Constitutional Law, Politics

Arizona Bill Would Require Proof of U.S. Birth For Presidential Candidates

Arizona legislators are again wading into national politics. With the controversial immigration bill moving toward the Supreme Court, House has passed a bill that would require all presidential candidates to prove they were born in the U.S. by producing their birth certificates. It is a bill that this clearly crafted to exclude the current documents produced to show the birth of President Barack Obama. I am currently scheduled to discuss this legislation with Lawrence O’Donnell tonight

The legislation that would require presidential candidates to produce a birth certificate before they can be on the ballot in Arizona to show that he or she is a natural-born citizen of the U.S. and eligible to be president.

The bill requires that Arizona’s Secretary of State actually inspect the birth certificate. In a bizarre twist, it will also accept a baptism certificate.

Of course, any barrier to Arizona for Obama would not be a huge loss since, in 2008, Obama lost the state by nine percentage points. While that was a race against a native son (McCain), Arizona has only gone Democrat once (inn 1996) since 1948. However, 13 other states are not following suit with their own proposals.

Here is the full language of the bill.

The language is crafted to specifically require a long-form birth certificate or an array of other documents, including the bizarre addition of a baptismal record (which is hardly more authoritative than the current Hawaiian record).

The question is whether this will violate the U.S. Constitution. On one level (as with the immigration law), Arizona can claim to be merely carrying out federal conditions (in this case the conditions of Article II, Section I of the Constitution).

However, it would run against the language of the Full Faith and Credit Clause under Article IV, Section 1. Hawaii already recognizes this birth and Arizona would be refusing to accept that recognition. A birth certification would appear to fall under the language of “”public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state.”

Of course, Arizona can claim that, when there is a rivaling express provision under Article II, a state is not required to give Full Faith and Credit. Moreover, the state could argue that Full Faith and Credit requires proof in the form of these documents. On this latter argument, they are likely to cite the statement of Justice Joseph Story in Mills v. Duryee that makes references to authenticated copies:

It is argued, that this act provides only for the admission of such records as evidence, but does not declare the effect of such evidence, when admitted. This argument cannot be supported. The act declares, that the record, duly authenticated, shall have such faith and credit as it has in the state court from whence it is taken. If in such court it has the faith and credit of evidence of the highest nature, viz., record evidence, it must have the same faith and credit in every other court.

Notably, the Full Faith and Credit Clause is not generally viewed as requiring the recognition of same-sex marriage under a public policy exception as discussed in Pacific Employers Insurance v. Industrial Accident.

However, the issue of Arizona imposing higher showings to establish eligibility for office raises significant constitutional questions. I will be discussing this issue tonight on MSNBC.

Here is the key language:

A. The national political party committee for a candidate for president for a party that is entitled to continued representation on the ballot shall provide to the secretary of state written notice of that political party’s nomination of its candidates for president and vice‑president. Within ten days after submittal of the names of the candidates, the national political party committee shall submit an affidavit of the presidential candidate in which the presidential candidate states the candidate’s citizenship and age and shall append to the affidavit documents that prove that the candidate is a natural born citizen, prove the candidate’s age and prove that the candidate meets the residency requirements for President of the United States as prescribed in article II, section 1, Constitution of the United States.

B. The affidavit prescribed in subsection A shall include references to and attachment of all of the following, which shall be sworn to under penalty of perjury:

1. A certified copy of the presidential candidate’s long form birth certificate that includes at least the date and place of birth, the names of the hospital and the attending physician, if applicable, and signatures of any witnesses in attendance. If the candidate does not possess a long form birth certificate as required by this paragraph, the candidate may attach two or more of the following documents that shall take the place of the long form birth certificate if the candidate swears to their authenticity and validity and the documents contain enough information for the secretary of state to determine if the candidate meets the requirements prescribed in article II, section 1, constitution of the United States:

(a) Early baptismal or circumcision certificate.

(b) Hospital birth record.

(c) Postpartum medical record for the mother or child signed by the doctor or midwife or the person who delivered or examined the child after birth.

(d) Early census record.

2. A sworn statement or form that identifies the presidential candidate’s places of residence in the United States for fourteen years.

C. In addition to the requirements of subsection B, the presidential candidate may also submit a notarized affidavit from two or more persons who witnessed the presidential candidate’s birth.

D. If the secretary of state receives any documents in place of a long form birth certificate pursuant to subsection B, paragraph 1 and cannot determine if the presidential candidate meets the requirements prescribed in Article II, section 1, Constitution of the United States, the secretary of state may establish a committee to assist in the determination or hold hearings and submit any documents for forensic examination.

E. If both the presidential candidate and the national political party committee for that candidate fail to submit and swear to the documents prescribed in this section, the secretary of state shall not place that presidential candidate’s name on the ballot in this state. If the candidate and national political party committee for that committee submit and swear to the documents prescribed in this section, but the secretary of state believes that the preponderance of the evidence shows that the candidate does not meet the citizenship, age and residency requirements, the secretary of state shall not place that presidential candidate’s name on the ballot in this state.

F. A member of the house of representatives, a member of the senate or any other citizen of this state has standing to initiate an action to enforce this section.

Source: Arizona Republic

Jonathan Turley

395 thoughts on “Arizona Bill Would Require Proof of U.S. Birth For Presidential Candidates”

  1. Kevin (Dr. Con) had INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS CORPORATION which acquired Qs Technologies (I don’t recall the year, but I can find it if needed). Then the whole thing was sold to NetSmart in 2006 for ~1.5 Million. NetSmart engaged in contract with the Hawaii DOH; about 5 months before the sale of IS/Qs to NetSmart. (It is possible that Qs/Intelligent Systems had a contract with the Hawaii DOH prior to the contract with NetSmart, and that this was all part of a bigger deal. –I haven’t looked.)

    Find it strange that we have a person who is under contract with the Hawaiian Dept of Health blogging about Obama’s birth certificate.

    This is the company he owned until 2006.

    http://www.qsinc.com/about/index.html

    After the sale of IS/Qs, Dr. Con became General Manager and VP of Operations for NetSmart.

    http://www.lead411.com/Kevin_Davidson_1300374.html

  2. Jonathan, Not sure why you are fretting over this legislation. Fukima, the former Hawaii Dept. of Health Director, claims she saw Obama’s long-form birth certificate on file. If you check the Internet, you will find other people who have obtained their long-form birth certificates from the state of Hawaii and posted them online. I don’t see what the big deal is. Obama will simply have to get a certified copy of what Fukima has already told us is on file with the state. No problem. Right?

  3. People are demanding to see my birth certificate Kevin.

    and married or not, the U.S. Citizen parent was required to be 10 years a resident in the United States, five years of which had to be after the age of 14.

    8 USC 1601 –Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952

    (7) a person born outside the geographical limits of the United States and its outlying possessions of parents one of whom is an

    alien, and the other a citizen of the United States who, prior to the birth of such person, was physically present in the United States

    or its outlying possessions for a period or periods totaling not less than tell years, at least five of which were after attaining the age

    of fourteen years: Provided, that any periods of honorable service in the Armed Forces of the United States by such citizen parent may be included in computing the physical presence requirements of this paragraph.”

    http://www.scribd.com/doc/8693236/1952-Immigration-and-Nationality-Act-Title3-Chapter1

    You should notice that the statute doesn’t say anything about marriage.

    No matter how you or Dr. Conspiracy want to spin it the text of the law does not change. If you want to provide a court ruling wherein the statutory provision was declared unconstitutional we can explore that, but with clear evidence to the contrary what you or Dr. Conspiracy have to say about it is mindless drivel.

  4. Slartibartfast

    I have been an Obama supporter — voted for him, donated to him, blogged for him etc.

    I am really confused though why Obama’s Office of Management and Budget doesn’t demand that DOJ have actual meetings of the Data Integrity Board. One thing that is really strange though is that they did file a very short required report which they apparently signed without having a meeting. Or they didn’t conform with the Open Meetings Act.

  5. Bdaman could settle the issue of his allegations being shameful bigoted lies once and for all by just presenting indisputable facts that support them (he could then send his evidence to prosecutors – I’m sure that they would thank him for the help…) – yet he has failed to do so for at least 4 minutes! What is he hiding?

  6. That would be because there is no real dilemma, bdadistraction.

    There are lots of legitimate reasons to attack Obama’s legitimacy. Violating the Constitution and attacking Libya without Congressional approval simply because it made his nipples hard comes to mind. However, his citizenship simply isn’t one of the valid reasons to attack his legitimacy.

    Since it’s an invalid attack against an immutable fact of law, what is the possible motivation?

    Just a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing . . . other than the lame ass attempt to bring up the birther issue to appeal to the racists in the GOP-T. Simple lies to appeal to simple minds.

    Because surely no black man born in the U.S. could become President. He must be a one of them furrr-in-errs. Ain’t that right, Bubba?

  7. Not for nothing, but do any of you fanatics care about who the proper parties to this ‘birther lawsuit’ must be?

    See, the first step in analyzing a legal issue is identifying who the parties are; i.e. who’s on either side of the “vs.”

    Why? Because that defines the jurisdictional issues; e.g. personal and subject matter jurisdiction and those little matters regarding justiciability. And in some cases it also clarifies the legal issues that must be addressed.

    All this jabber about who and who is not a citizen and absolutely no discussion about who the proper parties would be and how on earth you’d ever get them into court.

    Sheer idiocy.

  8. Bdaman,

    In the words of George Carlin: “these are my rules, I make them up”

    Everyone here knows of your past bad faith in such matters as well as my past good faith – all of the issues you raised are more than throughly debunked in pages linked off of the one I gave. I choose not to play your asymmetric game today. Every allegation you’ve made here (overt or implied) is baseless, lying propaganda – go ahead, prove me wrong! If you wont (or, more likely, can’t) then STFU.

  9. 11% of democrats believe Obama not born in the U.S. according to John Kings interview. When your base stops believing you might want to reconsider your reasoning for not releasing your info.

  10. Say what you want, it still does not solve the dilemma.

    Obama could by telling Hawaii to release the info. But he won’t either he can’t or it’s part of his master plan.

  11. If you actually did competent research instead of talking points regurgitation, you might just find out how full of crap you really are, bdaman.

    Then again, maybe not.

  12. Find them myself? this is how you debate? You claim I won’t engage, then I do, then you tell me to do my own research?

  13. Bdaman,

    President Obama has never been asked to prove his natural born citizenship in court, but his natural born status has been proven (to a legal certainty) and don’t have any evidence to the contrary. The Arizona SoS has already recognized this fact as will any court in which the issue is pertinent.

    You said: “Again focus on all the evidence except for the one piece of evidence that would erase all doubt.”

    This is a contemptible lie – you should be ashamed. I’m done answering your crap for now, you’ll get nothing more from me today but derision as a response to your pathetic, dishonest crap.

    p.s. Think about all of the birther effort that went into passing a law so that the state of Arizona could certify President Obama to be a natural born citizen – how many birthers do you think will be pleased with that outcome?

    To everyone else:

    All of the birther crap that Bdaman spews is easily (though not necessarily quickly) debunked bullshit. Odds are he doesn’t even believe it himself (I don’t think he is stupid enough to believe the lies and propaganda he posts, but I could be wrong… ;-)).

  14. Bdaman said,

    “Dr. Dunham is known to have been a US citizen for her entire life and would have transmitted citizenship to her son even if he was born abroad”

    The naturalization laws in place at the time of Obama’s birth required “Dr. Dunham” to have been 19 years old to pass citizenship to a child born abroad. She was 18 years old at the time of Obama’s birth.

    Untrue – as a (legally) unmarried woman, she was old enough to transmit citizenship to her son if she gave birth on Mars (look up the law yourself – you can probably find a reference if you poke around Doc C’s, but I have no intention of doing the work just because you’re lazy…). I would have thought you’d be smart enough to avoid such an obvious trap. I guess I was wrong. It’s a moot point, anyway, since jus soli=NBC and President Obama was unquestionably (at least the only ones still asking the questions are bigots and idiots) born in Hawai’i.

    As to your link requests – I could provide links that give strong (and un-rebutted) evidence that President Obama is not guilty of any wrongdoing in regards to his SS#, but I’m not going to – find them yourself (actually, all of that can be found on the page I did link…). I can’t, however, debunk Mr. Hollister’s crime as I believe that he clearly committed a federal crime in obtaining President Obama’s Selective Service registration and I hope he is prosecuted for that crime to the fullest extent of the law…

  15. “It can also be said (entirely truthfully) that President Obama has released more information regarding his natural born status (including what is considered indisputable proof [at least lacking evidence to the contrary] in any US court including the SCOTUS) than any of his opponents or predecessors.”

    Neither Obama nor his predecessors have submitted any proof of being a natural born citizen in any court. Obama is the only one who has been challenged in court, and he still failed to provide any proof to the court.

    The question should be; Was there a background check performed on any of the past Presidents?

    We know that, going back as far as Truman, that with the exception of Clinton and Obama, those Presidents had previously served as Officers in the U.S. Military. Those Officers surely underwent background investigations before being granted a security clearance. You must be a U.S. Citizen in order to become a commission officer.

    Again focus on all the evidence except for the one piece of evidence that would erase all doubt.

  16. “Dr. Dunham is known to have been a US citizen for her entire life and would have transmitted citizenship to her son even if he was born abroad”

    The naturalization laws in place at the time of Obama’s birth required “Dr. Dunham” to have been 19 years old to pass citizenship to a child born abroad. She was 18 years old at the time of Obama’s birth.

  17. Could you provide a link that debunks Susan Daniels or Neil Sankey.

    Can you provide a link that debunks the number used on Obama’s selective registration form.

    Can you provide a link that debunks the crime that Col. Gregory Hollister committed in obtaining and the verification via the Social Security Number Verification Service that Obama’s social security number was “never issued” even though Obama used the social security number in his Selective Service Registration.

    Oh and Off topic

    Coming in 2020: 50 Million Environmental Refugees

    http://www.care2.com/causes/global-warming/blog/coming-in-2020-50-million-environmental-refugees/

  19. Were I live bumper stickers are popping up everywhere that says

    Somewhere in Kenya a village is missing an idiot

    Of course I live in the South with a bunch of racist bigoted T Party T Baggers that are confederate flag waving that have another sticker that says you can have my gun after you pry my dead fingers from it so that might not be saying too much 🙂

  20. Bdaman,

    DOMICILE
    The principal place of residence of an individual. This is determined primarily by intent. A good indication of domicile is where a person registers to vote.

    The place where a person has fixed his ordinary dwelling, without a present intention of removal. The law of domicil is of great importance in those countries where the maxim ‘actor sequitur forum rei’ is applied to the full extent.

    A man cannot be without a domicil, for he is not supposed to have abandoned his last domicil until he has acquired a new one. Though by the Roman law a man might abandon his domicil, and, until be acquired a. new one, he was without a domicil. By fixing his residence at two different places a man may have two domicils at one and the same time; for example, if a foreigner, coming to this country, should establish two houses, one in New York and the other in New Orleans, and pass one-half of the year in each; he would, for most purposes, have two domicils. But it is to be observed that circumstances which might be held sufficient to establish a commercial domicil in time of war, and a matrimonial, forensic or political domicil in time of peace, might not be such as would establish a principal or testamentary domicil, for there is a wide difference in applying the law of domicil to contracts and to wills.

    There are three kinds of domicils: 1. The domicil of origin. 2. The domicil by operation of law, or necessary domicil. 3. Domicil of choice.

    By domicil of origin is understood the home of a man’s parents, not the place where, the parents being on a visit or journey, a child happens to be born. Domicil of origin is to be distinguished from the accidental place of birth.

    There are two classes of persons who acquire domicil by operation of law. 1st. Those who are under the control of another, and to whom the law gives the domicil of another. Among these are: 1. The wife. 2. The minor. 3. The lunatic, etc. 2d. Those on whom the state affixes a domicil. Among this class are: 1. The officer. 2. The prisoner, etc.

    Among those who, being under the control of another, acquire such person’s domicil, are the wife. The wife takes the domicil of her hushand, and the widow retains it, unless she voluntarily change it, or unless she marry a second time, when she takes the domicil of the second husband.

    A party may have two domicils, one actual, the other legal; the husband’s actual and the wife’s legal domicil, are, prima facie, one. The domicil of the minor is that of the father, or in case of his death, of the mother. The domicil of a lunatic is regulated by the same principles which operated in cases of minors. The domicil of such a person may be changed by the direction, or with the assent of the guardian, express or implied.

    The law affixes a domicil. 1. Public officers, such as the president of the United States, the secretaries and such other officers whose public duties require a temporary residence at the capital, retain their domicils. Ambassadors preserve the domicils which they have in their respective countries, and this privilege extends to the ambassador’s family. Officers, soldiers, and marines, in the service of the United States, do not lose their domicils while thus employed. 2. A prisoner does not acquire a domicil where the prison is, nor lose his old.

    The domicil of origin, which has already been explained, remains until another has been acquired. In order to change such domicil, there must be an actual removal with an intention to reside in the place to which the party removes. A mere intention to remove, unless such intention is carried into effect, is not sufficient. When he changes it, he acquires a domicil in the place of his new residence and loses his original domicil. But upon a return with an intention to reside, his original domicil is restored.

    http://www.lectlaw.com/def/d071.htm

    Unquestionably, Dr. Dunham was domiciled in Hawai’i (The birthers are ultimately completely and utterly fucked by the fact that Dr. Dunham is known to have been a US citizen for her entire life and would have transmitted citizenship to her son even if he was born abroad* [which it is a scientific certainty that he was not]). I believe that by this definition, Barack Obama Sr. was as well, but I note that intent is significant and I would point out that marrying a citizen and having a child could be construed as having intent to stay in the country.

    *This depends on Dr. Dunham being legally unmarried at the time, but I don’t think that’s a problem since Barack Obama Sr. was a bigamist…

    Got any more ignorant misinformation to peddle?

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