Political Pistachio
| A direct clash with those who accuse President Trump of violating the Constitution The Constitutional Presidency of Donald J. Trump Available now for purchase at Amazon! |
By Douglas V. Gibbs
(Summary of a chapter in my latest book: The Constitutional Presidency of Donald J. Trump)
The debate over birthright citizenship centers on the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause, which states that a person must be both born in the United States and subject to its jurisdiction to be a citizen. Modern interpretations ignore the second requirement and depart from the original intent of the framers.
Drawing on the congressional debates of 1866, the authors of the Citizenship Clause (Senators Lyman Trumbull and Jacob Howard) made clear that “subject to the jurisdiction” meant complete political allegiance, not mere physical presence. This understanding was rooted in the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which required that a person be “not subject to any foreign power.”
President Trump’s Executive Order 14160 followed this original meaning by denying automatic citizenship to children of illegal aliens and temporary visitors. Contrary to critics, Trump was not creating new law but enforcing the longstanding constitutional and statutory framework.
The Supreme Court’s 1898 decision in United States v. Wong Kim Ark has been misinterpreted. The ruling was based on the fact that Wong Kim Ark’s parents were legal permanent residents, satisfying the jurisdiction requirement. Several other Supreme Court cases (Elk v. Wilkins, Minor v. Happersett, Weedin v. Chin Bow, Rogers v. Bellei) reinforce the principle that allegiance, not geography, determines citizenship.
Congress bypassed constitutional limits with the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, illustrating how political branches sometimes attempt to change constitutional meaning through legislation rather than amendment; revealing the inconsistency of Trump’s critics.
The Founding Fathers, and the framers of the Citizenship Clause were concerned about divided allegiance, from the threat of Tories during the Founding era to modern national‑security concerns such as birth tourism, to the original purpose of the Citizenship Clause.
Trump’s stance reflects constitutional fidelity, while progressive defenses of universal birthright citizenship are driven more by political incentives than by constitutional principle. From an originalist perspective, ending birthright citizenship for children of illegal aliens and temporary visitors is not only constitutional… it is necessary.
For full analysis, Patron Members visit “Full Constitutional Analysis of the Birthright Citizenship Debate“
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
To Become a Patron Member, go to our Membership Page
The Declaration of Independence
IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:
Column 1
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton
Column 2
North Carolina:
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton
Column 3
Massachusetts:
John Hancock
Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton
Column 4
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKean
Column 5
New York:
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark
Column 6
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Massachusetts:
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire:
Matthew Thornton
By Douglas V. Gibbs
The United States Supreme Court recently struck down President Donald Trump’s executive order seeking to end the unconstitutional concept of birthright citizenship. According to the High Court, mere presence on American soil at birth guarantees citizenship; a decision that fundamentally undermines the original intent of the 14th Amendment’s Citizenship Clause.
In a split decision, Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson joined Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett to form a 5-4 majority, effectively granting citizenship to virtually everyone born within U.S. borders regardless of their parents’ allegiance or legal status.
At the heart of this case lies the proper interpretation of the Citizenship Clause’s phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” The majority interprets “jurisdiction” as merely “legal jurisdiction,” being subject to American laws while physically present in the country. However, the authors of the clause intended “political jurisdiction,” which they defined as “not subject to a foreign power.”
The historical record is clear on this point. The same authors of the Citizenship Clause also sponsored the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which uses identical language. During congressional debates, Senators Jacob Howard and Lyman Trumbull explicitly defined “jurisdiction” as “full jurisdiction,” meaning not subject to any foreign power. They clarified that mere birth on American soil was insufficient for citizenship, specifically exempting “Indians not taxed” and “children of aliens, foreigners, diplomats, ambassadors and other foreign ministers and consuls” from automatic citizenship despite their birth on U.S. soil (Congressional Globe, May 30, 1866).
Despite this historical evidence, Chief Roberts claimed there was “scant evidence” to support the government’s originalist definition. Instead, he concluded that “children born of parents unlawfully or temporarily present in the United States” “satisfy both elements of the Citizenship Clause” and are therefore “citizens at birth.”
In his powerful dissent, Justice Samuel Alito called the ruling both “one of the most important decisions in the history of the Court” and “a serious mistake.” “Careful analysis of the text of the Fourteenth Amendment and the process that led to its adoption,” Alito argued, “shows that it does not degrade the concept of United States citizenship in this way. Instead, the Fourteenth Amendment confers citizenship on only those children who, at birth, owe allegiance solely to this country.”
Justice Clarence Thomas similarly criticized the decision, stating that it “devalues citizenship” and that the majority’s historical account was “not historically accurate.” He lamented that the ruling “adds to the sad history of the Fourteenth Amendment, which was designed and understood to secure equal rights for the freed blacks but has instead been repurposed for political projects that the Reconstruction Congress did not support.”
The majority’s reasoning relies heavily on English common law, noting that under early English law, children born in Britain automatically became British subjects. “This view crossed the Atlantic with the colonists, and was adopted with little fanfare after the Revolution,” Roberts wrote. However, this comparison is deeply flawed. The majority conveniently ignores that under British law, while birth on imperial soil granted subject status, full rights, including inheritance rights, were reserved for “natural born subjects,” which required having a British father at the time of birth. This distinction demonstrates that British law itself recognized different levels of “jurisdiction” based on parental allegiance.
The Court also leaned heavily on the 1898 case United States v. Wong Kim Ark, where Ark argued that since he was born in San Francisco he was a citizen. While proponents of expansive birthright citizenship cite this case as precedent, they conveniently ignore a crucial detail: Wong’s parents had established permanent domicile in the United States, thereby satisfying the “full jurisdiction” requirement. This nuance is ignored because it contradicts the leftist narrative of unconditional birthright citizenship.
The 14th Amendment was originally adopted to repudiate the Supreme Court’s infamous 1857 ruling in Dred Scott v. Sandford, which denied citizenship to Black people whose ancestors were brought to America as slaves. The Citizenship Clause was specifically written to reverse the language of that ruling. The authors of the clause, however, also knew it would be used as the definition for citizenship.
Like Roe v. Wade, this decision is not set in stone and can be reversed. I believe that day may come when our enemies use this ruling to accelerate their invasion of our country through illegal migration and birth tourism. When that crisis reaches its breaking point, perhaps the Court will finally recognize its mistake and restore citizenship to its rightful place – not as a mere accident of geography, but as the precious inheritance of those who owe their allegiance solely to the United States of America.
Or, at least that is what I am hoping.
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
By Douglas V. Gibbs
It was a sweltering June of 1776. The city was alive with tension and possibility. Philadelphia, the heart of revolutionary America, buzzed with the energy of men wrestling with the most consequential question of their time: Should the American colonies break away from the mightiest empire on Earth?
Into this charged atmosphere stepped the Second Continental Congress, a gathering of brave delegates who had already risked everything by merely meeting. Now, they faced an even greater decision. With the weight of history upon their shoulders, they turned to a 33-year-old Virginian; a tall, red-haired man, with a mind as sharp as any lawyer and a pen as mighty as any sword. Thomas Jefferson, they tasked, with crafting the justification for America’s independence from Great Britain.
Picture Jefferson as he retreated from the bustling streets of Philadelphia to a quiet, rented parlor on the second floor of Jacob Graff’s newly built brick house at 7th and Market Streets. This was no grand office, no marble chamber. Just a simple room where history would be made. Armed with a portable writing desk he had designed himself, Jefferson worked in deliberate isolation, knowing that the words he put to paper might determine the fate of millions yet unborn.
For two weeks, this quiet room became a crucible of revolutionary thought. Jefferson poured over ideas from philosophers like John Locke, whose writings on natural rights had ignited minds across the colonies. He drew from colonial pamphlets and the collective grievances that had been building for years. But he did more than compile arguments—he wove together grievances and revolutionary ideals into something extraordinary. Jefferson set out to craft not just a political brief, but an enduring piece of literature that would capture what he called the “American mind.”
In those long hours of concentration, with Philadelphia’s summer heat pressing in, Jefferson reached deep into his understanding of human nature and divine truth. He knew that mere legal arguments would not suffice; what was needed was a document that would speak to the heart as well as the mind, that would articulate not just why America should be free, but why freedom itself mattered to all humanity.
Before presenting his “original Rough draught” to the full Continental Congress, Jefferson shared his words with a five-man committee that included two of the most brilliant minds of the age: John Adams, the passionate advocate from Massachusetts, and Benjamin Franklin, the wise and witty polymath from Pennsylvania. These three giants of revolutionary thought sat together, reviewing Jefferson’s work, making roughly two dozen edits to his text. They refined phrases and ensured the tone was perfectly calibrated to rally the colonies; not just to anger, but to purposeful action built upon the foundation of timeless truth.
When the document finally reached the floor of Congress, the delegates spent two days debating and heavily editing Jefferson’s writing. They slashed roughly a quarter of his original draft, including an impassioned passage he had written condemning King George III for perpetuating the slave trade. Though Jefferson sat frustrated by the heavy red-lining, his words, his thoughts, his carefully crafted arguments being cut away, the core message remained intact, shining through like a beacon in the night: that all people possess unalienable rights, chief among them Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Then came the moment that would echo through eternity. On July 2, 1776, Congress officially voted to sever ties with Great Britain. The decision was made, the course set. But there was still the matter of making it official, of putting into words what their hearts had already decided. Two days later, on July 4, they formally adopted the edited text of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence.
Think of that moment. Fifty-six men, representatives of thirteen diverse colonies, putting their names to a document that declared them traitors to the Crown and patriots to a new ideal. They knew the risks. They knew the price they might pay. Yet they signed anyway, with courage that still takes our breath away centuries later.
The elegant words Jefferson had penned in that quiet parlor would soon be galloped on horseback across the thirteen colonies, printed in broadsheets and read aloud in town squares. They would rally troops facing impossible odds, spark a revolution that would shake the world, and establish principles that would guide not just America but nations yet unborn.
From that simple room in Philadelphia came a document that would change the course of human history. It began as the work of one man in isolation, but became the voice of a people yearning to be free. It started as a justification for rebellion, but ended as a declaration of human dignity that transcended time and place.
As we reflect on those momentous days in June and July of 1776, let us remember that freedom is not born in battle alone, but in the quiet rooms where thoughtful souls dare to dream of a better world. Let us remember Thomas Jefferson, sitting at his portable desk, crafting words that would outlive empires and inspire generations. And let us remember that the Declaration of Independence was not just the birth certificate of a nation, but a testament to the power of ideas to transform the world.
The tale of that Philadelphia parlor reminds us that greatness often comes from humble beginnings, that the most powerful revolutions can begin with a single person putting pen to paper, and that the words we speak today might just echo through the ages, changing lives we will never meet, in times we can scarcely imagine.
This is our heritage as Americans. Not just the battles won or the territories claimed, but the ideas articulated in that quiet room, ideas that continue to guide us, challenge us, and inspire us to build a more perfect union. May we never forget the power of those words, and may we always strive to live up to their promise.
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
Summary: DSA History and Revolution
By Douglas V. Gibbs
The historical development and current influence of socialist movements in America, particularly the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is the culmination of a century-long infiltration strategy. Beginning with the British Fabian Society’s gradualist approach in the 1880s, the socialist principles incrementally penetrated U.S. institutions through the Progressive Era, New Deal programs, and 1960s counter-culture movements. The DSA, founded in 1982 through the merger of the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee and New American Movement, has grown from a fringe activist group to a political powerhouse with over 100,000 members and more than 200 elected officials across all levels of government. The organization’s electoral successes, including the elections of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, demonstrates its growing influence within the Democratic Party. The DSA’s policy positions, including universal healthcare, free college, defunding law enforcement, nationalizing key industries, and fundamentally restructuring American government are true goals. Despite the “democratic” label, the DSA represents a continuation of communist strategies aimed at dismantling constitutional constraints and free market systems, posing what is characterized as the most significant threat to American liberty since the nation’s founding.
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
Membership Patrons, please read a deeper and longer analysis at Democratic Communists of America: A Long History