Table Of ContentAmendment XIV
Citizenship for All
Date: October 7, 2008 Comp Specialist: adarga Edit session: 581
Other Books of Related Interest
Opposing Viewpoints Series
Civil Liberties
Feminism
Race Relations
Work
Working Women
Current Controversies Series
Civil Liberties
Extremist Groups
Feminism
Human Rights
Amendment XIV
Citizenship for All
Jeff Hay, Book Editor
Date: October 7, 2008 Comp Specialist: adarga Edit session: 582
ChristineNasso,Publisher
ElizabethDesChenes,ManagingEditor
©2009GreenhavenPress,apartofGale,CengageLearning.
GaleandGreenhavenPressareregisteredtrademarksusedhereinunderlicense.
Formoreinformation,contact:
GreenhavenPress
27500DrakeRd.
FarmingtonHills,MI48331-3535
OryoucanvisitourInternetsiteatgale.cengage.com
ALLRIGHTSRESERVED.
Nopartofthisworkcoveredbythecopyrighthereinmaybereproduced,transmitted,
stored,orusedinanyformorbyanymeansgraphic,electronic,ormechanical,including
butnotlimitedtophotocopying,recording,scanning,digitizing,taping,Webdistribution,
informationnetworks,orinformationstorageandretrievalsystems,exceptaspermitted
underSection107or108ofthe1976UnitedStatesCopyrightAct,withoutthepriorwritten
permissionofthepublisher.
Forproductinformationandtechnologyassistance,contactusat
GaleCustomerSupport,1-800-877-4253
Forpermissiontousematerialfromthistextorproduct,submitallrequestsonlineat
www.cengage.com/permissions
Furtherpermissionsquestionscanbeemailedtopermissionrequest@cengage.com
ArticlesinGreenhavenPressanthologiesareofteneditedforlengthtomeetpagerequire-
ments.Inaddition,originaltitlesoftheseworksarechangedtoclearlypresentthemain
thesisandtoexplicitlyindicatetheauthor’sopinion.Everyeffortismadetoensurethat
GreenhavenPressaccuratelyreflectstheoriginalintentoftheauthors.Everyefforthas
beenmadetotracetheownersofcopyrightedmaterial.
Coverphotograph©MortonBeebe/Corbis.
LIBRARYOFCONGRESSCATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATIONDATA
AmendmentXIV:citizenshipforall/JeffHay,bookeditor.
p.cm.--(Constitutionalamendments)
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN-13:978-0-7377-4124-7(hardcover)
1.Citizenship--UnitedStates.2.Citizenship--UnitedStates--History.3.United
States.Constitution.14thAmendment.4.AfricanAmericans--Civilrights.
5.Immigrants--Civilrights--UnitedStates.I.Hay,Jeff.II.Title:Amendment
14.III.Title:AmendmentFourteen.
KF4700.A962009
342.7308’3--dc22
2008031773
Printed in the United States ofAmerica
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 12 11 10 09 08
Contents
Foreword 11
Amendment Text and Explanation 14
Introduction 18
Chronology 26
Chapter 1: Historical Background on the
Fourteenth Amendment
The Fourteenth Amendment Confirms That 32
African Americans Are Indeed U.S. Citizens
Akhil Reed Amar
A Constitutional scholar examines how the Fourteenth
Amendment overturned the Supreme Court’s Dred Scott
decision of 1857, which had declared that black people
could never be full citizens of the United States and
which was one of the important factors inspiring the
American Civil War of 1861 to 1865.
The Fourteenth Amendment Emerged Out of 41
an Earlier Civil Rights Act
Kenneth L. Karst
A legal scholar illustrates how the effort to ensure that all
Americans were citizens was challenged by attempts to
restrict the freedoms of African Americans in Southern
states after the Civil War.
It Is Absurd to Consider Former Slaves 49
Anything Other than Full Citizens
James F. Wilson
In a congressional debate, a senator from Iowa argues
that the Fourteenth Amendment reinforces the U.S.Con-
stitution as well as long-standing legal and political tra-
ditions.
Date: October 10, 2008 Comp Specialist: adarga Edit session: 588
The Fourteenth Amendment Would Establish 55
Federal Despotism over the Individual States
A.J. Rogers
A New Jersey congressman claims that the Fourteenth
Amendment, by requiring citizenship for all former
slaves, will unjustly restrict the rights of the states to
make their own policies. This will amount to the sort of
tyranny that helped inspire the American Revolution.
Reconstruction Inspired Political Debate 60
and Public Violence
Eric Foner
The author notes that by the 1866 presidential election,
the debate over the Fourteenth Amendment was at the
center of attempts to reconstruct the relationship be-
tween America’s federal government and the states.
The Fourteenth Amendment Will Help 70
America Fulfill Its Promise
Thaddeus Stevens
A congressman who was one of the Fourteenth
Amendment’s most active supporters reflects on the rati-
fication of the amendment in 1868.
America Committed Itself to Citizenship 76
for People of All Ethnicities
Earl Warren
A former chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court notes
that the Fourteenth Amendment, along with the Thir-
teenth and Fifteenth (the other Reconstruction
Amendments), marked a major change in the relation-
ship between whites and blacks.
Chapter 2: Testing the Fourteenth
Amendment’s Citizenship Clause
The Fourteenth Amendment Ensures 84
Citizenship to All People Born on U.S. Soil
Horace Gray
In an 1898 decision the U.S. Supreme Court determined
that Wong Kim Ark, whose parents were Chinese immi-
grants but who was born in San Francisco in 1873, was a
naturalized citizen of the United States. The decision
stood despite the Chinese Exclusion Acts then in place,
which denied citizenship to actual immigrants from
China.
The Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship 93
Clause Is Contrary to Legal Tradition and Sets
a Dangerous Precedent
Melville Fuller
Expressing his dissent in the Wong Kim Ark case, a Su-
preme Court justice claims that citizenship by descent,
rather than citizenship by birthplace, is the stronger tra-
dition in both English and American history.
A Naturalized U.S. Citizen Cannot Have His 98
or Her Citizenship Taken Away Without Consent
Hugo Black
The Fourteenth Amendment guarantees U.S. citizenship,
and a naturalized American citizen cannot have his or
her privileges taken away. The U.S. Supreme Court
reached this conclusion in a 1968 case, Afroyim v. Rusk,
in which an American citizen found his rights removed
for voting in a foreign election.
The Fourteenth Amendment Does Not 107
Guarantee Citizenship in All Circumstances
John Marshall Harlan
This dissenting opinion contends that the majority deci-
sion in Afroyim v. Rusk (1968) is unwarranted, because
the Fourteenth Amendment does not provide for placing
restrictions on Congress’s ability to deal with foreign
powers or foreign nationals.
Date: October 10, 2008 Comp Specialist: adarga Edit session: 590
Individual States Cannot Deny Public Education 114
to the Children of Undocumented Immigrants
William Brennan
Using a combination of the citizenship and equal protec-
tion clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Supreme
Court determines that the state of Texas cannot deny
public education to those living in the United States.
Chapter 3: Citizenship Controversies
in Contemporary America
The Fourteenth Amendment’s Guarantee of 125
Birthright Citizenship Should Be Changed
Ron Paul
The Texas congressman argues that some recent immi-
grants abuse the Fourteenth Amendment at great cost to
American institutions.
Current Debates over Citizenship for Immigrants 129
Recall Arguments from Earlier Times
Garrett Epps
The writer argues that those who seek to restrict citizen-
ship rights for immigrants in twenty-first-century
America sound remarkably like those who tried to re-
strict German or other newcomers in earlier periods of
U.S. history.
Illegal Immigrants Abuse the 135
Fourteenth Amendment by Having Babies in
the United States
Dmitri Vasillaros
A columnist examines the case of a would-be immigrant
mother with a small child seeking sanctuary to avoid de-
portation, a fate she has faced already.
Recent Immigrants and Their Babies 139
Are No Threat
Priscilla Huang
An activist argues that the claim that immigrant mothers
come to the United States simply to give birth is miscon-
ceived and politically motivated.
The Fourteenth Amendment Allows for 143
Dual Citizenship and Divided Loyalties
Allan Wall
The author contends that the Fourteenth Amendment
and other rules and regulations make it too easy for re-
cent immigrants to maintain dual citizenship and,
thereby, not fully commit themselves to America.
Despite an Increase in Dual Citizenship, 148
Most Immigrants Are Loyal to the United States
Michael Barone
The author notes that immigrants from Mexico show
little evidence of “transnational” loyalties despite both a
rise in dual citizenship and less pressure to fully assimi-
late into mainstream American life than earlier immi-
grants faced.
Appendices 154
A. The Amendments to the U.S. Constitution 156
B. Court Cases Relevant to the
Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause
For Further Research 159
Index 162
Date: October 10, 2008 Comp Specialist: adarga Edit session: 592
