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00:00You know, ladies and gentlemen, this is my pocket copy of the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.
00:06Now, in the last half century, I've probably read this a thousand times.
00:12I've looked around it, those who wrote it, the history at the time, what they meant,
00:18depending on which words, which phrase, which section, which clause we're dealing with.
00:22And I went back and I took a look earlier today, and I cannot find this phrase, birthright citizenship.
00:28I have looked everywhere. I've looked in the penumbras and emanations, and I can't find it.
00:34I've looked at the invisible ink. I can't find it.
00:39Birthright citizenship. And yet, last week, there was a big argument in front of the Supreme Court.
00:45And the justices, a couple of them were really wise, but most of them were like, kind of strange.
00:51Getting into policy and politics and quirky examples and things of that sort.
00:57So I thought I'd bring us back down to earth and deal with this, because sometimes lawyers,
01:04particularly lawyers in black robes who think they're really smart, they get carried away with themselves.
01:10Let's get back to brass tacks here. Let's get back to the facts. You ready?
01:16We have this Dred Scott decision in 1857. It was a diabolical decision, and it held in short that blacks,
01:24whether enslaved or free, were not U.S. citizens.
01:28Now, the court, led by Chief Justice Roger Taney, ruled that black people, descendants of imported slaves,
01:35were not included in the citizenship definition of the Constitution, and I quote,
01:41had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.
01:44Now, that was a 72 decision, and the decision helped trigger the Civil War,
01:49our costliest war with over 700,000 casualties that almost destroyed the country.
01:54That war was fought for two reasons, to keep the Union together and to eliminate slavery.
02:01So following the Civil War, after these horrendous battles and these horrendous casualties and so forth,
02:08certain formerly Confederate states, they passed restrictive laws called black codes.
02:14Now, what did these black codes do?
02:16They limited the freedoms of former slaves.
02:18Despite the Civil War, it was also a time when the Klan came into being, founded by former Confederate generals
02:26and so forth.
02:27Well, Congress had already adopted the 13th Amendment in 1865, right at the end of the Civil War.
02:33That formally abolished slavery throughout the country.
02:37But they determined that the 13th Amendment alone was obviously not enough to guarantee freed slaves their civil liberties,
02:47including citizenship and equal rights and equal protection and due process.
02:53So Congress took action.
02:55After all, it was controlled by the Republicans.
02:57So Congress, in 1866, passed our first Civil Rights Act, the Civil Rights Act of 1866.
03:06Now, that act formally declared that all persons born in the United States, anywhere in the United States except Indians,
03:14were citizens, granting them equal protection under federal law.
03:18Why not Indians or Native Americans?
03:21Because in many cases, the tribes were considered their own nations.
03:27Their own nations.
03:29And you can be a citizen of two nations at the same time, especially within the Americas.
03:35So, they passed that.
03:37Now, what did it state in relevant part?
03:39The Civil Rights Act of 1866, which is crucially relevant to this discussion.
03:45Be it enacted that all persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power.
03:51In other words, not a citizen of another country.
03:55Excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States.
04:00This, again, was aimed at what?
04:03At the former slaves, their family, their children, their future children, and the black codes in these southern states that
04:15were preventing the implementation of equal rights and citizenship.
04:20And such citizens of every race and color, without regard to any previous condition of slavery or involuntary servitude,
04:28except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted,
04:33shall have the same right in every state and territory in the United States to make and enforce contracts,
04:39to sue, to be parties, and give evidence, to inherit, to purchase, to lease, to sell, to hold, and convey
04:46real and personal property,
04:48and to the full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings,
04:51for the security of every person and property, as is enjoyed by white citizens,
04:56and shall be subject to like punishment, pains, and penalties,
05:00and to none other, any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom to the contrary, notwithstanding.
05:05A complete repudiation of the Dred Scott and a complete repudiation of the black codes.
05:12So this act was intended to reverse the Supreme Court's decision and eliminate these black codes.
05:19So they passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866 in the overwhelmingly Republican Congress.
05:25And what happens?
05:26Well, the bill goes to a Democrat by the name of Andrew Johnson,
05:30who'd been vice president but became president on the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
05:34He's a Democrat from Tennessee.
05:36So President Johnson vetoed the Civil Rights Act of 1866.
05:42But there were enough Republicans in Congress to override his veto.
05:46So it remained the law.
05:47But the Republican Congress was concerned about the ease with which a law could be changed,
05:54or even eliminated down the road.
05:56They saw what Johnson tried to do.
05:58Thus was born the impetus for the 14th Amendment.
06:02Their purpose was to constitutionalize the Civil Rights Act of 1866.
06:08How do we know this?
06:09Because they told us this.
06:10John A. Bingham, B-I-N-G-H-A-M.
06:14These are great patriots.
06:15He was a House Republican from Ohio.
06:17In the House, he was the main drafter considered the Madison of the 14th Amendment,
06:23of the language in Section 1 of the 14th Amendment, which includes the Citizenship Clause.
06:29He was a member of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction in the 39th Congress,
06:34which formulated the amendment to provide a constitutional basis for civil rights following the Civil War.
06:42That is the constitutionalization of the 1866 Civil Rights Act.
06:46Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania, a well-known, famous, so-called radical Republican and Republican leader in the House,
06:55helped him draft the amendment and helped him usher it through the committee.
06:58On the other side of the Capitol, on the Senate, Senator Lyman Trumbull, a Republican of Illinois.
07:03Notice they're all Republicans.
07:05He had drafted the 13th Amendment that had been passed in 1865, abolishing slavery formally,
07:11and was a contributor, if not the main writer, of the Civil Rights Act of 1866.
07:17He was a key figure also in drafting that process of drafting of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution.
07:25Trumbull.
07:26Then we have Senator Jacob Howard, a Republican of Michigan,
07:30who introduced the amendment in the Senate, declaring, among other things,
07:33it would extend the Bill of Rights to the states.
07:37Every state.
07:38Now, what exactly does Section 1 of the 14th Amendment say?
07:44The language that is being debated, that was heard in front of the Supreme Court,
07:49which they say gave birth to birthright citizenship.
07:53Well, we know it doesn't say that.
07:55What exactly does it say?
07:59Quote, right here in my little pocket constitution,
08:03All persons born or naturalized in the United States, born or naturalized in the United States,
08:09and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.
08:12Remember, in the Civil Rights Act a few years earlier, which is intended to constitutionalize,
08:17it talked about having no allegiance to a foreign country or foreign nation.
08:22Here they basically implement that by saying subject to the jurisdiction thereof,
08:27meaning subject to the United States and the jurisdiction of the United States.
08:36Remember, they're doing this because of these black codes and these formerly Confederate states.
08:43They're citizens of the United States and of the citizen wherein they reside.
08:48No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United
08:55States,
08:55nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law
09:02or deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
09:07Boy, that doesn't sound like it has a lot to do with immigration, let alone the illegal immigrants,
09:12let alone the children of illegal immigrants in the United States, because it didn't.
09:16It was written in provisionums of illegal immigrants in response to the southern states,
09:17Now, before we put another Once, here's a kitchen 선택 of an increasingly
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