Tomorrow and The Time of Trump

Precisely at noon tomorrow, Donald J. Trump will place his hand on a bible and, for the second time, recite the 35-word Oath of Office that will bestow upon him the primary obligation of the President of the United States of America: thirty-five words that commit each new President to protect and defend the people’s Constitution. That is what every President's oath of office has required since George Washington. –to protect and defend the people’s Constitution.

American presidents offer no fidelity to any man, only to the Constitution of the United States. The Constitution, in that respect, is as close to sacred as a civil document can be. Fidelity to rules of governance rather than to a Head of State was established as the governing principle of America nearly two and a half centuries ago. It was earth-shaking. One reads through 53 paragraphs of the Constitution before reaching the first text that even mentions the word “President.”

The 52-word preamble to our Constitution conceived 243 years ago, was drafted to serve the people for all time thereafter. The drafting is precise; "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." Today, this sentiment is recognized among the most enduring and powerful words ever put to paper to memorialize a governing principle.

That’s a problem for President-elect Trump. The Constitution of the United States grants citizenship protections to individuals, many of whom, such as birthright citizens, Donald Trump doesn’t believe should be granted citizenship. These are individuals who, by virtue of being born in the United States, are automatically citizens of the United States even though their parents may not be.

For example, when someone enters the United States legally or illegally and gives birth to a child here, that child is an American citizen and entitled to all citizenship protections. Trump refers to birthright citizenship as “ridiculous.” Trump says he would seek to repeal birthright citizenship through executive action, which he cannot do because birthright citizenship is codified rock solid within the Fourteenth Amendment. The likelihood of securing an amendment to cancel the Fourteenth Amendment provisions establishing birthright citizenship is nil. Three-fourths of the states would have to approve such a proposed amendment after three-fourths of the House and Senate had approved the Amendment. It’s a herculean task and would have little or no chance of meeting such a threshold.

Trump, determined to overturn certain constitutionally protected rights, can only seek to cancel these protections through amendments to the Constitution, which bestowed these rights in the first place. The likelihood of succeeding is nil, given the difficulty of securing a nullifying amendment. While it is true that the 21st Amendment repealed the 18th Amendment, which ended prohibition in the United States, trying to repeal sections of the 14th Amendment to remove birthright citizenship would be a herculean task that would be almost certain to fail.

Perhaps Ronald Reagan said it best., “This, I believe, is one of the most important sources of America’s greatness. We lead the world because we are unique among nations; we draw our people, our strength, from every country and every corner of the world … Thanks to each wave of new arrivals to this land of opportunity, we’re a nation forever young, forever bursting with energy and new ideas, and always on the cutting edge; always leading the world to the next frontier.…” But that sense of belonging has been undergirded by the right of all children born on U.S. soil — no matter where, when, or how their parents came here — to claim citizenship.

When Fox News commentator Maria Bartiromo asked President-elect Trump how he would deal with government officials and other functionaries who oppose him, he replied, "I always say, we have two enemies; the outside enemy, and the enemy from within. The enemy from within, in my opinion, is more dangerous than China, Russia, and all these countries." Trump opined that a smart president could handle outside adversaries pretty easily, but the thing that's tougher to handle are these lunatics that we have inside, like Adam Schiff…" I call him the enemy from within," Trump said.

This week, President-elect Trump said he is preparing an executive order to remove the citizenship guarantee in the 14th Amendment, which states that those born in the United States are citizens. Not surprisingly, Sen. Lindsey Graham announced that he would introduce legislation to end birthright citizenship.

However, the Constitution cannot be negated by executive order, and Congress cannot emasculate constitutional protections by voting to nullify them.

Birthright citizenship is not something that insular politicians should savage. It has been over 150 years since the 14th Amendment guaranteed that anyone born in this country was a citizen of this country regardless of their parentage, race, or ethnicity. This was further codified more than a century ago when the Supreme Court determined that citizenship vests to children born in this country without regard to the status of their parents.

The Fourteenth Amendment that established birthrate citizenship plunged a sword between the shoulder blades of the odious Dred Scott decision, which established that Black people born in the United States were not citizens. They were, instead, a “subordinate and inferior class of beings” with “no rights or privileges unless the government decided to grant certain rights.” Citizenship was denied to enslaved people, even formerly enslaved people. Citizenship was also denied to their descendants. It was an odious decision by odious justices.

The 14th Amendment overturned Dred Scott. The Amendment redefined citizens as persons, any persons born or naturalized in this country and subject to the jurisdiction of this country. The passage of the 14^th Amendment granted citizenship to former slaves and their children, ending the scourge of slavery in America. Denying citizenship to children born in the United States to parents who may reside here permanently but are not citizens merely places the children, with few exceptions, in limbo. Most authorities agree that birthright citizenship serves the child and society well.

Please share our weekly commentary with others.

Of Thee I Sing 1776. Subscribe here:

https://oftheeising1776.substack.com/subscribe

Recent podcasts have featured my commentary on Liz Cheney’s book, “Oath and Honor,” as well as my commentaries regarding:

U.S. Representative Jim Jordan,

Brian Kemp and Those Republicans of Georgia,

The Trump Indictments,

The Fox Corp Settlement,

The CNN Trump Town Hall,

The Hunter Biden plea deal,

The New American Cult of Personality,

and my interviews with William Bratton, Retired Chief of Police in New York City, Los Angeles, and Boston;

Rikki Klieman, Attorney, Network News Analyst, and best-selling author;

John Thoresen, Executive Director, Barbara Sinatra Children’s Center;

Katherine Gehl, co-author of The Politics Industry and founder of the Institute for Political Innovation;

Jazz artist Ann Hampton Callaway;

Outlander author Diana Gabaldon;

AI Data Scientist Lawrence Kite;

Ryan Clancy, Chief Strategist of No Labels;

Former Senator Barbara Boxer;

Former Senator Joe Lieberman;

and former Maryland Governor Larry Hogan.

Novels by Hal Gershowitz