendment as expressed in Wong Kim Ark and Elk , since Congress does have broad power to pass necessary and proper legislation to regulate naturalization under the Constitution, Art. I, § 8, cls. 4 & 18 of the constitution Congress arguably has the power to define "subject to
12870-483: The kind. That is the fallacy of his argument. Mr. Trumbull: If the Senator from Pennsylvania will show me in the law any distinction made between the children of German parents and the children of Asiatic parents, I may be able to appreciate the point which he makes; but the law makes no such distinction; and the child of an Asiatic is just as much of a citizen as the child of a European. Fourteenth Amendment to
13000-482: The language of your Constitution itself, a natural-born citizen; but, sir, I may be allowed to say further that I deny that the Congress of the United States ever had the power, or color of power to say that any man born within the jurisdiction of the United States, not owing a foreign allegiance , is not and shall not be a citizen of the United States. [emphasis added] At the time of the amendment's passage, President Andrew Johnson and three senators, including Trumbull,
13130-416: The majority decision. Justice John McLean , in his dissent, said of Dred Scott himself, "Being born under our Constitution and laws, no naturalization is required, as one of foreign birth, to make him a citizen." And Justice Benjamin Curtis , in his dissent, stated, "[I]t is a principle of public law, recognized by the Constitution itself, that birth on the soil of a country both creates the duties and confers
13260-408: The party must be born within a place where the sovereign is at the time in full possession and exercise of his power, and the party must also at his birth derive protection from, and consequently owe obedience or allegiance to the sovereign, as such, de facto. Story excluded children of ambassadors and the children of occupying enemy soldiers from those eligible for citizenship under the common law. But
13390-504: The position of U.S. Attorney General . A highly recommended candidate for the Chief Justice position upon the death of Salmon P. Chase in 1873, Curtis was passed over by President Ulysses S. Grant . He was the unsuccessful Democratic candidate for U.S. senator from Massachusetts in 1874. From his judicial retirement in 1857 to his death in 1874, his aggregate professional income was about $ 650,000. Curtis had 12 children and
13520-495: The privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States, or which injures them in life, liberty or property without due process of law, or which denies to any of them the equal protection of the laws." The Radical Republicans who advanced the Thirteenth Amendment hoped to ensure broad civil and human rights for the newly freed people—but its scope was disputed before it even went into effect. The framers of
13650-464: The privileges and immunities of national citizenship included only those rights that "owe their existence to the Federal government, its National character, its Constitution, or its laws." The Court recognized few such rights, including access to seaports and navigable waterways, the right to run for federal office, the protection of the federal government while on the high seas or in the jurisdiction of
13780-472: The privileges and immunities of state citizenship from interference by other states. In the Slaughter-House Cases (1873), the Supreme Court concluded that the Constitution recognized two separate types of citizenship—"national citizenship" and "state citizenship"—and the Court held that the Privileges or Immunities Clause prohibits states from interfering only with privileges and immunities possessed by virtue of national citizenship. The Court concluded that
13910-478: 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. Section 1 of the amendment formally defines United States citizenship and also protects various civil rights from being abridged or denied by any state or state actor . Abridgment or denial of those civil rights by private persons
14040-460: The public welfare. Instead, they only direct the process by which such regulation occurs. As the Court has held before, such due process "demands only that the law shall not be unreasonable, arbitrary, or capricious, and that the means selected shall have a real and substantial relation to the object sought to be attained." Despite the foregoing citation the Due Process Clause enables the Supreme Court to exercise its power of judicial review , "because
14170-558: The purpose of the Citizenship Clause and the words "persons born or naturalized in the United States" and "subject to the jurisdiction thereof", in this context: The main object of the opening sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment was to settle the question, upon which there had been a difference of opinion throughout the country and in this Court, as to the citizenship of free negroes ( Scott v. Sandford , 19 How. 393), and to put it beyond doubt that all persons, white or black , and whether formerly slaves or not, born or naturalized in
14300-417: The question of U.S. birthright citizenship in its relation to other countries, argues that: Many things claimed as uniquely American—a devotion to individual freedom, for example, or social opportunity—exist in other countries. But birthright citizenship does make the United States (along with Canada) unique in the developed world. ... Birthright citizenship is one expression of the commitment to equality and
14430-693: The right of the individual to contract, to engage in any of the common occupations of life, to acquire useful knowledge, to marry, establish a home and bring up children, to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience, and generally to enjoy those privileges long recognized at common law as essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men. However, the Court did uphold some economic regulation, such as state Prohibition laws ( Mugler v. Kansas , 1887), laws declaring maximum hours for mine workers ( Holden v. Hardy , 1898), laws declaring maximum hours for female workers ( Muller v. Oregon , 1908), and President Woodrow Wilson 's intervention in
14560-402: The rights of citizenship.” During the American Civil War , Attorney General Edward Bates addressed an opinion letter to Treasury Secretary Salmon P. Chase , affirming the principle of birthright citizenship under the common law and touting its usefulness in the cause of racial equality: As far as I know, Mr. Secretary, you and I have no better title to the citizenship which we enjoy than
14690-472: The rule also applied only to the people born of "free persons," thus excluding the children of slaves. The rule also excluded the children of Native Americans living in tribes, on the reasoning that they were born under the dominion of their tribes, and not within the purview of the law of the United States. To those outside the above categories, the rule was generous in scope. One antebellum treatise, by William Rawle , stated: "Therefore every person born within
14820-433: The same thing as "not subject to some foreign power", and Trumbull asserted that this was already true prior to the passage of the Civil Rights Act, but Senator Edgar Cowan of Pennsylvania disagreed, arguing that this was only true for the children of European immigrants. Senator John Conness of California expressed support for the Amendment for giving a constitutional basis for birthright citizenship to all children born in
14950-449: The state wherein they reside, according to the various applicable state and federal laws and court decisions. The Civil Rights Act of 1866 granted U.S. citizenship to all persons born in the United States "not subject to any foreign power". The 39th Congress proposed the principle underlying the Citizenship Clause due to concerns expressed about the constitutionality of the Civil Rights Act during floor debates in Congress. The framers of
15080-432: The states through the Privileges or Immunities Clause instead of the Due Process Clause. Due process deals with the administration of justice and thus the due process clause acts as a safeguard from arbitrary denial of life, liberty, or property by the government outside the sanction of law. The Supreme Court has described due process consequently as "the protection of the individual against arbitrary action." In 1855,
15210-458: The states. The fourth section was held, in Perry v. United States (1935), to prohibit Congress from abrogating a contract of debt incurred by a prior Congress. The fifth section gives Congress the power to enforce the amendment's provisions by "appropriate legislation"; however, under City of Boerne v. Flores (1997), this power may not be used to contradict a Supreme Court decision interpreting
15340-600: The term liberty are protected by the Federal Constitution from invasion by the States." The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment applies only against the states, but it is otherwise textually identical to the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment , which applies against the federal government; both clauses have been interpreted to encompass identical doctrines of procedural due process and substantive due process . Procedural due process
15470-430: The third component of the right to travel. Writing for the majority in the Slaughter-House Cases , Justice Miller explained that one of the privileges conferred by this Clause "is that a citizen of the United States can, of his own volition, become a citizen of any State of the Union by a bona fide residence therein, with the same rights as other citizens of that State." (emphasis added) Justice Miller actually wrote in
15600-407: The time". In the 21st century, Congress has occasionally discussed passing a statute or a constitutional amendment to reduce the practice of " birth tourism ", in which a foreign national gives birth in the United States to gain the child's citizenship. The clause's meaning with regard to a child of immigrants was tested in United States v. Wong Kim Ark (1898). The Supreme Court held that under
15730-559: The vacancy caused by the death of Levi Woodbury . Massachusetts Senator Daniel Webster persuaded Fillmore to nominate Curtis to the Supreme Court, and was his primary sponsor. Formally nominated on December 11, 1851, Curtis was confirmed by the United States Senate on December 20, 1851, and received his commission the same day. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1854. He
15860-473: The vehicle for the incorporation of the Bill of Rights . Beginning with Allgeyer v. Louisiana (1897), the U.S. Supreme Court interpreted the Due Process Clause as providing substantive protection to private contracts, thus prohibiting a variety of social and economic regulation; this principle was referred to as " freedom of contract ". A unanimous court held with respect to the noun "liberty" mentioned in
15990-493: Was a Whig and in tune with their politics, and Whigs were in power. As a potential young appointee, he was thought to be the seed of a long and productive judicial career. He was appointed by the president, approved by the Senate, elevated to the Supreme Court bench, but was gone in six years. Curtis received a recess appointment to the United States Supreme Court on September 22, 1851, by President Millard Fillmore , filling
16120-509: Was a natural-born citizen under this rule. Chancellor James Kent , in his Commentaries on American Law , framed the rule in terms similar to what would become the citizenship clause of the Fourteenth Amendment: “Natives,” he said, “are all persons born within the jurisdiction of the United States,” while “[a]n alien,” conversely, “is a person born out of the jurisdiction of the United States.” The most significant challenge to
16250-414: Was an American lawyer and judge who served as an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court from 1851 to 1857. Curtis was the first and only Whig justice of the Supreme Court, and he was the first Supreme Court justice to have a formal law degree . He is often remembered as one of the two dissenters in the Supreme Court's infamous 1857 decision Dred Scott v. Sandford . Curtis resigned from
16380-620: Was criticizing Lincoln’s "utter incompetence" and publicly argued that the Emancipation Proclamation was unconstitutional. This put Curtis out of the running when Lincoln had to choose a successor to Chief Justice Roger Taney , who died in October 1864. In the presidential campaign of that year, Curtis supported Democrat George B. McClellan against Lincoln. In 1868, Curtis acted as defense counsel for President Andrew Johnson during Johnson's impeachment trial . He read
16510-557: Was drafted in response to Senator Benjamin Wade 's concern that, although the question of citizenship was "settled by the civil rights bill, and, indeed, . . . was settled before," there was a danger that "the Government should fall into the hands of those who are opposed to the views that some of us maintain." Thus it was Congress's obligation to "fortify and make [the citizenship guarantee] very strong and clear." Section 1, Clause 1, of
16640-469: Was married three times. Curtis died in Newport, Rhode Island , on September 15, 1874. He is buried at Mount Auburn Cemetery , 580 Mount Auburn Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts. On October 23, 1874, Attorney General George Henry Williams presented in the Supreme Court the resolutions submitted by the bar on Curtis's death and shared observations on Judge Curtis's defense of President Andrew Johnson in
16770-500: Was observed: "Although a literal reading of the Clause might suggest that it governs only the procedures by which a State may deprive persons of liberty, for at least 105 years, since Mugler v. Kansas , 123 U. S. 623, 660-661 (1887), the Clause has been understood to contain a substantive component as well, one "barring certain government actions regardless of the fairness of the procedures used to implement them." Daniels v. Williams , 474 U. S. 327, 331 (1986)." The Due Process Clause of
16900-621: Was the first Supreme Court Justice to have earned a law degree from a law school. His predecessors had either " read law " (a form of apprenticeship in a practicing firm) or attended a law school without receiving a degree. His opinion in Cooley v. Board of Wardens 53 U.S. 299 (1852) held that the Commerce Power as provided in the Commerce Clause , U.S. Const., Art. I, § 8, cl. 3, extends to laws related to pilotage . State laws related to commerce powers can be valid so long as Congress
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