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Permalink Reply by Amelia Gora on July 10, 2012 at 3:54pm

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Permalink Reply by Amelia Gora on July 10, 2012 at 4:08pm

Points of above case:

Two separate nations - the U.S. and the Hawaiian Kingdom both having immunities......add the above to the fact that Royal Person(s) are not subject to the Laws, this is an additional reason why the amounts of fines charged by the State of Hawaii which evolved from the Territory, evolved from the Republic, evolved from the Provisional Government, evolved from the conspirators, treasonous persons from the temporary part of the three (3) part Hawaiian Government called the House of Representatives who premeditated, conspired against the 2/3 Permanent Part of the Hawaiian Government called the Sovereign and the House of Nobles, their bloodlines, their koko, their descendants/heirs is additional proof as to why the entity State of Hawaii, supported by a nation that has PERPETUAL Treaty(ies) with the Hawaiian Government cannot apply laws alien to our own recognized neutral, friendly, non-violent nation , etc.

aloha.

p.s.  it is interesting that there are many other postings on google which has to do with the Landais case:

The Law of Nations and the Law of the United States

By Dr. Conspiracy on February 21, 2009 in Citizenship, Emmerich de Vattel

Emer de Vattel

One of the more vexing nObama arguments is their redefinition of Natural Born Citizen. The primary way they attempt to do this is to assert that the definition of “natural born citizen” in the Constitution should be determined by a book by a Swiss philosopher and jurist from the 18th century name Emmerich de Vattel writing in a book loosely called “The Law of Nations”. The approach inflates de Vattel’s influence.

 

A mindless literalism appears among the nObama when they say that an 18th century Swiss jurist de Vattel’s work, Le Droit des Gens. ou Principes de la Loi Naturelle, appliques a la conduite & aux affaires des Nations & des Souverains, is written into the US Constitution because the phrase “the Law of Nations” appears therein (and that is a translation of a bit of Vattel’s French title).

Some assert that the word “natural” in “natural born citizen” is a reference to “natural law”. That is, they assert that a natural born citizen is some who is born a citizen by natural law. Let’s run with that.

De Vattel describes exactly two kinds of citizen in his book, natural born citizens (or natives) who are citizens by natural law (this is described in Book 1, Chapter 212), and naturalized citizens who are citizens made so by statute (described in Book 1, Chapter 214).

The essential problem in any discussion is determining what “natural law” is. For de Vattel, natural law makes one a citizen based on who one’s parents are. For him, loyalty and national allegiance are inherited. The problem with arguments based on natural law is that there is no source to which an appeal can be made to determine what natural law is. One cannot question nature directly. Natural law is at one time a consensus view of what is “right” and at another an excuse for inflating one’s own prejudices and biases to superhuman levels.

If natural law is a window on prejudice, then we might consider the conditions of the United States as compared to Switzerland.

Particularly in the southeastern colonies of British North America, disease was so severe that only immigration kept the population from declining. Naturalization standards were lenient (one year’s residence with good conduct). Americans who had just asserted that they were no longer British citizens seemed ready to deny their blood and swear allegiance to the place. It makes no sense for a nation of immigrants to consider “natural allegiance” to be determined by where their father’s came from.

For more information on citizenship issues, look at our Citizenship category.

British North America, Le Droit, natural law, Switzerland, United States

← Kerchner v. Obama and the WHOLE COUNTRY (Part 2)

Kokopelli →

45 Responses to The Law of Nations and the Law of the United States

1. smrstrauss February 21, 2009 at 2:39 pm #

   How often does the phrase “Common Law” appear.

   I ask because some of the anti-Obama Natural Born theorists say that the US Constitution was an attempt to get away from British common law.

2. Bob Weber February 21, 2009 at 2:42 pm #

   Emmerich de Vattel was certainly a respected jurist, but he had nothing to do with U.S. law or the constitution. There have been plenty of books with the title of “Law of Nations”. Vattel was influenced by Christian Wolff’s book which is usually, in English translation, titled “Law of Nations”. The de Vattel quote commonly lifted out of context by birfers has the heading, “regarding the laws of our nation”. For some reason they always omit this heading. De Vattel in that section explains ius sanguinis, “law of ancestry”, which is the law of “our nation”, i.e. Switzerland. You are a citizen-at-birth of Switzerland if, and only if, your parents are Swiss, and it makes no difference where you are born. De Vattel in other sections explains ius solis, “law of the soil”, which is the law in other countries. Note also that naturalized Swiss citizens are eligible for all their federal offices.

3. Hitandrun February 21, 2009 at 5:23 pm #

   Doc and company,

   You’ll be disappointed to learn that Mr Greschak, after a detailed explication of the “NBC” sources, bordering on parody, concludes a “natural born citizen” must be at a minimum (1) a citizen at the time, (2) a citizen at birth, (3) born on US soil, AND (4) born to parents themselves both citizens at the time of their child’s birth.

   http://www.greschak.com/essays/natborn/index.htm

   Hitandrun

4. richCares February 21, 2009 at 5:53 pm #

   No disappointment:
   Greschak says “It should be noted that I do not consider this to be a definition of the phrase natural born Citizen. What I have listed here are just what I believe are some necessary conditions for one to be a natural born Citizen”

   None of his coments include the US Constitution, do they? It’s what he believes, I believe something else!

5. Dr. Conspiracy February 21, 2009 at 7:04 pm #

   HR, thanks for the reference. Yes, I am disappointed. I am impressed by the material he collected. I just wish that he had relied on his material and not so much on the dictionary. One cannot derive the meaning of a phrase solely from the meaning of its constituent words, hyphen or no. There are several excellent examples from citations from which I will pick one, the Private Act No. 101:

   [As a reward for service during the war Peter Landais shall] be deemed adjudged and taken to be a natural Subject of this State to all Intents Constructions and Purposes as if he said Peter Landais had been Born within this state and had continued and dwelt therein from the Time of his Birth…

   This is a good example showing the equivalence of natural Subject with being Born within the state. Other citations have variations on the wording, but all convey the same result and parents are never mentioned.

   I have sent him an email asking if he’s willing to discuss the matter.

   [Added: That’s probably a waste of time, now that we know that he’s been talking with Leo Donofrio.

6. Dr. Conspiracy February 21, 2009 at 7:39 pm #

   Since the Constitution nowhere defines “natural born citizen”, one must look elsewhere. Mr. Greschak has taken an essentially linguistic approach. I feel that a better argument can be made that citizen parents are not required (that part was rather a leap).

   This is certainly the most sophisticated thing to come out of the citizenship denial side to date. It bears careful analysis.

   The more I think about it, the more this essay looks fishy. First off, it is very long. Some of the repeated copies of alternate translations of Latin texts seems irrelevant to the conclusion. One wonders whether their inclusion is either to make the essay appear erudite or even if the attempt is to tire the reader so that they will give up and and click the Synopsis link rather than finishing the essay.

   Skipping the end of the essay is a bad thing because the entire argument is at the end. The Synopsis is nothing more than the conclusion without the intervening argument. If the reader reads half the essay and then skips to the Synopsis, they will not have read anything that supports the conclusion.

   In any case as I said, this is a sophisticated challenge and it will require some careful thought to unravel.

7. Dr. Conspiracy February 21, 2009 at 8:10 pm #

   HR, would you flesh out what you mean by “bordering on parody?” I am intrigued.

8. Expelliarmus February 21, 2009 at 8:46 pm #

   That idea — that there was some attempt to “get away” from British Common Law — just demonstrates total ignorance of law and US history. Any American law student knows otherwise, because we learn from the outset that American jurisprudence is laid on top of British common law, and so much of the early American case law goes back to British common law as a determinant of various questions. It’s common to see British holding cited as authorities in 19th century US Supreme Court holdings. I never heard of Vattel in law school — but I sure as hell knew Blackstone!

9. Expelliarmus February 21, 2009 at 8:56 pm #

   Google tells me that John Greshak might have very useful opinions to share in the fields of music and mathematics — he seems quite gifted in those arenas.

   But a quick scan of his essay tells me that, unfortunately, the man does not know the first thing about Constitutional law or American jurisprudence.

10. Expelliarmus February 21, 2009 at 9:01 pm #

    I disagree – the essay betrays naivite rather than sophistication in terms of legal analysis. It has a false aura of sophistication because of the type of argument advanced — but you could probably find examples of equally complex reasoning and citation to authorities in writings in support of creationism, yet none would be given a second look by a modern scientist.

11. Dr. Conspiracy February 21, 2009 at 9:14 pm #

    I appreciate your views. Sometimes I’m a little slower in reaching clarity.

12. Hitandrun February 22, 2009 at 5:29 pm #

    Doc,

    The parody, I’m sure, is unintended on Mr Greschak’s part, who has done yeoman’s work in assembling the “NBC” sources. Nonetheless, sophisticated readers like Expelliarmus might find Mr Greschak’s convoluted interpretations and conclusions bordering on parody. To my mind’s eye they do.

    Hitandrun

13. Hitandrun February 22, 2009 at 5:45 pm #

    richCares,

    You are misinterpreting Mr Greschak’s main point, which is that the requirements for “natural born citizen” status in the Constitution or elsewhere during the period of the Framers must include AT A MINIMUM all those he lists, and perhaps more.

    Incdentally, as Doc has already learned, Amb. Keyes in his personal essays does not lend credence to such Donofrio arguments. Dr Keyes, time and again, emphasizes that a foreign birth remains the major possibility which might vitiate Mr Obama’s eligibility — hence his demand for public disclosure of the vault document.

    Hitandrun

14. Expelliarmus February 22, 2009 at 7:41 pm #

    Strangely enough, we do agree on that point.

    I don’t agree that his convoluted interpretations lead to the conclusions he has drawn, either. He made a rather odd logical leap, based entirely on an unsupported assumption which seems to defy history, when he got to the point of deciding which sort of citizen would be “most numerous”.

15. Expelliarmus February 23, 2009 at 5:10 am #

    Here’s a link to Congressional hearings that go into the history of the “National Born Citizen” requirements in some depth:
    http://tinyurl.com/dlk55s

    The information there paints a very different picture than the claims of Greschak’s essay or Donofrio’s theorizing. There’s a lot to read there, but its interesting stuff.

    These hearings took place about 4 years ago, and the Senate Judiciary was considering a possible Constitutional Amendment to allow naturalized citizens to run for President, or a statute clarifying that children of citizens who were born abroad (like McCain) should be considered natural born. They all agreed consistently throughout that “natural born” did include all children born in the US, regardless of parentage, and they used the phrase “natural born” interchangeably with “native born”.

    Plus they pretty much discredit the theories about fears of foreign influence due to parentage.

    (Thank to mimi for providing me the link)

16. Dr. Conspiracy February 23, 2009 at 10:26 pm #

    The PDF version is now hosted here and added to the Bookmarks page under “S. Hrg. 108-694 — Maximizing Voter Choice: Opening the Presidency to Naturalized Americans, October 5, 2004 – TEXT 115K | PDF 3.3M”

17. Cymraeg February 28, 2009 at 12:12 am #

    As to “natural born citizen” I would suggest reading US v Wong Kim Ark 169 US 649 (1898). If you do read it get a very large cup of coffee, it is very long. I came to the conclusion that the court assumed this underlying principal: Within the class “Citizens” there are two and only two subclasses (1) “Natural Born Citizens”, and (2) “Naturalized Citizens”. In short the finding of the Court was that if you are born on US soil you are a natural and/or native born citizen (natural and native are used interchangeablyby the Court). THe nationality of the parents is irrelevant.

    If you notice the birthers never mention the Wong case.

    The other day I saw a birther blog that cited the Dred Scott case. I cannot believe someone could have been so idiotic.

18. Dr. Conspiracy February 28, 2009 at 1:15 am #

    Mr. Donofrio drones on about Wong.

19. Hitandrun March 25, 2009 at 1:20 pm #

    Doc,
    What happened to the Federalist Papers ‘common law’ references and the Apuzzo blog excerpt in your original article?
    Have they been moved to another thread?

    Hitandrun

20. Dr. Conspiracy March 25, 2009 at 4:51 pm #

    The previous version was “under construction”. The final version hacked a lot of stuff I was accumulating that I didn’t have any use for. Following is what the article used to say:

    The Law of Nations and the Law of the United States
    Original Content
    One of the more vexing nObama arguments is their redefinition of Natural Born Citizen. The primary way they attempt to do this is to assert that the definition of “natural born citizen” in the Constitution should be determined by a book by a Swiss philosopher and jurist from the 18th century name Emmerich de Vattel writing in a book loosely called “The Law of Nations”. The approach inflates de Vattel’s influence. A mindless literalism appears among the nObama when they say that an 18th century Swiss jurist de Vattel’s work, Le Droit des Gens. ou Principes de la Loi Naturelle, appliques a la conduite & aux affaires des Nations & des Souverains, is written into the US Constitution because the phrase “The Law of Nations” appears therein (and that is a translation of a bit of Vattel’s French title). I found the following comment posted on Apuzzo’s blog.

    [This is in response to your defenses of your beliefs that "the word 'natural' in the term natural born citizen is from the Natural Law".] Perhaps the root of our disagreement, or more specifically, the root reason why I have raised this point of disagreement is that I suspect, that in this discussion we are having concerning the meaning of the phrase “natural born Citizen of the United States”, Vattel’s text is a red herring. Here would be yet another example of why I would believe that to be the case. It has been stated that Vattel’s text was quite significant to the Framers. Also, it has been mentioned that Vattel’s text was read aloud in the Constitutional Convention. Yet, when one examines “Records of the Federal Convention of 1787″, by Max Farrand (1911), one does not find much evidence to support those statements. Farrand’s three volume work, which consists of roughly 2000 pages, is the most comprehensive source we have of what actually happened at the Constitutional Convention. In Farrand’s books, there are only four pages on which the word “Vattel” occurs and all of these instances pertain to three different accounts (by Madison, Yates, and King) of the same event in which a “Mr. Martin, the attorney general from Maryland”, spoke for roughly 3 hours on the subject of proportional representation. During that speech, it is reported that he read passages from Locke, Lord Somers, Dr. Priestly, and Vattel. Also, there were no occurrences of the following alternate spellings of Vattel: vatel, vatell, vatelle, vattell, vattelle, vittel, vitel, vitell, vitelle, vittell or vittelle; or Vattel’s or Vattels. I should also note that the phrase “natural law” was mentioned only once in all of Farrand’s three volume work (on page 452 of Volume 3, in “James Madison: Note to his speech on the right of suffrage”). While the phrase “law of nations” occurs at least 30 times, in all instances that I have examined, this phrase is being used as a generic term rather than one that refers to the specific system of laws that are Vattel’s “Law of Nations”. John Greschak

    Reference to common law in the Federalist Papers:

    FEDERALIST No. 37 Concerning the Difficulties of the Convention in Devising a Proper Form of Government From the Daily Advertiser. Friday, January 11, 1788. MADISON To the People of the State of New York: … The experience of ages, with the continued and combined labors of the most enlightened legislatures and jurists, has been equally unsuccessful in delineating the several objects and limits of different codes of laws and different tribunals of justice. The precise extent of the common law, and the statute law, the maritime law, the ecclesiastical law, the law of corporations, and other local laws and customs, remains still to be clearly and finally established in Great Britain, where accuracy in such subjects has been more industriously pursued than in any other part of the world. …

    Here common law that the law of nations (lower case) are used in the came context:

    FEDERALIST No. 42 The Powers Conferred by the Constitution Further Considered From the New York Packet. Tuesday, January 22, 1788. MADISON To the People of the State of New York: … The definition of piracies might, perhaps, without inconveniency, be left to the law of nations; though a legislative definition of them is found in most municipal codes. A definition of felonies on the high seas is evidently requisite. Felony is a term of loose signification, even in the common law of England; and of various import in the statute law of that kingdom. But neither the common nor the statute law of that, or of any other nation, ought to be a standard for the proceedings of this, unless previously made its own by legislative adoption. The meaning of the term, as defined in the codes of the several States, would be as impracticable as the former would be a dishonorable and illegitimate guide. It is not precisely the same in any two of the States; and varies in each with every revision of its criminal laws. For the sake of certainty and uniformity, therefore, the power of defining felonies in this case was in every respect necessary and proper. ,,, FEDERALIST No. 43 The Same Subject Continued (The Powers Conferred by the Constitution Further Considered) For the Independent Journal. Wednesday, January 23, 1788 MADISON To the People of the State of New York: THE FOURTH class comprises the following miscellaneous powers: 1. A power “to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing, for a limited time, to authors and inventors, the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.” The utility of this power will scarcely be questioned. The copyright of authors has been solemnly adjudged, in Great Britain, to be a right of common law. The right to useful inventions seems with equal reason to belong to the inventors. The public good fully coincides in both cases with the claims of individuals. The States cannot separately make effectual provisions for either of the cases, and most of them have anticipated the decision of this point, by laws passed at the instance of Congress.

    On the courts:

    FEDERALIST No. 81 The Judiciary Continued, and the Distribution of the Judicial Authority From McLEAN’s Edition, New York. Wednesday, May 28, 1788 HAMILTON To the People of the State of New York:

    Many citations here. Take the link to 81 preceding. Keep in mind the distinction between “common law” and British common law.

21. Ken Dunbar May 31, 2009 at 9:01 pm #

    Wong Kim Ark case?

    Okay. I’ll state a fact about it.

    In only ONE place does it use the phrase/term “natural born citizen”.

    Justice Grey [sic, Dr. C] :
    “Justice Grey [sic, Dr. C], in US v Wong Kim Ark (1898)
    http:// caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=169&invol=649

    “In Minor v. Happersett, Chief Justice Waite, when construing, in behalf of the court, the very provision of the fourteenth amendment now in question, said: ‘The constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that.’ And he proceeded to resort to the common law as an aid in the construction of this provision.”

    And as Grey [sic, Dr. C] was quoting the earlier case Minor vs Happersett… here is that portion,

    Chief Justice Waite in Minor v. Happersett (1875)
    http:/ / www. law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0088_0162_ZO.html

    “The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common-law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives, or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners. Some authorities go further and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction without reference to the citizenship of their parents. As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first.”

     

•  *********************************************

   

  3)  

Permalink Reply by Amelia Gora on July 10, 2012 at 4:09pm

1. Ken Dunbar May 31, 2009 at 8:50 pm #

   ” Letters of Delegates to Congress
   1774-1789
   Edited by Paul H. Smith, et al. (1976-93) ”
   http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/DelVol02.html , in “Volume 02” is Benjamin Franklin’s letter dated December 9, 1775 to Charles William Frederic Dumas.

   “I am much obliged by the kind present you have made us of your edition of Vattel. It came to us in good season, when the circumstances of a rising state make it necessary frequently to consult the law of nations. Accordingly that copy, which I kept, (after depositing one in our own public library here, and sending the other to the College of Massachusetts Bay, as you directed,) has been continually in the hands of the members of our Congress, now sitting, who are much pleased with your notes and preface, and have entertained a high and just esteem for their author. Your manuscript “Idee sur le Gouvernement et la Royaute” is also well relished, and may, in time, have its effect. I thank you, likewise, for the other smaller pieces, which accompanied Vattel.”

   Read Robert Trout’s piece.

   continue at http://maoliworld.com/forum/topics/the-house-of-nobles-has-been-in-place-with-the-acting-liaison-of