New Hampshire Senate candidates are split on amending the 14th amendment
With the Obama regime readying a push to grant illegal aliens amnesty this issue could be at the forefront of the midterm elections in November. There has been much talk lately about the possibility of amending the 14th amendment to end birthright citizenship for babies born to parents of illegal aliens while they are on American soil.
So as the election approaches here in New Hampshire, all of the candidates running for the senate seat that is being vacated by the retiring Judd Gregg, were asked where they stand on the issue of amending the 14th amendment.
It goes without saying that the lone Democrat running for this seat–Paul Hodes–is against amending the 14th amendment. But where do the Republican candidates for the Senate stand? They are split on this issue.
Kelly Ayotte and Bill Binnie support the possibility of amending the 14th amendment after more review, while Ovide Lamontagne and Jim Bender do not.
Here is what Kelly Ayotte and Bill Binnie (who is a naturalized citizen) had to say:
We first need to start securing our border and enforcing existing law and (making) English the official language,” Ayotte said. “Congress can do those three things immediately and then we can take a look to see if we need to amend the 14th Amendment
Binnie issued a statement saying, “Our charity as a nation and our immigration laws are being abused. We need to secure our borders and enforce our immigration laws and I support reviewing the language of the 14th amendment
Both candidates support securing the border first, and enforcing current immigration laws before taking a look at amending the 14th amendment, but they are open to the idea.
Ovide Lamontagne and Jim Bender also support securing the border and enforcing current laws, but they do not support amending the constitution, but both believe that a more reasonable change will alleviate the problem.
Both Ovide Lamontagne and Jim Bender support the Birthright Citizenship Act of 2009, which would amend the Immigration and Nationality law to ensure that only babies born to legal aliens would be granted birthright citizenship.
Here is what Jim Bender had to say about this:
That’s a much more reasoned approach to the problem we’re trying to address,” said Bender. “Repealing the 14th Amendment is a huge over-reaction to the problem
Ovide Lamontagne’s comment:
“I do not believe the 14th Amendment needs to be amended to address the issue of ‘anchor babies’ born in the United States to illegal aliens.”He said the key phrase in the 14th Amendment is “subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” and Smith’s proposed change in law would make it clear children born to illegal immigrants would not be subject to jurisdiction and therefor not have birthright citizenship.
“Changing the statute is the way to go rather than an amendment, and it will be quicker that way as well,” Lamontagne said.
Paul Hodes–the lone Democrat in the race–supports neither amending the constitution nor Birthright Citizenship Act of 2009, and is claiming that the Republican Senate hopefuls are using the fate of babies born to illegal aliens for political gain:
The Kelly Ayotte and Sarah Palin team would trample on the rights of Americans simply to score political points. I will not support any proposal to weaken, rewrite, or repeal the 14th Amendment of our Constitution
I happen to agree with Paul Hodes slightly here; as I said in my original post on the topic of amending the constitution to eliminate birthright citizenship, I stated that I believe Republicans are throwing this idea out there during an election year in an attempt to gain political points all the while knowing that nothing is ever going to come from this. But that is where my agreement with Paul Hodes ends, because I do support amending the constitution to end birthright citizenship. And I also know that while Paul Hodes talks about securing the border, in the end he will do what he always does, fall in line with the president and vote for granting amnesty to illegal aliens.
But I also understand that this is never going to happen, and even if the process was started, it would take years for the amendment to be ratified by enough states to institute the change, and time is something that we do not have. So why not look at other options to end this practice? The man that I have endorsed for the Senate–Ovide Lamontagne–has stated that instead of changing the 14th amendment, he would support the Birthright Citizenship Act of 2009, which would accomplish the same goal–only quicker. That seems like a reasonable position to me.
The question is, would this law be constitutional or would it violate the very same amendment that some want to see overturned? I don’t know the answer to this question, but I am going to render a guess anyway.
The 14th 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 key phrase here–as Ovide Lamontagne pointed out–is “and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” but the constitution does not clarify who those people are that are subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.
Because of this, the Immigration and Nationality Law determines who is subject to the laws of the United States, so if the Birthright Citizenship Act of 2009 changes the language so that only babies born to legal aliens are citizens, I am not sure how this would violate the constitution because the constitution is silent on this issue.
This seems much more expedient answer to the question of anchor babies to me–but as we saw with the federal government’s reaction to the Arizona immigration law–we can expect a challenge from the Obama regime on the constitutionality of such a law, thereby offsetting the value of enacting this law over amending the constitution.
It seems to me that while I favor changing the constitution to disallow anchor babies, supporting the Birthright Citizenship Act of 2009 might be the better approach to this problem. The only concern that I have is that it would be much easier to reverse this law than it would be to amend the constitution after the 14th amendment was amended. Although, as I feel that the 14th amendment will never be amended, I think that this is an option that should be looked at seriously.
I would be happier if Ovide Lamontagne hadn’t ruled out the possibility of amending the constitution on this issue, but I do think that he may have hit on a better, more expedient way to remedy one of the biggest problems facing this country.
America's Watchtower 
“So this is how liberty dies, with thunderous applause.” And a picture of Obama at a rally. So, Obama is the death of liberty??? Were you crying about the death of liberty when the various Patriot Acts were being rushed through Congress? When warrantless wire taps were being used against American citizens? Where you worried about deficits when Bush, Jr., was was cutting the taxes for the elite class? When Bush, Jr., was doubling the National Debt? Were you crying about the death of liberty at the 2004 election speeches by Bush and Cheney, when Americans who wanted to voice their opinions were herded into Free Speech Zones, far removed from the media as well as the politicians they wanted to address? Were you concerned about America when 75 of Bush, Jr’s, top aides and cabinet members had dual citizenship? I.e., they had sworn oaths of allegiance to a foreign power?
As long as you keep this a fight between the Liberal Left and the Conservative Right, youll be doing this nation a disservice. The real fight is between the Corporate Elites and The People. Right now, The People are losing every day.
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I’m sorry, what does that have to do with this post…..
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It’s a comment about the wallpaper here…. That’s not okay?
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Oh boy, a troll! can I feed him, dad?
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Hey, I was reading this page about people wanting to change the Constitution as a reaction to anchor babies, and I happened to see that absurd quotation about how liberty dies to thunderous applause. I’m no fan of Obama— he’s yet another stooge in a system that will destroy our freedoms, but he’s a piker at that compared to the regime that preceded him. So, I reacted to what I saw. If your way of dismissing the content of what I said is to brand me as a troll, well, if that works for you, great!
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Oops, I fed him without your permission. Say, if you want an amusing guide to trolls: http://rsmccain.blogspot.com/2009/04/quick-guide-to-blog-trolls.html.
Based on that guide, it appears what we have here is a case of trollmania: “the compulsion to comment disruptively on other people’s blogs.”
don’t worry, I won’t feed him anymore.
cheers!
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What, then, is the purpose of having a “comments” section? “Please leave a comment as long as it agrees with me, supports my world-view, and/or compliments me on the brilliance of my blog post. As for opposing ideas, I’ve already heard them all, and I already know everything. I’m not interested in anything that challenges my belief system. The purpose of this blog is to preach to the choir. So, if you’re not going to pick up the hymn book and sing along, please refrain from making comments.”
Our nation has never been in greater peril than it is today. To be strong enough for the task, the ideas that will lead us out of our danger need to be hammered out on the anvil of rigorous discourse and plunged into an icy bath of what’s true, what’s real, what’s workable. That cannot happen if the forum of ideas is only open to blinded ideologues —of whatever persuasion— who only listen to those who agree with them.
And that’s not going to happen, is it? While Left bickers with Right, and Conservative bashes Liberal, monstrous changes will take place as they are doing now, and we will wake up to an America unrecognizable as such.
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You have seriously mischaracterized me and my blog. If you had searched through previous posts you will see that I allow All comments to stand–including those that only serve to insult me–and I will debate those comments as well. I am not interested in only hearing from people who agree with me, that does not move the debate forward. However, comments to specific posts should remain on topic–your’s did not and that is the reason why people might brand you a troll. If you had wanted to comment on something unrelated to the post, you should have left that comment on the “Feedback” page, if you had I would have responded to your comment.
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No problem, it can be fun!
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Steve, I wrote what I wrote. Your response was to ask what that had to do with the topic of the article. I replied that I was commenting, not on the article, but on something else I saw on this web page. If you had replied by saying, “Comments to specific posts should remain on topic. If you have something else to say, go to such-and-such a page,” I would certainly have respected that. I didn’t know what your rules are, which is different from disregarding them.
You said below that I am “pretending” not to know what I had done wrong. The reason I didn’t know what I had done wrong is because I didn’t know what the rules here are. If your perception of what I wrote is that its purpose was to somehow avoid discussing the move to amend the Constitution, or to sabotage such a discussion, that’s certainly not at all true. I was directed to this site by a post at Reddit, I saw something I felt strongly about, and I made my comment about it. In doing so, I broke rules that I didn’t know you had. When challenged about this, I responded. You and your friends apparently seem to suspect that I am some sort of agent of The Left, here to disrupt your discussions. I assure you, I am no such creature, and had no such intentions. Whether you believe that or not is your affair. My responsibility ends with my simply telling you the honest truth.
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Troll 101, take the post off topic to avoid discussing the topic at hand.
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What’s the old saying, “fail troll is fail?”
Anyway, to actually discuss the CONTENT of the article…
Steve, as you point out, this is a complicated issue, while it will take years to get a Constitutional Amendment ratified, it is worth the effort. At the same time, passing the Birthright Citizenship Act might have merit, if they can get it past Obama’s veto pen. However, such a law will only survive for about 15 seconds after hitting a liberal judge’s court.
At any rate, every effort should be made to deal with the problem. And, if the GOP thinks they can talk a good game at election time, and then go back to the status quo once in office (as they have done for decades), they have another thing coming. The days of us going dormant once the GOP wins are over. A new GOP majority will find out that we will show up at their offices and their town hall meetings to remind them of their promises.
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Don’t you love the way Jack is pretending that he doesn’t understand what he has done wrong?
I do agree that amending the constitution is worth the effort, we must try to move this idea forward. The Birthright Citizenship Act intrigues me because it could be done so much quicker, having said that, I agree with you that this will end up being challenged in court and probably thrown out. That is why we still must try to amend the constitution.
I think that the primary results prove your last point; we are not going to simply vote in Republicans because the are Republicans, they have to hold firm to conservative ideas. If they do not, we will get rid of them.
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I think that if the GOP fails more, past 2012, we’ll likely do to them what they did to the Whigs. It won’t be pretty.
Jack just wants us to respond to his smug arguments. Then, we responding to him, instead of discussing the issue. Unwarranted self importance, if you ask me.
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If Republicans haven’t already learned their lesson, they will learn it the hard way.
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