Matt Chapman

There are no solutions, only trade-offs.

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@LoufactsIGB Born and raised basketball-obsessed Hoosier here. Had no idea Wemby is half white. Not sure how many casual white fans know, or more importantly, give a shit. Cool story though, homie.

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@ChelsElaina

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@johniadarola

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@elsathora 🤩

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@itsAntWright @pick_six22 When”keeping it real” goes wrong.

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@mehdirhasan

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@gman5180

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@majestymasculin Things women do that give men the ick: constantly whining about everything men do while pretending they themselves aren’t annoying as fuck.

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@SamuelSilvaJr @aryh21

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@ChelsElaina

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@ChelsElaina

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@robelliott6 @KirkHaston35IU @sagesteele Rob, go practice falling down.

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@elsathora It was a magical place as a kid in the 80’s.

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@emmitonair McHale

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@MishGEA https://t.co/I0laKzZVML

[Tom Woods @ThomasEWoods]

Trump is of course right about birthright citizenship, and here's why.

The Fourteenth Amendment begins, "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 to consider there when considering who is a "natural-born citizen" is "subject to the jurisdiction thereof." The argument of Trump's legal supporters is that illegal immigrants are subject to a foreign sovereignty, are therefore not subject to U.S. jurisdiction, and thus the citizenship clause above does not apply.

The "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" clause, effectively ignored by birthright citizenship advocates, has to have some meaning or it wouldn't have been included, and the number of children of foreign diplomats being vanishingly small, we can assume it extended beyond that extremely rare case (so rare as hardly to be worth mentioning).

What was meant by the clause was that you had to be subject to no other sovereign.

Senator Jacob Howard drafted the citizenship clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Here is what he said it meant: "This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons." (Emphasis added.)

Well, if we value honesty, that right there should settle it.

Congressman John Bingham, sometimes called the father of the Fourteenth Amendment itself, held that its meaning was that "every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen." (Emphasis added.)

Beyond this evidence, two Ivy League professors, Peter Schuck and Rogers Smith, in Citizenship Without Consent: Illegal Aliens in the American Polity, published by Yale University Press, make a compelling case that the Fourteenth Amendment does not mandate birthright citizenship.

The two scholars begin a Summer 2018 article in National Affairs this way:

If an unauthorized alien gives birth to a child on American soil, is the child automatically a United States citizen? Americans have long assumed that the answer is yes — that the child is a birthright citizen regardless of the parent's legal status, and that such citizenship is required and guaranteed by the Constitution. But a closer examination of the matter suggests that this answer is actually incorrect, and that birthright citizenship for the children of immigrants here illegally is better understood as a matter for Congress and the American people to resolve.

What makes their conclusion especially interesting is that Schuck and Smith describe themselves as scholars who "strongly favor even more legal immigration than the U.S. now accepts, and a generous amnesty for those now here illegally."

So even though their conclusion runs counter to their personal political beliefs, and they are not Trump sympathizers in the least, they contend that the evidence is so strong against birthright citizenship that scholarly honesty compels them to say so: "The fact that many opponents of birthright citizenship for the children of unauthorized parents harbor anti-immigrant views does not mean that their bottom-line position is wrong."

They argue that because the Constitution does not mandate birthright citizenship, the matter may be regulated by congressional statute instead.

There was no "illegal immigration" problem at the time the Fourteenth Amendment was drafted, so (even though we have the testimony of Jacob Howard, which would seem to settle the matter), Schuck and Smith suggest using the example of Native Americans to shed light on the issue:

The framers vested such discretion [regarding the citizenship question] in Congress with respect to Native Americans, whose presence in the country (which of course long predated that of the framers themselves) was manifestly accepted. This was recognized in the 14th Amendment's own text, a long line of treaties with the tribes, and legislation regulating their citizenship. We doubt the framers would have denied Congress that same policy choice with respect to a group whose very presence in the country — by definition — violates federal law. Basic constitutional protections for this group would certainly have been granted, as in Plyler. But automatic citizenship without public debate and congressional consent would probably not have been. [Emphasis added.]

This is one very good reason that history matters. Not so much because we can always draw neat little "lessons" from it, but because if we have a deep knowledge of history we will be better equipped to respond to shysters trying to pull one over on us. (1/2)

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@FinFreedom414 B. Not even close.

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@adamtaggart

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@jasonwhitlock Goodman is a twerp. Amazing anyone with credibility in the game of basketball would take him seriously.

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@ChelsElaina

[Matt Chapman @mattschapman]

@FloraLuzz_ If only everyone who threatened to leave would