Naturalized citizens should be able to run for President

The election of Barrack Obama as the president of the United States was historic because it showed that any US citizen with the desire, dedication and talent could become the president. However, in reality, not all US citizens are eligible to run for the presidency. The constitution prevents anyone born outside the US from becoming the president, even if they are legal citizens of the US. This is a double-standard and against the spirit of democracy and equality. How can someone be told that they can achieve anything they want, only to be told later that they are ineligible to become the president of their own country? The constitution included the native-born clause as a proactive measure due to the political atmosphere of the US in the 1700s; but those conditions no longer exist. It is high time for the constitution to be amended to give all US citizens the right to run for president.

Preventing naturalized citizens to run for the presidency is against democracy. For a democracy to work, all citizens must have equal rights and responsibilities. Denying a basic right to a large percent of citizens creates the illusion that some citizens are better than others. The concept of “citizens with limited rights”, essentially second-class citizens, promotes the idea that “all citizens are equal, but some are more equal than others.”

The book Animal Farm by George Orwell provides a good example of how a seemingly democratic group can turn into a totalitarian regime when one group has more privileges than others. In the beginning of the book, a group of animals take control of their farm and establish a democracy. They create seven Commandments, one of which says “All Animals are equal”. However, as time goes on, a group of animals (the pigs) begin to give themselves more privileges and deny the rights of other animals. Eventually, they gain absolute control over the animals and change the Seven Commandments to “All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others.”

This shows how our rights are taken away from us – gradually over time. We don’t lose our rights and freedoms overnight; we lose them gradually, in steps. Labeling and classifying citizens as “native born” and “naturalized”, and giving one group more rights than the other is dangerous for democracy. It is the starting point of more equality and injustice. There shouldn’t be any stratification in citizenship – if someone deserves the right to gain citizenship, they should have the same rights as other citizens, including the right to become the president.

To understand why the constitution disqualifies foreign-born citizens from the presidency in the first place, we must understand the political and social atmosphere of the US during the 1700s. The US had just gained independence from the British Empire and adopted the then-radical idea of democracy. Without the protection of the British Empire and as a pioneer of democracy, the US was very vulnerable from invasion by other nations. It was possible for an enterprising monarch to gain vicarious control of the US by sending one of his or her subjects to the US to become a naturalized citizen, and eventually become the president. In other words, democracy was a liability if everyone was allowed to run for president. The founding fathers reasoned that anyone born in the US would be much more likely to be loyal to the US, which is why they included the clause that only native-born citizens are eligible to become the president of the US. [1]

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There was a need for excluding foreign-born citizens from the presidency during the 1700s because there was a viable threat of invasion back then. But today, in the21^st century, such a threat no longer exists. The US is no longer a weak and vulnerable nation; Democracy is the dominant form of government in the world today; monarchy is all but obsolete. Now is the perfect time to amend the constitution and give all citizens equal rights. The founding fathers had the foresight to know that the world would change. They designed the constitution to adapt to changes in accord with the changes in the world, by creating procedures to amend the constitution. This is why the constitution is called a “living document.”

More than 12.8 million Americans are naturalized citizens [2]. Many of them came to the US with their parents when they were infants. They grew up with American culture, they went to school in America, they pay allegiance to the US and they know only ONE homeland – the US. They love the US as much, if not more than any natural born citizen . And for all their patriotism and loyalty, they are ineligible to run for the presidency. Should kids be told that they can achieve anything they want in life if they work hard and do well in school only to be told later that they cannot run for president? And only because they are naturalized citizens? This may make them feel like second-class citizens and create resentment against the government. It may even lead to a loss of motivation and drive to succeed. Sure, not everyone who wants to become the president achieves their dream. But the idea that they can achieve anything they want acts as a placebo to keep them motivated. Without the placebo there will be a significant drop in motivation and desire to succeed.

Opponents of removing the native-born clause claim that naturalized citizens are a disloyal group; but their claim isn’t supported by any facts. They are merely being ethnocentric and xenophobic. Naturalized citizens have more reasons to appreciate the freedoms and opportunities of the US. Many of them had to work hard to gain citizenship and therefore they don’t take the perks of living here for granted. The anti-equal rights people also fail to consider the fact that native-born citizens are equally susceptible of putting their personal interests above the interests of their country.

Other opponents of removing the native-born clause claim that “foreign people could buy their way into the presidency and exploit the US.” People who make such claims obviously lack knowledge about the political institutions of America. They lack basic knowledge about the core ideals of the constitution – about the numerous checks and balances devised by the founding fathers to prevent just that. And more importantly, they ignore the American public. Any candidate would have to win the heart of the American public; and to do so, they would have to understand how the American public thinks; what the American public wants.

The US has changed dramatically since breaking off from the British Empire and becoming an independent nation. It has come a long way - from giving suffrage only to white men who owned land to all citizens; from marginalizing different ethnic groups to celebrating cultural diversity. The election of Barrack Obama broke the race barrier. The next step would be to allow all American citizens, native-born or naturalized, to become the president. We must always stay alert to ensure that our rights and freedoms aren’t taken away. And we must always strive to achieve “perfect democracy”.

Bibliography

[1] http://www.ushistorysite.com . 17 Nov. 2009

[2] The US Census Bureau, 2000. Web. 17 Nov. 2009