Natural Born Citizen, Constitutional History of Within the Constitutional Convention, the matter of the presidency was first taken up on Tuesday 1787 July 17. Eight days later July 25 John Jay (who later became the first Chief Justice of the first Supreme Court) addressed his famous letter to George Washington (who was then the president of the Convention) and requested the natural born citizen requirement: Permit me to hint, whether it would not be wise and seasonable to provide a strong check to the admission of Foreigners into the administration of our national Government, and to declare expressly that the Command in chief of the American army shall not be given to, nor devolve on, any but a natural born Citizen. Presumably Jays letter was discussed with delegate Alexander Hamilton, who then brought it back from New York to Philadelphia after the end of the Conventions July 26 to August 6 adjournment. On August 22, the Committee on Detail, which formulated the first preliminary draft of our Constitution and which was likely not to have yet seen Jays recommendation, that Committee formulated its requirement that the president should be a citizen. Then eleven days later on Sunday September 2, Washington posted a reply to Jay and likely passed Jays recommendation on to the Committee of States, which then incorporated Jays natural born citizen requirement into its September 4 draft, superseding the earlier unqualified citizen requirement.
Posted on: Tue, 27 Jan 2015 01:17:42 +0000