There recently has been a proposal for a Constitutional Amendment allowing foreign born citizens to become President of the United States. The idea being that people like Austrian born Arnold Schwarzenegger will be able to run for President. It sounds like a great plan on it’s surface, but stop and think about it realistically. Sure, Arnold would probably make a decent President, but if you allow him to become President, what’s to stop a Muslim radical from moving to the US, become a citizen, and run for President?If you’ll recall your high school world history, Germany made this same mistake about 70 years ago. And if I recall correctly, it was an Austrian born person who rose to power so quickly in Germany. Now I’m not saying that Arnold, by sharing the same home country as Hitler is in any way similar to Hitler, but that’s not the point. The point is that if the Constitution is amended to allow foreign born citizens become President, it opens the door for any foreign radical to become President.
Now don’t get me wrong. There is a time and a place for amendments to the Constitution. In cases where the original text of the Constitution is inadequate (i.e. it doesn’t address a particular topic, which needs to be addressed, such was the case with the Bill of Rights) amendments are absolutely necessary. But that isn’t the case here. Article II, Section I, Clause 5 of the Constitution clearly addresses this issue.
In fact, John Jay writes in Federalist Paper No. 64, “By excluding men under thirty-five from the first office (the President), and those under thirty from the second (the Vice-President), it confines the electors to men of whom the people have had time to form a judgment and with respect to whom they will not be liable to be deceived by those brilliant appearances of genius and patriotism which, like transient meteors, sometimes mislead as well as dazzle.” As history taught us, the German people were “deceived by those brilliant appearances of genius and patriotism.” I just pray that Americans don’t succumb to the same fate.
The only way to guarantee this does not happen is to make sure this amendment does not pass. We don’t need Arnold for President in 2008, 2012 or any year for that matter. There are plenty of good, home grown Americans, available to do the job. Arnold may be a good leader, but I would never sacrifice American sovereignty just for one man to become President. It is simply just not worth it.
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