{"id":179133,"date":"2016-02-05T18:02:57","date_gmt":"2016-02-05T23:02:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/webadmin.news-harvard.go-vip.net\/gazette\/gazette\/?p=179133"},"modified":"2019-03-04T16:19:02","modified_gmt":"2019-03-04T21:19:02","slug":"a-question-of-citizenship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2016\/02\/a-question-of-citizenship\/","title":{"rendered":"A question of citizenship"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t
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During a forum at Harvard Law School, Laurence Tribe, the Carl M. Loeb University Professor and Professor of Constitutional Law, argued that Sen. Ted Cruz is ineligible to hold the presidency, using what he called Cruz\u2019s own strict interpretation of the Constitution. <\/p>

Kris Snibbe\/Harvard Staff Photographer<\/p><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\t

\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\tNation & World\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\n\t\t

\n\t\tA question of citizenship\t<\/h1>\n\n\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t
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\n\t\tLiz Mineo\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t

\n\t\t\tHarvard Staff Writer\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/address>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t

\n\t\t\tLegal scholars debate Cruz\u2019s eligibility to serve as president\t\t<\/h2>\n\t\t\n<\/header>\n\n\n\n
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With his surprising victory in the Iowa caucuses last Sunday, Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz solidified his status near the top of the GOP field. But in the background, the controversy over his birthplace and his eligibility for the nation\u2019s highest office simmered on.<\/p>\n

At the forum \u201cIs Ted Cruz Eligible to Be President?\u201d held Friday at Wasserstein Hall in Harvard Law School<\/a> (HLS), two constitutional scholars debated whether Cruz\u2019s birth in Calgary, Alberta, to a Cuban father and an American mother disqualifies him to serve as president.<\/p>\n

Laurence Tribe<\/a>, the Carl M. Loeb University Professor and Professor of Constitutional Law, who teaches at HLS, argued that Cruz is ineligible to hold the presidency, using what he called Cruz\u2019s own strict interpretation of the Constitution.<\/p>\n

\u201cCruz claims that the narrow, historical meaning of the Constitution is literal, except when it comes to the \u2018natural born citizen\u2019 clause,\u201d said Tribe, who taught Cruz when he was a student at HLS in 1994.<\/p>\n

The crux of the matter is that the Constitution, in Article II, Section 1, Clause 5, states that \u201cno person except a natural born citizen\u201d can be president.<\/p>\n

Under English common law, upon which U.S. law was based, a \u201cnatural born citizen\u201d would be someone born on American soil. For Tribe, according to this definition, Cruz does not qualify. He compared Cruz to Alexander Hamilton, a founding father who was born in Nevis, but qualified as a U.S. citizen at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, and former presidential candidate John McCain, who was born in the Panama Canal Zone when it was under U.S. control.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnlike Cruz, McCain was born in U.S. territory,\u201d said Tribe. \u201cAnd unlike Cruz, McCain was born to two U.S. citizens, parents who had been deployed to the Panama Canal Zone by the military to serve the country.\u201d<\/p>\n

But for Jack Balkin, a constitutional law professor at Yale University, Cruz is a \u201cnatural born citizen\u201d because under U.S. immigration law in 1970, he automatically became an American because his mother was one. The law grants birthright citizenship to a child born overseas if one parent is a U.S. citizen.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe question is: What was the law in 1970 when Cruz was born?\u201d said Balkin. \u201cThe law in 1970 was that if one of your parents was a U.S. citizen and has established residency before your birth, you become automatically a U.S. citizen by birth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tribe and Balkin did agree that cogent arguments could be made both in favor of and against Cruz\u2019s eligibility by using different interpretations of the Constitution and existing laws.<\/p>\n\r\n\t\n\n\t

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Countering Tribe was Jack Balkin, a constitutional law professor from Yale, who said Cruz is a \u201cnatural born citizen\u201d because under U.S. immigration law in 1970, he automatically became an American because his mother was one.\u00a0Kris Snibbe\/Harvard Staff Photographer\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\n\t\r\n\n

Tribe said he\u2019d be open to interpretations allowing a flexible reading of the \u201cnatural born citizen\u201d clause. A self-described liberal, Tribe represented Democratic candidate Al Gore in Bush v. Gore during the dispute over the 2000 presidential election.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs an unapologetic living constitutionalist,\u201d said Tribe, \u201cI\u2019m someone who believes that constitutional terms of art, like \u2018natural born citizen,\u2019 can be flexible enough to accommodate changing national values, experiences, and practices. So I\u2019m at least open to the view that Cruz should be deemed eligible under an expanded understanding of the \u2018natural born citizen\u2019 clause.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Cruz, a U.S. senator from Texas who was campaigning in nearby New Hampshire Friday in advance of Tuesday\u2019s primary election there, his citizenship is settled law. But after Cruz\u2019s surging victory in Iowa, his Republican rival Donald Trump, who came in second, renewed his attacks over the issue. Trump has joked that Cruz should run for office in Canada. Cruz renounced his latent Canadian citizenship when he ran for office in the United States.<\/p>\n

Tribe and Balkin did agree that the matter is not settled.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe question is anything but open-and-shut,\u201d said Tribe. \u201cIn no possible sense has this issue been settled, either by the Supreme Court or political process or by popular consensus.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sponsored by the Harvard Federalist Society<\/a>, the debate drew an audience that filled the room despite the snowstorm. Among those on hand was law student Chris Danello, who summed up the issue afterward.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt exposed the divide not just on the right and the left,\u201d he said, \u201cbut also among the many ways to interpret the Constitution.\u201d<\/p>\n\r\n\n

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