Can McCain Legally Be President?
Not if you believe being born in the Panama Canal Zone in 1936 doesn’t meet the requirement that a president has to be a “natural-born citizen” Article II Section I of the Constitution states:
No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.
Thursday’s New York Times reminds us that this debate is being revived, and that it is “not a frivolous issue” according to Atlanta lawyer Jill Pryor who wrote on this for the Yale Law Journal. The question was also raised in 1998 before McCain embarked on his 2000 bid.
To date, no American to take the presidential oath has had an official birthplace outside the 50 states.
I don’t think there’s a real problem here. A Washington Post page points out an act by the 1st Congress which states: “The children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond sea, or outside the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural-born citizens of the United States.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/campaigns/junkie/archive/junkie070998.htm
My family and I were concerned about my nephew being born in the Philippines, but my brother just had to show the embassy that he was a citizen, and it wasn’t a problem.
February 28th, 2008 at 2:40 pm
He’s not American? Get him out of here!
February 28th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
If it becomes an issue, it’ll just make those that bring it up now look like asses.
February 28th, 2008 at 6:55 pm
Old as he was, I thought he qualified under “a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution.”
February 29th, 2008 at 2:50 am